'A wake-up call to the world': 2024 the warmest year ever recorded

A wildfire burns a house in the Pacific Palisades neighborhood of Los Angeles on Tuesday amid a terrifying wave of wildfires across the US state of California. Photo: AP/Ethan Swope

The year 2024 was the warmest ever recorded and the first to exceed the key milestone of 1.5C above pre-industrial level, bringing “unprecedented” weather events and “causing misery for millions of people”.

The EU's Copernicus Climate Change Service said that human-induced climate change was the primary driver of “extreme” air and sea surface temperatures along with the El Nino weather event last year.

A wildfire in El Cariso, California, in September. Photo: AP/Eric Thayer

It comes as a terrifying wave of wildfires continues to blaze across the US state of California on Thursday, with a new fire igniting in the hills overlooking Los Angeles' Hollywood Boulevard and its Walk of Fame.

More than 200,000 people have been ordered to evacuate as dry, hurricane-force winds spread flames across parched ground that has seen no rain for months. At least five people have died since the fires erupted on Tuesday. More than 1,300 buildings have burned, with a further 60,000 threatened.

A wildfire in Lahaina, Hawaii, in August. Photo: AP/Matthew Thayer/The Maui News

“Each year in the last decade is one of the 10 warmest on record,” European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts strategic lead, Samantha Burgess, said. “We are now teetering on the edge of passing the 1.5C level defined in the Paris Agreement and the average of the last two years is already above this level.” 

Copernicus said that extreme weather events were observed worldwide last year, ranging from severe storms and floods to heatwaves, droughts and wildfires.

A volunteer battles a wildfire in northern Athens, Greece, in August. Photo: AP/Aggelos Barai

It said the increasing frequency and intensity of these events pose a significant risk to livelihoods across the globe, as the record amount of water vapour in the atmosphere contributed to extreme rainfall events and major storms.

In the wake of this, the next Government has been urged to show “bravery and leadership” in implementing necessary measures to mitigate from the worst effects of climate change.

Professor Peter Thorne, director of the Icarus climate research centre at Maynooth University and member of Ireland’s Climate Change Advisory Council, said that there is a fundamental difference between a single month, or year, or even a decade in terms of this 1.5C mark.

We’ve not permanently exceeded 1.5C,” he said. “But the range of disasters we saw in 2024 is a wake-up call to the world.

With climate change posing a significant challenge for the next Government, and an issue being discussed in coalition formation talks, Prof. Thorne said that strong political leadership would be needed in the coming years.

A wind-whipped wildfire tears through homes and other buildings in Ruidoso, New Mexico, in June. Photo: Village of Ruidoso Tourism Department via AP

“It has to stop dealing in carrots alone, citizens are aware that you also have sticks. You need to apply some of those in significant ways. We also need to be active in the international sphere in negotiations. That’s going to be very hard given the way geopolitical winds are blowing.” 

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