Global forecast for 2025 sees temperatures falling back below 1.5°C

Earth’s average surface temperature by 2025 will be between 1.29°C and 1.53°C – and possibly 1.41°C – above the pre-industrial average, according to a forecast by the Met Office, the UK’s national weather and climate service. according to That’s a little cooler than 2024, ie It will be the first calendar year to exceed 1.5 °C.

“A year ago, our forecast for 2024 highlighted the first possibility of exceeding 1.5°C,” the Met Office’s Nick Dunston said in a statement. “Although this seems to have happened, it is important to note that temporarily exceeding 1.5 °C does not mean that the Paris Agreement is being violated. But the first year above 1.5°C is certainly a worrying milestone in climate history.”

The Paris Agreement set a target of limiting warming to between 1.5°C and 2°C above the pre-industrial baseline. Most climate scientists now define the pre-industrial temperature as the average surface temperature between 1850 and 1900, because this is the first time we have reliable direct measurements. However, several studies suggest that the world at that time it was already significantly warmed by human activities.

The predicted decrease in surface temperature in 2025 will be the result of the heat that will pass from the atmosphere to the oceans due to the La Niña phenomenon, and it does not mean that the entire planet has stopped warming. The the overall heat content of the oceans and atmosphere it keeps going up because it’s getting bigger carbon dioxide emissions from human activities causing higher atmospheric CO2 levels.

During La Niñas, cooler waters rise in the Pacific and spread across the surface, creating a net transfer of heat from the atmosphere to the oceans. During El Niños, the opposite happens. An El Niño in 2023 caused record surface temperatures for that year, which were then surpassed in 2024. El Niño alone does not fully explain record temperatures.