Climate scientists say most of the record heat is from human-caused climate change of carbon dioxide and methane emissions from the burning of coal, oil and natural gas. Additional heat comes from a natural El Nino, a warming of the central Pacific that changes global weather patterns.“Given the strong El Nino since mid-2023, it’s not surprising to see above-normal global temperatures, as El Ninos pump heat from the ocean into the atmosphere, driving up air temperatures. But the amount by which records have been smashed is alarming,” said Woodwell Climate Research Center climate scientist Jennifer Francis, who wasn’t part of the calculations.“And we also see the ongoing ‘hot spot’ over the Arctic, where rates of warming are much faster than the globe as a whole, triggering a cascade of impacts on fisheries, ecosystems, ice melt, and altered ocean current pattern s that have long-lasting and far-reaching effects,” Francis added.Record high ocean temperatures outside the Pacific, where El Nino is focused, show this is more than the natural effect, said Francesca Guglielmo, a Copernicus senior climate scientist.The North Atlantic sea surface temperature has been at record level — compared to the specific date — every day for a solid year since March 5, 2023, “often by seemingly-impossible margins,” according to University of Miami tropical scientist Brian McNoldy.Those other ocean areas “are a symptom of greenhouse-gas trapped heat accumulating over decades,” Francis said in an email. “That heat is now emerging and pushing air temperatures into uncharted territory.”“These anomalously high temperatures are very worrisome,” said Cornell University climate scientist Natalie Mahowald. “To avoid even higher temperatures, we need to act quickly to reduce CO2 emissions.”This was the warmest winter — December, January and February — by nearly a quarter of a degree, beating 2016, which was also an El Nino year. The three-month period was the most any season has been above pre-industrial levels in Copernicus record keeping, which goes back to 1940.Francis said on a 1-to-10 scale of how bad the situation is, she gives what’s happening now “a 10, but soon we’ll need a new scale because what’s a 10 today will be a five in the future unless society can stop the buildup of heat-trapping gases.”
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