Global warming has accelerated in a “statistically significant” way since 2015, according to a study published by the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK).
“Over the past 10 years, the estimated warming rate has been around 0.35 degree Celsius per decade, depending on the dataset, compared with just under 0.2 C per decade on average from 1970 to 2015,” the study found.
“This recent rate is higher than in any previous decade since the beginning of instrumental records in 1880,” it added.
The study relied on observational data on climate change from Nasa, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and Berkeley Earth, a California-based nonprofit research organization.
Study coauthor Grant Foster said that the researchers had “filtered out” natural influences likely to obscure the underlying temperature trend, such as the El Niño phenomenon, volcanic eruptions, and variations in solar activity.
In this way, “the ‘noise’ is reduced, making the underlying long-term warming signal more clearly visible,” Foster added.
“The adjusted data show an acceleration of global warming since 2015 with a statistical certainty of over 98 percent,” said Stefan Rahmstorf, PIK researcher and lead author of the study.
“If the warming rate of the past 10 years continues, it would lead to a long-term exceedance of the 1.5 C limit of the Paris Agreement before 2030,” Rahmstorf added.
Scientists say the last 11 years have been the warmest ever recorded, with 2024 topping the podium and 2023 in second place.
