Is humanity accelerating global warming?
What's the story
A recent study has revealed that humanity is accelerating global warming at an unprecedented pace. The research shows that the rate of global temperature rise has nearly doubled in the last decade. The findings highlight a worrying trend in climate change, with major implications for future climate scenarios and international agreements like the Paris Agreement.
Acceleration
Fastest rate of temperature increase since 1880
The study found that global warming has accelerated from a steady rate of less than 0.2 degree Celsius per decade between 1970 and 2015, to about 0.35 degree Celsius per decade over the past 10 years. This is the fastest rate of temperature increase since systematic Earth temperature measurements began in 1880. The research also excluded natural factors such as El Nino from its analysis, which could have skewed recent temperature readings.
Concerns
Paris Agreement's limit could be breached by 2030
Stefan Rahmstorf, a scientist at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and co-author of the study, said if the current warming rate continues, it would breach the long-term 1.5 degree Celsius limit set by the Paris agreement before 2030. The research also used a noise-reduction method to filter out nonhuman factors in five major datasets compiled by scientists to gage Earth's temperature. An acceleration in global heating was detected in each dataset around 2013 or 2014.
Consensus
Acceleration in warming recently
Zeke Hausfather, a climate scientist at Berkeley Earth, who wasn't involved in the study, said there's widespread agreement that there has been an acceleration in warming recently. However, he added that it's unclear how much of this extra warming over the past decade is a forced response versus unforced variability. The research also found that the acceleration falls within climate models' scope and predicted a breach of the 1.5 degree Celsius threshold for long-term warming this year if trends continue.