Last month was the warmest January on record, according to new data.
The finding has baffled scientists, who had expected changes in ocean currents in the Pacific to take the edge off rising global temperatures.
Figures released by the European Copernicus climate service show average temperatures around the world in January were 1.75C warmer than before greenhouse gas emissions started to rise significantly in the industrial revolution around 150 years ago.
That’s 0.1C above the record set last January. And it comes after a year in which temperatures topped 1.5C, the target for climate negotiations, for the first time.
Dr Friederike Otto, a climate scientist at Imperial College London, warned that the rising pace of climate change would increase the risk of extreme weather and its consequences.
“This January is the hottest on record because countries are still burning huge amounts of oil, gas and coal,” she said.
“The Los Angeles wildfires were a stark reminder that we have already reached an incredibly dangerous level of warming. We’ll see many more unprecedented extreme weather events in 2025.”
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January had been expected to be slightly cooler than last year because of a natural shift…
