UN warns world could break new heat records before 2030

The United Nations has warned that global temperatures are expected to remain at or near historic highs over the next five years, raising fresh concerns over the accelerating pace of climate change and the world’s ability to keep warming within internationally agreed limits.

In its latest climate outlook released on Thursday, the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO), the UN’s weather and climate agency, said there is an 86 per cent likelihood that at least one year between 2026 and 2030 will surpass 2024 as the warmest year ever recorded.

The agency also projected a 75 per cent chance that the average global temperature over the 2026–2030 period will exceed the critical threshold of 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, a benchmark established under the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement.

According to the WMO, all of the 11 hottest years ever recorded have occurred since 2015, underscoring what scientists describe as an intensifying global warming trend largely driven by greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuels.

“Global average temperatures are likely to continue at or near record levels in the next five years,” the agency stated in its Global Annual-to-Decadal Climate Update.

The report comes as several parts of Europe battle unusually high temperatures linked to a “heat dome” phenomenon.

Britain and France recently recorded some of their hottest May temperatures in history, highlighting the growing frequency of extreme weather events associated with climate change.

Scientists also warned that the possible return of the El Niño climate phenomenon later in 2026 could further accelerate warming trends and potentially make 2027 the next record-breaking year.

Leon Hermanson, lead author of the report, explained that forecasts currently indicate the development of an El Niño event toward the end of next year.

“There is an El Niño predicted for the end of 2026, which increases the chances of the following year, 2027, being the next record-breaking year,” Hermanson said.

El Niño is a naturally occurring climate pattern characterised by unusually warm ocean surface temperatures in the central and eastern Pacific Ocean.

The phenomenon typically disrupts global weather systems, influencing rainfall patterns, storms, droughts and temperatures across different regions of the world.

The last major El Niño episode contributed significantly to making 2023 the second-hottest year on record, while 2024 emerged as the warmest year ever observed globally, with temperatures estimated at approximately 1.55 degrees Celsius above the 1850–1900 average.

The WMO report warned that annual global temperatures between 2026 and 2030 are expected to range from 1.3 degrees Celsius to 1.9 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.

The Paris Agreement, adopted by nearly 200 countries in 2015, aims to limit long-term global warming to well below 2 degrees Celsius and preferably below 1.5 degrees Celsius.

Scientists measure these temperature increases against the 1850–1900 average, regarded as the pre-industrial baseline before widespread industrial use of coal, oil and gas significantly increased carbon dioxide emissions.

The WMO said there is a 91 per cent probability that at least one year during the next five-year period will temporarily exceed the 1.5 degrees Celsius threshold.

However, climate experts clarified that the Paris targets are assessed over long-term averages spanning about two decades, meaning temporary breaches do not necessarily indicate that the goals are permanently lost.

Despite the grim projections, the report noted that the likelihood of any single year surpassing 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels before 2030 remains extremely low, estimated at less than one per cent.

The report also highlighted alarming warming trends in the Arctic region, where temperatures are rising at a much faster rate than the global average.

According to the WMO, Arctic temperatures during the next five northern hemisphere winters are expected to be around 2.8 degrees Celsius above the 1991–2020 average, more than three times higher than the projected global temperature anomaly for the same period.

The climate outlook further projected wetter-than-normal conditions across the Sahel region, northern Europe, Alaska and Siberia between May and September from 2026 to 2030.

In contrast, drier conditions are expected across the Amazon region, raising additional concerns about drought risks and environmental degradation in one of the world’s most critical ecosystems.

The report was produced by the United Kingdom’s Met Office in collaboration with the WMO’s lead centre for annual-to-decadal climate prediction and combines forecasts from 13 international scientific institutions.