Last month was the hottest January on record, despite expectations that cooler La Niña conditions could curb a string of record global temperatures, according to the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S), UNN reports with reference to France 24.
Details
The service said on Thursday that January was 1.75°C hotter than pre-industrial times, continuing a steady run of historic highs in 2023 and 2024, as human-caused greenhouse gas emissions push up temperatures.
Climatologists expected this exceptional period to end after El Niño warming peaked in January 2024, and conditions would gradually shift into the opposite, cooling La Niña phase.
But since then, the heat has remained at or near record levels, sparking debate among scientists about what other factors could lead to temperatures rising to the upper limit of expectations.
"That's what makes it a little bit unexpected... you don't see this cooling effect, or at least the temporary slowdown in global temperatures that we expected to see," Julien Nicolas, a climatologist at Copernicus, told AFP.
La Niña is expected to be weak and Copernicus said that prevailing temperatures in the equatorial Pacific indicate a "slowdown or halt" to the cooling phenomenon.
Nicholas said it could be completely gone by March.
Current La Niña phenomenon is weaker than expected - climatologists20.01.25, 13:58
Copernicus reported that in January, Arctic sea ice reached a monthly record low, almost matching 2018. An analysis conducted in the United States this week ranked it as the second lowest in the dataset.
In general, 2025 is not expected to go down in history after 2023 and 2024: scientists predict that it will be the third hottest year.
Copernicus said it will closely monitor ocean temperatures throughout 2025 to get clues about how the climate might behave.
Scientists say that the period we are currently experiencing is likely the warmest period the Earth has experienced in the last 125 ,000 years.
Addendum
Last month, Copernicus announced that global temperatures averaged over 2023 and 2024 exceeded 1.5 degrees Celsius for the first time.
Scientists warn that every fraction of a degree of warming above 1.5°C increases the intensity and frequency of extreme weather events such as heat waves, heavy rainfall, and droughts.