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Records for the global surface air temperature – a key climate change indicator – were broken three times last week in as many days according to the Copernicus Climate Change Service in what its director, Carlo Buontempo, described as “truly uncharted territory”.
The develpment comes as Canada reels from wild wildfires and on the back of other recent indicators of the rapid acceleration of the climate crisis. Copernicus also publishes data on sea surface temperatures, which were at a record seasonal high for more than a year to April 2024. Increased sea temperatures have accelerated phenomena such as coral reef bleaching and threaten the ability of the oceans to continue absorbing carbon.
UN Secretary General António Guterres has launched an urgent call for renewed action on global heating, stating that “extreme heat is having an extreme impact on people and planet. The world must rise to the challenge of rising temperatures.”

Guterres’ call stresses the need for “an urgent and concerted effort to enhance international cooperation to address extreme heat in four critical areas” – which are caring for the vulnerable, protecting workers, boosting the resilience of economies and societies using data science and limiting temperature rises to 1.5C by phasing out fossil fuels and scaling up investment in renewable energy.
With the current temperature spikes and the next UN climate talks taking place in Azerbaijan in November, calls to renew global action couldn’t be more urgent. There is some suggestion that the threshold of limiting rises to 1.5C has already been breached, but these findings remain controversial and disputed.
However, despite mounting evidence of climate impacts, action at the level required to meet the challenge is a long way off, with much of the blame lying at the feet of the fossil fuel industry.
Fighting vested interests
At his press conference on extreme heat this week, Guterres stated: “We know what is driving it: fossil fuel-charged, human-induced climate change. And we know it’s going to get worse. Extreme heat is the new abnormal. But, the good news is that there are solutions. The good news is we can save lives and limit its impact”.
While the solutions are clear, the ramping up of effective action both domestically and internationally remains hampered by the vested interests of industries and powerful individuals who benefit from the continuation of a fossil fuel based economy.
In an era where all-out climate denialism is confined to the fringes of the debate, “climate delay” has become the true enemy of concerted action. A 2020 article published in the Cambridge University Press defined the core tactics of delay. Many of them, such as arguing that the worst is now inevitable so it’s not worth trying to reduce emissions, and proposing unproven technological fixes, are now familiar parts of the debate.
Fighting the forces of climate delay is an essential part of responding to the repeated heat records and other alarming indicators of where the climate is headed.
It is now more than a year since the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change delivered its sixth assessment report, which gave a “final warning” to governments to act rapidly to limit and adapt to global heating. Since its publication, the urgency of the issue has only intensified.
The warnings have been there for a long time, but the political will globally to respond to the crisis has not yet met the enormity of the situation. Imperial College climate scientist Joyce Kimutai told AFP news agency this week that, “this is exactly what climate science told us would happen if the world continued burning coal, oil and gas”.
The UK must lead the way on climate
The UK must become a climate leader, reversing years of inaction and demonstrating what is possible. The removal of the onshore wind ban and the establishment of ‘Great British Energy’, a state run green energy producer have been welcomed by green groups, but far greater change than this is required to meaningfully address our carbon emissions and adapt to a hotter future.
The Government must overcome significant obstacles to its plan to ban new North Sea oil and gas licences, but it must also go further than this and remove licences granted in recent years. Currently there are also no plans for large-scale retrofitting of insulation to buildings throughout the UK. This measure would significantly reduce energy needs.
Many scientists believe that the window to limit heating to 1.5C has already passed, with climatologist and author of Hothouse Earth Bill Mcguire saying on X: “Forget 1.5C and 2C. Let’s hope – if we fight really hard – we can keep the rise this side of 3C.”