2024 Will Be the First Year to Exceed the Warming Limit of the Paris Agreement

New data confirms that 2024 will be the hottest year on record and the first year to exceed the limit set by the Paris Agreement — a devastating news for the planet, at a time when the United States has just elected a president who denies global warming, withdrew the country from the Paris Agreement when he was president for the first time, and promises to withdraw again as soon as he takes office in January 2025.What is the Paris AgreementAlmost all countries in the world have committed to striving to keep global warming below 1.5 degrees Celsius when they signed the Paris Agreement. According to scientists, this would prevent more severe impacts, such as droughts, heatwaves, and catastrophic sea-level rise. They warn that above this level, the human-caused climate crisis — fueled by fossil fuel pollution — begins to exceed the ability of humans and the natural world to adapt.New data makes it clear that further delays in climate action from major global economies will lead to even higher levels of warming and, consequently, increasingly worse impacts.Last month was the second hottest October on record, according to Copernicus, and was 1.65 degrees Celsius warmer than pre-industrial levels, when humans began generating pollution from fossil fuels.Extreme weather hit many places during the month, including Hurricane Milton, which destroyed cities in Florida, and devastating floods in Spain that killed over 200 people. Another alarming climate milestone during the last month included the lack of snow on the summit of Mount Fuji in Japan for the first time in 130 years of record.Not only did elected President Trump promise to withdraw the U.S. from the historic Paris climate agreement during the electoral campaign, but some former Trump officials floated the idea of pulling the country entirely out of the United Nations treaty to address climate change. Doing so would end U.S. participation in crucial international negotiations. It is worth noting that the country, alongside China and India, is one of the largest polluters in the world.Source: CNN