Climate change led to 41 additional days of extreme heat in 2024: Report

According to the European climate agency Copernicus, 2024 is set to end as the warmest year on record and the first year with a global average temperature 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.

Mumbai: Human-caused climate change added an average of 41 days of dangerous heat in 2024, harming human health and ecosystems, according to a study conducted jointly by World Weather Attribution and Climate Central.

The key findings of the report reveals that the world experienced an average of 41 extra days of dangerous heat in 2024 due to human-caused warming.

Climate change intensified 26 of the 29 weather events studied by World Weather Attribution that killed at least 3,700 people and displaced millions.

Climate change had a stronger influence than El Niño on many extreme weather events, a press statement said.

The report sets out four resolutions for 2025 to both tackle climate change and protect people from extreme weather: a faster shift away from fossil fuels, improvements in early warnings, real-time reporting of heat deaths, and international finance to help developing countries become more resilient.

"The impacts of fossil fuel warming have never been clearer or more devastating than in 2024. We are living in a dangerous new era. Extreme weather killed thousands of people, forced millions from their homes this year and caused unrelenting suffering. The floods in Spain, hurricanes in the US, drought in the Amazon, and floods across Africa are just a few examples. We know exactly what we need to do to stop things from getting worse: stop burning fossil fuels. The top resolution for 2025 must be transitioning away from fossil fuels, which will make the world a safer and more stable place,” said Dr Friederike Otto, lead of WWA and Senior Lecturer in Climate Science at Imperial College, London.

Globally, there were 41 extra days of dangerous heat in 2024 due to human-caused warming, the scientists found. These days represent the top 10 per cent warmest temperatures from 1991-2020 for locations around the world.

The result highlights how climate change is exposing millions more to dangerous temperatures for longer periods of the year as fossil fuel emissions heat the climate. If the world does not rapidly transition away from oil, gas and coal, the number of dangerous heat days will continue to increase each year and threaten public health, the scientists say.

The heat also fueled heatwaves, droughts, fire weather, storms and heavy rainfall causing floods throughout the year. In total, 219 events met World Weather Attribution’s trigger criteria used to identify the most impactful weather events.

The team of scientists studied 29 of these events and found clear evidence of climate change in 26. The floods in Sudan, Nigeria, Niger, Cameroon and Chad were the deadliest event studied by the group, with at least 2,000 people killed and millions displaced. If warming reaches 2°C, which could happen as early as the 2040s or 2050s, the regions could experience similar periods of heavy rainfall every year, the study found, highlighting how climate change is making some events a ‘new normal’.

Hurricane Helene left 230 people dead across six states in the US, making it one of the deadliest mainland US hurricanes in the last 50 years, second only to Hurricane Katrina in 2005. Climate change made the high sea temperatures that fueled Helene 200-500 times more likely and increased its devastating rainfall by 10 per cent, the scientists found. Just two weeks later, the US southeast was hit again by Hurricane Milton and a rapid analysis found it was also intensified by fossil fuel warming.