World nears 1.5°C warming threshold, carbon budget dwindling
The 2024 Global Carbon Budget projects fossil carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions of 37.4 billion tonnes, up 0.8% from 2023.
New Delhi: The world will exhaust in about six years, the remaining carbon budget before the 1.5 degrees C warming threshold is breached consistently, the Global Carbon Project’s science team has projected.

The carbon budget is the amount of carbon dioxide emissions that will result in limiting global warming to a given level, in this case, the Paris accord’s target of 1.5 degrees C over pre-industrial levels. This year is on track to be the first year that sees the threshold being crossed.
At the current rate of emissions, the Global Carbon Budget team estimated a 50% chance that global average temperatures will exceed 1.5 degrees C consistently in about six years.
“It’s clear that the remaining carbon budget – and therefore the time left to meet the 1.5 degrees C target and avoid the worst impacts of climate change – has almost run out,” a report by the Global Carbon Project said.
The report, produced by an international team of at least 120 scientists, provides an annual, peer-reviewed update, building on established methodologies. The 2024 edition (the 19th annual report) will be published in the journal Earth System Science Data.
HT reported on November 7 that this year will see the increase in the world’s average annual temperature breaching the Paris Agreement’s threshold of 1.5 degrees Celsius, the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) said. It is now virtually also certain that 2024 will be the warmest year on record, C3S added. WMO had said on Monday that for 16 consecutive months (June 2023 to September 2024), the global mean temperature likely exceeded anything recorded before, by a wide margin.
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Global carbon emissions from fossil fuels reached a record high in 2024, according to the study. The 2024 Global Carbon Budget projects fossil carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions of 37.4 billion tonnes, up 0.8% from 2023.
Despite the urgent need to cut emissions to slow climate change, the researchers say there is still no sign of these peaking globally.
Last month, WMO had flagged record greenhouse gas emissions in 2023. This will commit the world to rising temperatures for decades to come.
Given the extremely long life of CO2 in the atmosphere, the temperature level already observed will persist for several decades even if emissions are rapidly reduced to net zero, WMO has warned indicating that it may be difficult for countries to collectively meet Paris Agreement’s goals of limiting global warming to well below 2°C and aiming for 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels.
Over the last 10 years, fossil CO2 emissions have risen while land-use change CO2 emissions have declined on average – leaving overall emissions roughly level over that period, the study said.
“The impacts of climate change are becoming increasingly dramatic, yet we still see no sign that burning of fossil fuels has peaked,” said Professor Pierre Friedlingstein, of Exeter’s Global Systems Institute, who led the study.
“Time is running out to meet the Paris Agreement goals – and world leaders meeting at COP29 must bring about rapid and deep cuts to fossil fuel emissions to give us a chance of staying well below 2 degree C warming above pre-industrial levels,” said Professor Corinne Le Quéré, Royal Society Research Professor at UEA’s School of Environmental Sciences, said in a statement.
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“There are many signs of positive progress at the country level, and a feeling that a peak in global fossil CO2 emissions is imminent, but the global peak remains elusive,” Glen Peters, of the CICERO Center for International Climate Research in Oslo added.
In 2023, the largest contributions to global fossil CO2 emissions were China (31%), the USA (13%), India (8%), and the the Eurpoean Union (7%). These four regions account for 59% of global fossil CO2 emissions, while the rest of the world contributed 41%, including international aviation and marine bunker fuels (3% of the total), the study said.
Growth rates for these countries from 2022 to 2023 were 4.9% (China), -3.3% (USA), -8.4% (EU), and 8.2% (India).
