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The planet sweltered through the third-warmest year on record last year, European scientists have said, and no relief from the heat is expected in 2026.
The average global temperature was 1.47 degrees Celsius (2.52 degrees Fahrenheit) above the pre-industrial level in 2025, making the last 11 years the warmest ever, data released by the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts showed on Wednesday.
Last year was just 0.13C (0.234F) cooler than 2024, the warmest year on record, and 0.01C (0.018F) cooler than 2023, the second-warmest year, according to the intergovernmental weather monitor.
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For the first time ever, the average temperature during 2023-2025 exceeded the 1.5C (2.7F) limit set out in the Paris Agreement over three years, according to the data.
The UK Met Office said separately that its data also showed 2025 as the third-warmest year on record.
“The long-term increase in global annual average temperature is driven by the human-induced rise in the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere,” Met Office climate scientist Colin Morice said in a statement.
NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which monitor climate change in the United States, are set to release their latest data on global temperatures later on Wednesday.
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Nearly 200 countries pledged to limit the long-term rise in global temperatures to 1.5C (2.7F) at a landmark summit in Paris in 2015, but the planet’s continued warming has left that goal in serious doubt.
The US, the world’s second-biggest emitter of greenhouse gases, announced early last year that it would exit the Paris accord, in one of President Donald Trump’s first acts in office.
China, the world’s top polluter, in September announced a target for cutting emissions outright for the first time, but the goal was widely panned by climate experts as inadequate.
In October, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said the planet would inevitably overshoot the 1.5C (2.7F) threshold as he stressed the need for early warning systems to protect communities across the globe.
