00:00The United Nations on Monday warned that the amount of heat trapped by the Earth reached record levels in 2025,
00:07with the consequences of such warming feared to last for thousands of years.
00:12The 11 hottest years ever recorded were all between 2015 and 2025, the World Meteorological Organization's State of the Global
00:21Climate 2025 report confirmed.
00:23UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres says the global climate is in a state of emergency, with planet Earth being pushed
00:31beyond its limits.
00:32And for more on this, I can welcome Claire Ransom, who is the coordinator of the report.
00:36She's also an assistant scientific officer at the Climate Monitoring and Policy Division at the World Meteorological Organization.
00:44Good morning, Claire, and thank you very much for joining us.
00:46The report you helped put out has some alarming findings in it, some of which, such as the 11 hottest
00:54years all happening over the past decade, been quite familiar to people who watch the news.
00:59But there are other elements that are new. How would you describe the findings?
01:05Thanks so much. Glad to be here. And unfortunately, I wish it were with better news.
01:08But our findings this year are old news in some ways and new in others, and that the climate is
01:15still continuing to change.
01:17The Earth is continuing to warm. This is something we're all very familiar with.
01:20But this year we've added a new element, which is what we called Earth energy imbalance.
01:25And that's really an indicator that's looking at kind of bridging the story to help us understand why the planet
01:31is warming and where that energy is going.
01:34So we all have heard of greenhouse gases. Unfortunately, they are continuing to rise at record levels.
01:39We saw the jump from 2023 to 2024 was actually the largest on record, so we're headed the wrong way.
01:46But we are now, for the very first time, measuring in our report the ways in which those greenhouse gases
01:52are trapping the energy in the Earth system
01:54and warming not only our lands, but very critically, our oceans.
01:58Oceans absorb about 90% of that energy, and they are warming at record levels, doubling compared to when the
02:06initial observations first began, which is contributing to sea level rise.
02:10We're also seeing warming in our frozen world, in the cryosphere, in our glaciers, and sea ice, the ice caps.
02:16So tremendous impacts for people on ground already, and we'll just continue to see this for hundreds, if not thousands
02:22of years to come.
02:23Now, the report mentions global energy imbalance for the first time.
02:28Is there anything in particular that has accelerated this change in recent years?
02:35We're seeing all of these changes are driven by increasing greenhouse gas concentration.
02:39Those are really the driver of this energy imbalance, and we've known that from the get-go.
02:44And so as we're seeing greenhouse gas concentrations continue at record levels, we will continue to see this Earth energy
02:50imbalance continue, if not accelerate,
02:52which will then also have cascading impacts on the acceleration and the worsening of all of the other indicators,
02:57particularly for the oceans and our warming on land, which is going to have tremendous impacts on things like tropical
03:04cyclones, marine heat waves.
03:06We'll see tremendous impacts on coral reefs, marine ecosystems, fisheries, etc.
03:11Now, we've already seen in recent years the real-time effects that global warming has, particularly in extreme weather events.
03:24How is it likely to affect human populations?
03:27Are richer and poorer countries going to be equally affected, or will certain regions be worse off than others?
03:34Yeah, so first, climate impacts are already being felt in every region of the world, in both high- and
03:41low-income countries,
03:42but they are already not being experienced equally, and that will just continue to happen as time goes on.
03:48What we're really seeing very clearly is that exposure and vulnerability play a very big role.
03:53So we look at a number of different extremes in the report, things like tropical cyclones, droughts, floods, etc.
03:59And in contexts where communities are already facing challenges, things like limited resources or conflicts,
04:05that vulnerability is very much amplified, and climate shocks can have much more severe and lasting consequences
04:11than when we're in richer nations or in countries where resources are more readily available.
04:17And we're really seeing that it's not just single events, but really compounding shocks,
04:23where things like floods or droughts are happening once over and over again,
04:26and really reducing the ability of communities to prepare, to recover, and to adapt to those events.
04:31That's where we're really seeing the big discrepancy.
04:34Now, the current war in the Persian Gulf has more or less, like, not exactly brought to a standstill,
04:41but certainly stopped or reduced the flow of oil,
04:48which is, of course, one of the big drivers of climate change itself.
04:53What do you think that the longstanding impacts of this war, long after it is finished, might be for climate
04:59change?
05:02So, unfortunately, it's true that the world is facing multiple and overlapping crises.
05:07But the thing about climate change is that it doesn't pause.
05:10It's going to keep going regardless of the global context that we're in,
05:14and it will continue to unfold alongside these crises.
05:17So, in many cases, it's going to continue to amplify the risks that we'll see from multiple conflicts that are
05:23going on around the world.
05:25But we here at WMO are here to continue to monitor the climate
05:29and to continue to try to draw us attention to it as much as we can in a world full
05:33of competing priorities and other conflicts.
05:35And it's very much our hope that we can bring climate action as a part of addressing these broader conflicts
05:43and challenges
05:44rather than having to compete for the attention.
05:47Now, you mentioned there competing conflicts and interests.
05:51And we've seen in quite a lot of countries, particularly in the developed world,
05:54where there have been moves to roll back environmental protections.
06:01Is there a real danger that there will be, like, a slipback on this across the world?
06:10It's hard to say.
06:11We are seeing that there is less climate action in some countries
06:16and that there are definitely some lessening of the enthusiasm in the climate world
06:21as other priorities are taking place.
06:23But we are also seeing climate action step up in others
06:26and that it gets maybe less attention.
06:28So it's really a balance.
06:29And we are hopeful that as these impacts are unfortunately continuing to take place
06:34and the information is becoming more readily available,
06:36there'll be an uptick again.
06:38And we'll see that the climate action really get to where it needs to be globally.
06:42And finally, can I just ask you, are we at a climate turning point?
06:46And if so, is there any room for optimism at any point?
06:52Are there any silver linings?
06:55Yeah, so we are, it's not too far gone.
06:58I think that's really important for all of the viewers here today
07:01to really hear that it's not too late
07:03and that every degree of warming really does matter.
07:06So the actions that we take today will have a tremendous impact
07:09on the extent to which we feel the impacts of tomorrow.
07:13It is true that we have already committed in some areas
07:15to impacts that will be irreversible on human timescales.
07:19Ocean warming will continue at this rate now for hundreds, if not thousands of years.
07:24But that's not reason to give up hope.
07:27There are many other areas of the climate and of the planet that can still be changed
07:33and very much still do need our work and our actions from everybody.
07:37And every single action that we're able to take
07:40in every increment that we're able to reduce warming
07:42will have a tremendous effect not only on our generations,
07:44but future generations as well.
07:46Thank you very much for that, Clare Ransom,
07:49the coordinator of the World Meteorological Organization,
07:52State of the Global Climate 2025 report.
07:55Thank you very much.
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