Global warming will reach 1.5C threshold this decade

Climate change is accelerating and the world will cross the 1.5 degrees Celsius warming threshold this decade, according to research published

Climate change is accelerating and the world will cross the 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 Fahrenheit) warming threshold this decade, according to research published on Thursday that scientists said should raise alarms at this year's COP28 climate talks.

Countries pledged in the 2015 Paris Agreement to hold global warming to within 1.5C above pre-industrial temperatures but the new paper by a team of scientists, including from NASA and Columbia University, adds to evidence suggesting that this goal is already out of reach.

Most emissions scenarios under the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) envision the world breaching 1.5C during the 2030s.

"The 1.5C limit is deader than a doornail," said study co-author James Hansen of Columbia University's Earth Institute who was among the first scientists to alert the world in the 1980s to the climate-warming impact of greenhouse gases.

"The shortcoming of our scientific community is to not make clear to the political leaders what the situation is," he said.

The world already has warmed by nearly 1.2C (2.2F) above preindustrial temperatures.

The study has received mixed feedback from other climate scientists. Some questioned its findings, with Michael Mann of the University of Pennsylvania saying in a blog post that they were "very much out of the mainstream".