Indicators of global climate change 2024

Scientists find three years left of remaining carbon budget for 1.5°C

19 June 2025, Bonn – The central estimate of the remaining carbon budget for 1.5°C is 130 billion
tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO2) (from the beginning of 2025). This would be exhausted in a little more
than three years at current levels of CO2 emissions, according to the latest Indicators of Global
Climate Change study published today in the journal Earth System Science Data, and the budget for
1.6°C or 1.7°C could be exceeded within nine years.

Prof. Piers Forster, Director of the Priestley Centre for Climate Futures at the University of Leeds and
lead author of the study, said: “Our third annual edition of Indicators of Global Climate Change
shows that both warming levels and rates of warming are unprecedented. Continued record-high
emissions of greenhouse gases mean more of us are experiencing unsafe levels of climate impacts.
Temperatures have risen year-on-year since the last IPCC report in 2021, highlighting how climate
policies and the pace of climate action are not keeping up with what’s needed to address the
ever-growing impacts.”

This year’s update of key climate system indicators carried out by a team of over 60 international
scientists included two additional indicators, sea-level rise and global land precipitation, to give a
total of 10 indicators. This information is crucial for decision-makers seeking a current,
comprehensive picture of the state of the global climate system.

Between 2019 and 2024, global mean sea level has also increased by around 26 mm, more than
doubling the long-term rate of 1.8 mm per year seen since the turn of the twentieth century.

Dr. Aimée Slangen, Research Leader at the NIOZ Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research said:
“Since 1900, the global mean sea level has risen by around 228 mm. This seemingly small number is
having an outsized impact on low-lying coastal areas, making storm surges more damaging and
causing more coastal erosion, posing a threat to humans and coastal ecosystems. The concerning
part is that we know that sea-level rise in response to climate change is relatively slow, which means
that we have already locked in further increases in the coming years and decades.”

IGCC has worked with the Climate Change Tracker to provide a reliable, user-friendly platform for
tracking, visualising and understanding these indicators.