The United Nations warned Wednesday (May 18) that four key climate change indicators will all reach new record highs in 2021, warning that the global energy system is pushing humanity to disaster.
The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) reported in its "State of the Global Climate in 2021" report that greenhouse gas concentrations, sea level rise, ocean heat, and ocean acidity all reached new records last year.
According to the WMO, human activity is producing planetary-scale changes on land, in the water, and in the atmosphere, with negative and long-term consequences for ecosystems.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres emphasized that the yearly report is "a dismal litany of humanity's failure to tackle climate disruption"
"The global energy system is broken and bringing us ever closer to climate catastrophe," Guterres said.
According to the report, the last seven years have been the hottest on record.
Last year, global temperatures were cooled by back-to-back La Nina occurrences at the start and end of 2021.
Despite this, 2021 was one of the warmest years on record, with the average worldwide temperature 1.11 degrees Celsius over pre-industrial levels.
The report stated that four main climate change indicators "build a consistent picture of a warming world that touches all parts of the Earth system"
In 2020, greenhouse gas concentrations set a new world high, with carbon dioxide (CO2) concentrations reaching 413.2 parts per million (ppm), or 149% of preindustrial levels.
According to the analysis, global mean sea level reached a new high in 2021, rising an average of 4.5 mm each year from 2013 to 2021.
According to the analysis, ocean heat reached a record high last year, exceeding the 2020 figure.
The United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change assessed with "very high confidence" that open ocean surface acidity is at its highest level "for at least 26,000 years"
Meanwhile, the Antarctic ozone hole reached a "unusually deep and large" maximum extent of 24.8 million square kilometers in 2021, thanks to a strong and steady polar vortex.
Guterres advocated five steps to accelerate the transition to renewable energy "before it's too late"
He proposed, among other things, abolishing fossil fuel subsidies, tripling renewable energy investments, and making renewable energy technologies, such as battery storage, freely available global public goods.
"If we act together, the renewable energy transformation can be the peace project of the 21st century," Guterres said.
