January 2025 was the warmest January globally, continuing the streak of record-breaking temperatures despite the emergence of La Nina.
The average temperature last month stood at 13.23C, which is 0.79C above the 1991-2020 average for January, according to European space agency Copernicus.
January 2025 was 1.75C above the pre-industrial level.
Scientists hoped the emergence of La Nina will slow down the record breaking global warming, but last month broke the record by 0.1C.
This makes it the 18th month in the last 19 months for which the global-average surface air temperature was more than 1.5C above the pre-industrial level.
"January 2025 is another surprising month, continuing the record temperatures observed throughout the last two years, despite the development of La Niña conditions in the tropical Pacific and their temporary cooling effect on global temperatures,” Samantha Burgess, strategic lead for climate at ECMWF, said.
Usually after an El Nino like last year, temperatures fall rapidly, but "we've not seen that," Ms Burgess said.
The record temperatures come despite freezing temperatures in the US and elsewhere in the north. But the US is just a tiny fraction of the planet's surface, and "a much larger area of the planet's surface was much, much warmer than average," Ms Burgess told AP.
The average temperature over Europe for January 2025 was 1.80C, which is 2.51C above the 1991-2020 average for January, and the second warmest after January 2020.
Grim doesn't even begin to describe our prospects.
Outside Europe, temperatures were mostly above average over northeast and northwest Canada, Alaska, and Siberia. They were also above average over southern South America, Africa, and much of Australia and Antarctica.
Copernicus said the Arctic this month tied the January record for lowest sea ice. The US-based National Snow and Ice Data Center had it as second-lowest, behind 2018.
The biggest driver of record heat is greenhouse gas buildup from the burning of coal, oil and natural gas, but the natural factors that contribute to the changes, like El Nino and La Nina, are not cooling down the planet as was expected.
While Copernicus records date to 1940, and other US and British records go back to 1850, scientists have determined using proxies such as tree rings that this era is the warmest in about 120,000 years or since the start of human civilisation.
“The fact that the latest robust Copernicus data reveals the January just gone was the hottest on record – despite an emerging La Nina, which typically has a cooling effect – is both astonishing and, frankly terrifying,” said Bill McGuire, emeritus professor of geophysical & climate hazards at University College London.
“On the basis of the Valencia floods and apocalyptic LA wildfires, I don’t think there can be any doubt that dangerous, all-pervasive, climate breakdown has arrived.”
“Yet emissions continue to rise, while fossil fuel corporations seek to expand operations. Grim doesn't even begin to describe our prospects,” he says.
