Forgot your password?
Close
typodupeerror
Earth

Humanity Heating Planet Faster Than Ever Before, Study Finds (theguardian.com) 80

Posted by BeauHD from the PSA dept.
An anonymous reader The Guardian: Humanity is heating the planet faster than ever before, a study has found. Climate breakdown is occurring more rapidly with the heating rate almost doubling, according to research that excludes the effect of natural factors behind the latest scorching temperatures. It found global heating accelerated from a steady rate of less than 0.2C per decade between 1970 and 2015 to about 0.35C per decade over the past 10 years. The rate is higher than scientists have seen since they started systematically taking the Earth's temperature in 1880.

"If the warming rate of the past 10 years continues, it would lead to a long-term exceedance of the 1.5C (2.7F) limit of the Paris agreement before 2030," said Stefan Rahmstorf, a scientist at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and co-author of the study. [...] The researchers applied a noise-reduction method to filter out the estimated effect of nonhuman factors in five major datasets that scientists have compiled to gauge the Earth's temperature. In each of them, they found an acceleration in global heating emerged in 2013 or 2014. The findings have been published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters.
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.

Humanity Heating Planet Faster Than Ever Before, Study Finds More

Humanity Heating Planet Faster Than Ever Before, Study Finds

Comments Filter:

  • Who cares (Score:5, Insightful)

    by backslashdot ( 95548 ) on Friday March 06, 2026 @11:04PM (#66027456)

    I'm rich. I'm going to space. I'll see you guys roast from my telescope on Moonbase Alpha. Bye bye suckers.

    • https://www.pik-potsdam.de/en/... [pik-potsdam.de]
      "of about approximately 470 employees" and "PIK has an institutional budget of EUR 29 million".

      From https://www.energea.com/unders... [energea.com]
      1 MW solar farm: $1M - $1.2M
      10 MW solar farm: $10M - $12M
      100 MW solar farm: $100M - $120M

      This research agency's 29 million euro budget is about $33 million US dollars.

      They could take 10% of their annual budget and build a 10 megawatt solar farm, to reduce glo

      • There are (tens?) thousands of elected officials who use "climate alarm" as a campaign issue to win votes and win elections every year.

        Shouldn't a small part of that election campaign money, office holder salary and staff money be better spent on building solar power generating plants?

        It goes both for the "in favor of green energy" and "not in favor of green energy" political campaigns since both left and right need stable, well proven, money winning, and election winning campaign issues to ensure that they

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by tragedy ( 27079 )

          It would be wonderful if we lived in a world where there was simply no question that, whoever gets elected, they would do the right thing as far as the environment goes.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by taustin ( 171655 )

            It would be wonderful if there were any agreement on what "the right thing" is. But there never will be.

            Your reply will demonstrate why.

        • Re: (Score:3)

          by taustin ( 171655 )

          They never have to do anything other than feel good symbolic plans or micro-regulations, just have to keep on the perpetual campaign trail.

          The amount of money to be made leading the charge against the latest crisis guarantees that the people in charge not only won't make any effort to solve the problem, but they will actively prevent it from being solved. Once it's solved, you have to move on, and maybe (gasp!) get a real job.

      • Great point...They'll need a few tens of millions of Euros to study it.

      • So you believe their research? Climate change is done, we're all onboard? Politicians, decision makers, the general public has seen enough and we're all in agreement it's happening and mainly human caused? Now that the descriptions is settled we can fully focus on the prescriptions?

        Under those conditions then yes, I agree.

        If this is just the teenage argument of "if you think taxes are good why don't you just give all your money to the government. eheheheh" then obviously then you've double justified their e

      • Re:470 employees and 29 million Euro budget (Score:5, Insightful)

        by tragedy ( 27079 ) on Saturday March 07, 2026 @11:56AM (#66027980)

        They could take 10% of their annual budget and build a 10 megawatt solar farm, to reduce global warming and reduce pollution, every 5 years.

        Or they could do their actual job and their findings could convince the public, the government, and potentially private industry that it is worth investing far, far more than that into building GigaWatts of solar every year.

        The research agency was founded 34 years ago, in 1992, and could have been building multiple solar farms to take direct action against global warming caused by pollution, but they did not.

        And everyone could be baking their own bread, driving their own garbage to the dump instead of leaving it out for the collector, or doing their own surgery. Heck, some people do. Generally though specialization actually works. True, it's a question of balance and things sometimes get over-specialized, but I don't think this is one of those circumstances. They are a research institute that does climate research. However big they may seem to you, their budget is actually minuscule compared to the problem. They are supposed to do research that can help guide policy, which deals with resource management on a scale many orders of magnitude above their budget.

        You seem to be pushing some form of individual responsibility argument where the burden of dealing with the issue falls on small actors. An example would be water conservation. Overuse of water is an issue, so we want people to conserve water in the home. I am personally all for that. There's no reason (despite the claims of some that you need to flush the toilet ten times, fifteen times, as opposed to once) that you shouldn't have an efficient toilet because a properly designed one just needs one flush with only a fraction of the water of an old fashioned toilet. There's no reason that other appliances shouldn't be water efficient either. However, residential water usage is about 8% of all water usage. While it's good not to be wasteful, focusing too much on fussing about residential usage when a tiny increase in industrial or agricultural water efficiency surpasses what is even possible in residential savings is a poor use of time and effort. Just getting 20% more farms to use drip irrigation would probably exceed any gains that could be made in residential water usage.

        So, it seems to me that's what you're doing here, but to an even greater degree. Putting 10% or even 100% of their budget towards building solar panels would not make a dent, but the data from their studies could.

        In this case 34 years of talking talking and talking more has not built any pollution reducing green energy power generating plants.

        The problem here is that you have not actually provided any evidence of your assertion that their research has not led to any improvements. Institutes like this are, in fact, the ones who figure out which are the most serious problems to tackle and which are the easiest problems to tackle that can do the largest amount of good. If we ignore the actual differences in available technology over those 34 years (and variations in their budget), you're saying that they could have roughly built about 68 MW of solar capacity over their existence. Even if we outright ignore capacity factors, that would be around 10.43 TeraWatt-hours (I hate Watt-hours, but it's what everyone uses). If we use the approximate 1 ton of CO2 produced per MWh from using coal for electricity, that would prevent about 10,431,000 tons of CO2. That would be about 380,000 tons of methane. Or about 2,607 tons of HFC-404A refrigerant, etc. Policies preventing methane dumping into the atmosphere and phasing out problematic refrigerants as well as many others eliminate vastly more greenhouse gases from entering the atmosphere than the usage of their budget that you are proposing. Those policies are created based on the recommendations of research like the kind produced by this institute.

        • Re: (Score:3)

          by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

          There is massive investment just waiting to go into renewables, but governments and NIMBYs are blocking them. It's insane.

          Not just in the US, although the Trump administration is one of the worst. The UK could open up a lot more, e.g. the North Sea could be full of turbines.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by tragedy ( 27079 )

            There is massive investment just waiting to go into renewables, but governments and NIMBYs are blocking them. It's insane.

            I think that the problem is that it quite literally is insane. Anyone suggesting that wind turbines cause cancer through the sound they make, just as a random example, obviously need either serious remedial education, therapy, or medication with anti-psychotics. Whichever it is, it is quite literally completely insane that anyone who states and/or believes anything like that should be anywhere near policy making roles.

      • This is a "You first build something instead of endless meetings, speaking and research pieces and then we can discuss the research".

        We are in this together and perpetual meeting attendees for decades speaking the loudest how to spend other people's money to fix the problem need to go first with their own money to prove their commitment to solving the problem.

        Only 1% to 5% of the budgets of these talk only entities, on a national scale would fund multiple 10 megawatt solar farm projects each year.

        Since the

    • Honestly the world would be a better place if we took every rich fuckwit with a rocket and sent them to another planet on a one-way trip. Oh and they should take Trump with them, it's not like they can suck his dick remotely.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by dbialac ( 320955 )
      I for one look forward to planting a palm tree in my front yard.

  • The 1.5C target was missed a decade ago (Score:4, Insightful)

    by hdyoung ( 5182939 ) on Friday March 06, 2026 @11:13PM (#66027470)
    Yelling to keep under the 1.5C limit is like campaigning to save the dodo bird and the Yangze river dolphin. You’re trying to save something that’s already dead, buddy.

    • Lighten up, Francis, and read that quote once again. Or let me remove the words that confuse from that statement and re-state it in a simpler way:

      Now, this piece that you interpret as someone "yelling to keep things under 1.5C limit"

      "If the warming rate of the past 10 years continues, it would lead to a long-term exceedance of the 1.5C (2.7F) limit of the Paris agreement before 2030,"

      Actually says this:

      "Shit's warming up so badly, that we'll go hotter than the magic 1.5C in 2030 already and this will only get worse later". Or, to use the "AI" for a more polite way of saying it:

      If the earth keeps getting hotter at the same speed it has for the last 10 years, we'll pass the temperature goal that countries agreed to in the Paris agreement before the year 2030.

      See? You're actually arguing with the point you're making.

    • The alternative is to start talking about a different number. All that will achieve is climate deniers saying "You moved the goalposts!" "See Science doesn't know what it's doing!" in a misinformation campaign to make matters worse.

      • The climate deniers are a lost cause. They're like flat-earthers. So disconnected from reality that there really isn't much point in arguing with them. The smart people need to stop wasting time with them, and spend more time thinking about reality. We need to be planning for the future. If the science is correct, the really serious effects wont hit until next century, but when they do, the changes will be pretty big. And, the emissions curve has NOT GONE DOWN. Any future projection that relies on some sudd

  • No problem.

    We can just move Mar-o-Lago to Greenland...

    And it will be true Green-land - not what these lame Danes are doing. With beautiful green golf courses all around... It will be the most beautiful...
    nothing was so beautiful before... and big...

  • Trump clone in 2050: I did it, thanks to clean coal, magnificent clean cool, I love the smell of it, the earth is finally warming up at record speed. This is great news for the people of Greenland. Poor people, always cold. Denmark? They do not care. I? I do. I really do. Thanks to my clean coal policy Greenland is getting warmer fast! You think Denmark appreciates this? No they hate me for it. I do not mind though. You have to be tough as president. Very very tough. Biden would cave in after a day you know

  • We throw the spaghetti on the floor. We select 3 strands of spaghetti that emphasise the trend we wish to promote. We ignore the rest. We call 10 years of a trend climate. If a 10 year trend is climate then the Pause (of great entertainment) was climate.

    The spaghetti method is similar to Mann's method with proxies for the hockey stick, select those which strengthen the desired outcome, ignore the rest.

    • We throw the spaghetti on the floor. We select 3 strands of spaghetti that emphasise the trend we wish to promote. We ignore the rest. We call 10 years of a trend climate. If a 10 year trend is climate then the Pause (of great entertainment) was climate.

      The spaghetti method is similar to Mann's method with proxies for the hockey stick, select those which strengthen the desired outcome, ignore the rest.

      Otherwise known as "Statistics."

  • Cascading effects have already been kicked loose. It's not unlikely that the planet is already on it's way too a new equilibrium with or without us. That's the actual scary part. In short, it's likely we're already screwed. However, how hard is still up to us. So no excuses, we have to get this eco turnaround finished yesterday.

  • Good intentions and wishful thinking (Score:3)

    by jdawgnoonan ( 718294 ) on Saturday March 07, 2026 @09:19AM (#66027820)
    Short of a major catastrophe that wipes out at least half of the human population suddenly, this will not slow down. Despite my inability to believe that we have ever managed to actually accurately measure the temperature of the planet, I do believe that human behaviors have caused the climate to warm. Short of a technological miracle far larger than electric vehicles and dreadful vegetarian diets, there is no changing the direction that this is heading. I for one have no intention of changing my own behaviors until the wealthiest humans on earth lead by example and that will not happen any tine soon. So be it.
    • Just like the wealthy I am doing my damnedest to heat the planet as fast as possible . At least the part of the planet that is of interest to me right now. Don'cha just love charcoal? For the benefit of /. wimpwisted greenbeanerz, that consists of a 2" thick USDA-prime ribeye that best-gal and I intend eating for an extended brunch. Hear it sizzle and listen to bitch-Gaia scream. Coming off a 36-hour fast , makes you feel kinda warm and toasty inside thinking how your grand-kids will enjoy
      • Iâ(TM)m not doing my best to heat the planet, but Iâ(TM)m not going to go overboard in limiting myself when so live like they give no shits at all.
      • I meant âoeso many live like they give no shits at allâ. I ride a bicycle instead of a car whenever I can. I attempt to minimize wasteful energy use. But Iâ(TM)m not willing to worry a whole lot about it while our ruling class jet set around the world enjoying conferences for addressing climate change while in reality they are the worst offenders of all.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by tragedy ( 27079 )

        Generally speaking, traditionally made charcoal isn't really a problem from a greenhouse gas perspective because it's carbon neutral. All of the energy that goes into its initial pyrolysis and released when it is burned comes from the atmosphere in the first place and the energy comes from the sun. That doesn't mean there can't be other forms of pollution. Indeed smoke from charcoal burning in Africa by the Romans apparently used to reach Rome itself sometimes and caused significant deforestation. Hopefully

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by PPH ( 736903 )

      Short of a major catastrophe that wipes out at least half of the human population suddenly,

      You say this like it's a bad thing.

    • I do not know why people make such stupid comments.

      Currently we have an CO2 output of X.

      If half the population dies, it is X/2.

      Best case.

      Worst case: that half is in so bad shape that they produce something between X/2 and X.

      And?

      The temperatures will still be rising. /FACEPALM - stupid morons.

      Artificial CO2 production needs to go to ZERO. And killing all the people above median CO2 production, does not cut it to ZERO. Killing "random people" will do much less.

  • We should build a lots and lots of data centers and set AI to the task of solving the problem!

  • Study finds most studies are bogus.

  • Again disappointed by the lack of Funny here, but I have one. I misread the title as "Humanity HEALING Planet..." and when I opened the story I was expecting to see good news. (And I get plenty of eye exams.)

  • everywhere. I swear people didn't do it near as much when I was a kid. Now any parking lot I'm in has at least 2 cars idling.

    On top of that, people just keep buying bigger cars.

    And then you throw in more people driving for busy work as uber or whatever. The planet is gonna drive itself to death.

Slashdot Top Deals

"Let's show this prehistoric bitch how we do things downtown!" -- The Ghostbusters

Close