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Industries and individuals around the world burned record amounts of oil, gas and coal last year, releasing more greenhouse gases than ever before, a group of leading scientists said in a new report, warning that humanity is hurtling toward “climate chaos.”
The surge in global use of fossil fuels in 2024 contributed to extreme weather and devastating disasters including heat waves, storms, floods and wildfires.
“The planet’s vital signs are flashing red,” the scientists wrote in their annual report on the state of the climate. “The window to prevent the worst outcomes is rapidly closing.”
Some of the most alarming of Earth’s “vital signs,” the researchers said, include record heat in the oceans ravaging coral reefs, rapidly shrinking ice sheets and increasing losses of forests burned in fires around the world. They said the extreme intensity of Hurricane Melissa this week is another sign of how the altered climate is threatening lives and communities on an unprecedented scale.
“The climate crisis has reached a really dangerous stage,” said William Ripple, the report’s co-lead author and a professor at Oregon State University. “It is vital that we limit future warming as rapidly as possible.”
There is still time to limit the damage, Ripple said. It means switching to cleanly made electricity, clean transportation, fewer beef and dairy cows and other sources of harmful gases. These transitions are happening in some places, though not nearly fast enough.
For example, fossil fuel use actually fell in China in the first half of this year, a remarkable change for a country that remains the world’s biggest climate polluter. Renewable energy is being built out at a furious pace there, dwarfing installation in rest of the world. And in California, clean energy provided two-thirds of electricity in 2023.
Yet total use of fossil fuels rose 1.5% in 2024, the researchers said, citing data from the Energy Institute. Energy-related emissions of carbon dioxide and other planet-heating gases also reached an all-time high — exactly the opposite of what needs to be happening to address climate change.
The report notes that hotter temperatures are contributing to growing electricity demand.
“Avoiding every fraction of a degree of warming is critically important,” the scientists wrote. “We are entering a period where only bold, coordinated action can prevent catastrophic outcomes.”
The report, published Wednesday in the journal BioScience, is the sixth annual assessment that Ripple and his colleagues have compiled since they wrote a 2020 paper declaring a climate emergency — a statement that more than 15,800 scientists have signed in support.
The scientists said the current pace of warming greatly increases the risks of crossing dangerous climate tipping points, including vicious cycles such as the collapse of ice sheets, thawing of carbon-rich permafrost and widespread dieback of forests.
Ripple and his colleagues stressed that adopting solutions now to reduce emissions can swiftly bring benefits and that these solutions will be far less expensive than dealing with the consequences of uncontrolled climate change.
Efforts by President Trump and his administration to boost production of oil, gas and coal seriously threaten to slow the shift toward clean energy, said Michael Mann, a climate scientist and professor at the University of Pennsylvania.
He and co-author Peter Hotez argue in the recent book “Science Under Siege” that other nations must take on greater leadership now that the U.S. and other oil-promoting governments are working to block action on climate change.
Other scientists who helped write the report said the Trump administration is turning a blind eye to threats including sea-level rise, worsening droughts and wildfires, and diminished agricultural output.
“It’s a scandal that the U.S. is pulling back from any efforts to address environmental challenges,” said Peter Gleick, co-founder and senior fellow of the Pacific Institute, a think tank in Oakland. “The rest of the world should ignore efforts by the U.S. to delay progress on these problems … and I’m hopeful that other countries will continue to step up.”
The upcoming United Nations climate conference in Brazil in November could be a turning point if countries commit to bold and transformative changes, Ripple said.
Solutions must involve not only phasing out fossil fuels, the scientists said, but also addressing the fact that people are using up resources faster than nature can replenish them. Researchers, they noted, have estimated that two-thirds of the warming since 1990 is attributable to the wealthiest 10% of the world’s people because of “high-consumption lifestyles, high per capita fossil fuel use, and investments.”
The scientists called for changes including “reducing overconsumption” among the wealthy, protecting and restoring ecosystems, and shifting away from meat-heavy diets to more plant-based foods.
“It’s not just about cutting emissions. Dealing with climate change requires more,” Ripple said. “It calls for deep, systemic change in how societies value nature, design economies, consume resources and define progress.”
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Ian James
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