GENEVA:&nbsp;Heat-trapping carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere jumped by the highest amount on record last year, soaring to a level not seen in human civilization and &ldquo;turbo-charging&rdquo; the Earth&rsquo;s climate and causing more extreme weather, the United Nations weather agency said Wednesday. The World Meteorological Organization said in its latest bulletin on greenhouse gases, an annual study released ahead of the U.N.&rsquo;s annual climate conference, that C02 growth rates have now tripled since the 1960s, and reached levels not seen in at least 800,000 years. Emissions from burning coal, oil and gas, alongside more wildfires, have helped fan a &ldquo;vicious climate cycle,&quot; and people and industries continue to spew heat-trapping gases while the planet&rsquo;s oceans and forests lose their ability to absorb them, the WMO report said. The Geneva-based agency said the increase in the global average concentration of carbon dioxide from 2023 to 2024 amounted to the highest annual level of any one-year span since measurements began in 1957. Growth rates of CO2 have accelerated from an annual average increase of 2.4 parts per million per year in the decade from 2011 to 2020, to 3.5 ppm from 2023 to 2024, WMO said. &ldquo;The heat trapped by CO2 and other greenhouse gases is turbo-charging our climate and leading to more extreme weather,&quot; said WMO Deputy Secretary-General Ko Barrett in a statement. &ldquo;Reducing emissions is therefore essential not just for our climate but also for our economic security and community well-being.&rdquo; Climate Analytics CEO Bill Hare called the new data &ldquo;alarming and worrying.&rdquo; Even though fossil fuel emissions were &ldquo;relatively flat&rdquo; last year, he said, the report appeared to show an accelerating increase of CO2 in the atmosphere, &ldquo;signaling a positive feedback from burning forests and warming oceans driven by record global temperatures.&rdquo; &quot;Let there be no mistake, this is a very clear warning sign that the world is heading into an extremely dangerous state &mdash; and this is driven by the continued expansion of fossil fuel development, globally,&quot; Hare said. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m beginning to feel that this points to a slow-moving climate catastrophe unfolding in front of us.&rdquo; WMO called on policymakers to take more steps to help reduce emissions. While several governments have been pushing for further use of hydrocarbons like coal, oil and gas for energy production, some businesses and local governments have been mobilizing to fight global warming. Still, Hare said very few countries have made new climate commitments to come &ldquo;anywhere near dealing with the gravity of the climate crisis.&rdquo; The increase in 2024 is setting the planet on track for more long-term temperature increase, WMO said. It noted that concentrations of methane and nitrous oxide &mdash; other greenhouse gases caused by human activity &mdash; have also hit record levels. The report was bound to raise new doubts on the world&#39;s ability to hit the goal laid out in the 2015 Paris climate accord of keeping the global average temperature increase to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial times. United Nations climate chief, Simon Stiell, has said the Earth is now on track for 3 degrees Celsius.

A person checks his mobile phone as farmers burn crop residue after harvest near Bundelkhand expressway in India, on November 17, 2024. (AP)

Climate

UN warns of record CO2 levels driving extreme temperatures

WASHINGTON: President Donald Trump&#39;s second term has seen the United States go all-in to boost Big Oil and block renewables -- yet a wave of state and local climate-damage lawsuits against the fossil fuel industry continues to advance. Now Republicans are moving to shut them down with a two-pronged strategy: pushing for a federal shield law and urging the Supreme Court to intervene. &quot;The issue for the oil companies is that they know they did it,&quot; Richard Wiles, president of the nonprofit Center for Climate Integrity, told AFP. &quot;Their only avenue out of this is to get some kind of a waiver of liability, make the cases go away, bar the courthouse doors, get a &#39;get out of jail free card.&#39;&quot; Dozens of cases modeled on successful actions against the tobacco industry in the 1990s are playing out in state courts nationwide -- including claims of injuries, failure to warn, and even racketeering, meaning acting like a criminal enterprise. Some have been dismissed, and none have yet gone to trial -- though crucially, the conservative-dominated Supreme Court has repeatedly declined to intervene and block them. They have no shameIn June, 16 Republican state attorneys general urged the Trump administration to enact a shield law to end such cases. &quot;Under the banner of &#39;global climate change,&#39; they have effectively declared an all-out war on traditional American energy,&quot; their letter said, calling the lawsuits &quot;lawfare against the energy industry.&quot; It faulted the Supreme Court for not moving the cases to federal court, where companies believe they stand a better chance of winning, and cited a 2005 statute granting gunmakers a similar liability shield. &quot;They have no shame,&quot; said Pat Parenteau, an emeritus professor of environmental law at the University of Vermont, pointing to the epidemic of gun violence. &quot;I mean, come on, that&#39;s your argument?&quot; Congress has yet to act, but observers see worrying signs that it may be edging closer. A recent appropriations bill for the District of Columbia would bar the city from using funds to enforce consumer protection laws &quot;against oil and gas companies for environmental claims.&quot; And just last week, more than 100 House Republicans filed a friend-of-the-court brief in one Colorado case, urging the Supreme Court to &quot;put an end to these unconstitutional attempts to dictate national energy policy.&quot; AFP contacted Nebraska and West Virginia, which led the letter, as well as the Department of Justice, oil majors ExxonMobil, Shell, Chevron, and BP, and the American Petroleum Institute. None responded. Coordinated campaign&nbsp;The Trump administration, for its part, has escalated attacks on Democrat-led states passing &quot;polluter pays&quot; laws -- suing for example, New York and Vermont to block &quot;Superfunds&quot; that would require companies to pay billions toward climate and extreme weather resilience. The Justice Department has also asked the Supreme Court to weigh in through a friend-of-the-court brief in the Colorado case, where the state&#39;s top court allowed Boulder County to proceed with its lawsuit against Suncor Energy. A constellation of conservative legal scholars has joined what appears to be a coordinated push, including a <a data-fr-linked="true" href="//FoxNews.com">FoxNews.com</a> op-ed by John Yoo -- author of the Bush-era &quot;torture memos&quot; -- urging the Supreme Court to &quot;reaffirm federal authority over national energy.&quot; Results in the cases have so far been mixed: oil firms have won dismissals in some states, while others have allowed cases to advance. &quot;There hasn&#39;t been a big verdict yet. It&#39;s not clear there&#39;s going to be a big verdict. And you&#39;ve always got the Supreme Court lurking in the background,&quot; said Parenteau. That may explain why Congress has hesitated to act, he added -- though &quot;given the craziness that&#39;s going on in America right now, anything&#39;s possible.&quot; Environmental groups have urged Democrats to hold firm, and this summer, the 3,000-member National Association of Counties passed a resolution opposing &quot;any legislation that would limit or preempt counties&#39; access to courts or give companies immunity from lawsuits.&quot; Brigid Shea, commissioner for Texas&#39; Travis County, who helped lead the resolution, told AFP local governments were being &quot;walloped&quot; by extreme weather. &quot;We have to protect our access to the courts,&quot; she said. &quot;This is fundamental to our democratic process.&quot;

Americas

Republicans are moving to protect oil giants as climate lawsuits gain traction, pushing for federal immunity and Supreme Court backing. Critics say it’s an effort to dodge accountability as local governments pursue damages for climate-related destruction.

Articles tagged with "Climate change"

UN warns of record CO2 levels driving extreme temperatures

US Republicans seek to shield oil giants as climate lawsuits advance

UN warns of record CO2 levels driving extreme temperatures