Copernicus: Global Climate Highlights 2025 report

Copernicus: Global Climate Highlights 2025.

The 25th edition from the Copernicus Climate Change Service was released this morning. Key messages:

  • 2025 ranks as the third warmest year on record, following the unprecedented temperatures observed in 2023 and 2024
  • 2025 was only marginally cooler than 2023, while 2024 remains the warmest year on record and the first year with an average temperature clearly exceeding 1.5°C above the pre-industrial level
  • Globally, January 2025 was the warmest January on record. March, April and May were each the second warmest for the time of year.
  • In 2025, annual surface air temperatures were above the 1991–2020 average across 91% of the globe, the same fraction as in 2024. Nearly half of the globe (48%) experienced much warmer than average annual temperatures.
  • All regions –Arctic, Northern mid-latitudes, Tropics, Southern mid-latitudes and Antarctic– show a clear long-term warming trend.
  • The global sea surface temperature remained historically high throughout 2025, despite the absence of El Niño conditions.
  • The annual average sea surface temperature for 2025 was +0.38°C above the 1991–2020 average. It ranked as the third-highest on record.
  • February saw the lowest global sea ice cover since the beginning of satellite observations in the late 1970s.
  • In 2025, half of the globe experienced more days than average with at least strong heat stress (a feels-like temperature of 32°C or above)

Guardian: Mapped: How the world is losing its forests to wildfires

Guardian: Mapped: How the world is losing its forests to wildfires.

A story based on a recent World Resources Institute study illustrated with great maps.

Wildfires have always been part of nature’s cycle, but in recent decades their scale, frequency and intensity in carbon-rich forests have surged. Research from the World Resources Institute (WRI) shows that fires now destroy more than twice as much tree cover as they did two decades ago. In 2024 alone, 135,000km² of forest burned – the most extreme wildfire year on record.

Experts warn that climate change is making wildfires bigger, longer and more destructive. Hotter, drier conditions are extending fire seasons and fuelling more extreme blazes. 2023 and 2024 had the most forest area burned by wildfires on record. They were also the two hottest years on record.

Nature: US scientists push back as Trump eyes Greenland

Nature: US scientists push back as Trump eyes Greenland

An open letter organized by US-based researchers who work in Greenland opposes any takeover of the territory.

In response to Donald Trump’s threats to acquire Greenland, a group of scientists has compiled a “statement from US scientists in solidarity with Greenland”, which is open to any US-based researcher who has conducted research on the island. The letter, published on 9 January, has so far gathered 204 signatures.

Guardian: ‘Profound impacts’: record ocean heat is intensifying climate disasters, data shows

Guardian: ‘Profound impacts’: record ocean heat is intensifying climate disasters, data shows

Reporting on ‘Ocean Heat Content Sets Another Record in 2025‘, a study published in Advances in Atmospheric Sciences on 9 January 2026, Damian Carrington writes:

The world’s oceans absorbed colossal amounts of heat in 2025, setting yet another new record and fuelling more extreme weather, scientists have reported.

More than 90% of the heat trapped by humanity’s carbon pollution is taken up by the oceans. This makes ocean heat one of the starkest indicators of the relentless march of the climate crisis, which will only end when emissions fall to zero. Almost every year since the start of the millennium has set a new ocean heat record.

This extra heat makes the hurricanes and typhoons hitting coastal communities more intense, causes heavier downpours of rain and greater flooding, and results in longer marine heatwaves, which decimate life in the seas. The rising heat is also a major driver of sea level rise via the thermal expansion of seawater, threatening billions of people.

Le Monde: ‘Instead of commenting on the unthinkable, Europeans should take action in Greenland’

Le Monde: ‘Instead of commenting on the unthinkable, Europeans should take action in Greenland‘

In an op-ed, researchers Béatrice Giblin, Sylvain Kahn, Pauline Schnapper and Céline Spector argue: “Instead of commenting on the unthinkable, Europeans would be better served by taking action. They need to dare to engage in a balance of power and to draw red lines; such is the purpose of diplomacy. It is also a matter of territorial sovereignty and solidarity, as well as dignity and honor.”

A few suggestions:

  • The first step should be a clear and unequivocal declaration by the European Council affirming the territorial integrity of Greenland, Denmark and the EU.
  • The second would be to bar Trump’s special envoy to Greenland, Jeff Landry from entering EU territory by denying him any visa.
  • A third option would be, with the approval of the the Greenlandic Parliament to deploy military equipment and elite units from several member states – ideally from all 27 – around and on Greenland itself.

A Year of Clean Energy Milestones

YaleEnvironment360: A Year of Clean Energy Milestones.

In spite of the Trump administration’s worst intentions at home and policy bullying abroad, there is good news to be found around the transition to cleaner energy. From The Yale School of Environment’s 2025 review:

“Wind, solar, and electric vehicles made huge strides globally in 2025. For the first time, wind and solar supplied more power than coal worldwide, while plug-in vehicles accounted for more than a quarter of new car sales.

These milestones reflect the dramatic drop in the price of clean energy over the last decade and a half. Today, wind and solar are cheaper than coal and natural gas, and increasingly, they are boosted by ever more affordable batteries, which have gotten 90 percent cheaper over the last decade.”