Why read this: This piece offers an unusually clean example of an Economist-style argument: a deceptively neutral report card that, paragraph by paragraph, assembles a cumulative case for accelerated warming. For Mandarin L1 readers who already know the climate science in outline, the work here is mainly rhetorical—following how a writer hedges, concedes, and then rebuts without ever raising their voice. The 1.5°C threshold and the political weight of the Paris agreement give the analysis a stake that most science journalism lacks, while the human-voice ending in Buontempo's quote rewards close attention to register shifts.
What to notice: Notice how the article performs a concession-rebuttal manoeuvre across paragraphs four and five: it first grants that scientists were burned once before by the so-called climate hiatus, then pivots with 'nevertheless' into three converging lines of evidence. Track the sulphate paradox in particular—cleaner air is described as a 'hygienic boon' that simultaneously removes a brake on warming, a counter-intuitive causal chain that depends on holding two valences at once. Pay attention also to the saturated hedging: 'ought to have been', 'could pass 2°C', 'seems unlikely', 'might still throw a curveball'. Flattening any of these into certainty distorts the argument. Finally, observe the closing reframing of 1.5°C from a target to be defended into an overshoot to be managed.
Skills practised: Readers practise unpacking heavy academic nominalisation—phrases such as 'a sustained acceleration' or 'the risk of irreversible tipping points' that hide their verbs—into clause-level paraphrase. They follow numerical comparison across paragraphs (1.15°C, 1.44°C, the 1.48–1.5°C range, the 1.5°C and 2°C ceilings) without losing the argumentative thread that the numbers serve. They learn to read em-dash parentheticals as load-bearing rather than decorative, since several definitions and concessions live inside them. They map a multi-step expository structure—claim, expected counter-pattern, surprise, concession, three-part rebuttal, projection, quoted reframing—onto an article that signposts none of those moves explicitly. Finally, they tune their ear to scientific hedging and learn to preserve probability rather than collapsing it into prediction.
La Niña Notwithstanding: 2025 Confirms a Faster, Hotter Curve
The third-warmest year on record despite a cooling Pacific pattern hardens the case that global warming is accelerating—and that the 1.5°C target is slipping out of reach.
Tap any green word in the article to see its meaning.
A year that ought, on every reasonable assumption, to have come out cool has instead landed near the top of the temperature record. The principal climate- and agencies in Europe and America issued their for 2025 this week, and the picture is consistent across data sets: warming is not merely continuing but speeding up.
The eleven warmest years since records began are now also the eleven most recent, with the past three sitting at the head of the . The hottest of all was 2024, lifted by a vigorous El Niño—the Pacific pattern that nudges global temperatures upward—and by the brightest stretch of the . By 2025 that El Niño had , the cooling La Niña had taken its place, and the sun had begun to dim. A cooler year was expected. As La Niña years go, however, this one was sweltering: the warmest on record by a clear margin.
The most recent previous La Niña year, 2022, was 1.15°C above the world's average, according to the World Meteorological Organisation. Last year was 1.44°C above it—an unusually steep step for a Niña year. Averaged across the past three years, warming has settled between 1.48°C and 1.5°C, depending on which dataset you consult.
Many climate scientists remain reluctant to draw grand conclusions from the run since 2023, mindful that something like the opposite once happened. Through the early 2000s observed temperatures undershot the models, producing the so-called and prompting noisy claims from sceptics that warming had quietly stopped. In hindsight, several natural cycles had simply conspired to suppress the signal for a while.
Several converging lines of evidence nevertheless point to a sustained acceleration. The first is straightforward: manmade , especially though not only of carbon dioxide, keep growing rather than levelling off. The second, paradoxically, is that another sort of pollution—sulphates suspended in the atmosphere—is now in retreat. Tighter regulation has thinned two of their main sources, cargo shipping and Chinese power plants. Sulphates damage human health, but they also reflect sunlight back into space; stripping them from the air is a hygienic boon that quietly removes a brake on warming.
A parallel debate concerns whether the climate system is more sensitive to greenhouse gases than mainstream estimates assume. A study published this week by climate researchers at the University of Exeter, working with members of Britain's Institute and Faculty of Actuaries, places sensitivity at the upper end of that range and warns that, if correct, global temperatures could pass 2°C by mid-century. The risks beyond 2°C—including the chance of irreversible —are markedly worse than at the 1.5°C ceiling enshrined in the 2015 Paris agreement.
The strangest signals last year came from the . February 2025 brought the lowest combined polar ice cover since satellite observations began in the late 1970s, and Antarctica logged its hottest year on record. In Europe, hot, gusty conditions fed wildfires across Spain and Portugal in late July and early August, releasing nearly 14 million tonnes of carbon as carbon dioxide and as soot, which—being black—absorbs solar radiation and feeds back into the warming itself. No previous year has come close.
If recent trends hold, the 1.5°C threshold will fall sooner than the Paris signatories anticipated. Projecting the past 30 years' rate of warming forward gives, crudely, an arrival in the closing year of this decade—a finding consistent with other calculations released late last year. Carlo Buontempo, who heads Europe's Copernicus Climate Change Service, argues that the framing must shift: the question, he says, is no longer whether the 1.5°C overshoot can be avoided, but how it is to be managed. The next twelve months might still and bring relief, yet that looks improbable. With El Niño expected to return later this year, forecasters already pencil in 2026 as another contender for the .
A year that ought, on every reasonable assumption, to have come out cool has instead landed near the top of the temperature record. The principal climate- and agencies in Europe and America issued their for 2025 this week, and the picture is consistent across data sets: warming is not merely continuing but speeding up.
The eleven warmest years since records began are now also the eleven most recent, with the past three sitting at the head of the . The hottest of all was 2024, lifted by a vigorous El Niño—the Pacific pattern that nudges global temperatures upward—and by the brightest stretch of the . By 2025 that El Niño had , the cooling La Niña had taken its place, and the sun had begun to dim. A cooler year was expected. As La Niña years go, however, this one was sweltering: the warmest on record by a clear margin.
The most recent previous La Niña year, 2022, was 1.15°C above the world's average, according to the World Meteorological Organisation. Last year was 1.44°C above it—an unusually steep step for a Niña year. Averaged across the past three years, warming has settled between 1.48°C and 1.5°C, depending on which dataset you consult.
Many climate scientists remain reluctant to draw grand conclusions from the run since 2023, mindful that something like the opposite once happened. Through the early 2000s observed temperatures undershot the models, producing the so-called and prompting noisy claims from sceptics that warming had quietly stopped. In hindsight, several natural cycles had simply conspired to suppress the signal for a while.
Several converging lines of evidence nevertheless point to a sustained acceleration. The first is straightforward: manmade , especially though not only of carbon dioxide, keep growing rather than levelling off. The second, paradoxically, is that another sort of pollution—sulphates suspended in the atmosphere—is now in retreat. Tighter regulation has thinned two of their main sources, cargo shipping and Chinese power plants. Sulphates damage human health, but they also reflect sunlight back into space; stripping them from the air is a hygienic boon that quietly removes a brake on warming.
A parallel debate concerns whether the climate system is more sensitive to greenhouse gases than mainstream estimates assume. A study published this week by climate researchers at the University of Exeter, working with members of Britain's Institute and Faculty of Actuaries, places sensitivity at the upper end of that range and warns that, if correct, global temperatures could pass 2°C by mid-century. The risks beyond 2°C—including the chance of irreversible —are markedly worse than at the 1.5°C ceiling enshrined in the 2015 Paris agreement.
The strangest signals last year came from the . February 2025 brought the lowest combined polar ice cover since satellite observations began in the late 1970s, and Antarctica logged its hottest year on record. In Europe, hot, gusty conditions fed wildfires across Spain and Portugal in late July and early August, releasing nearly 14 million tonnes of carbon as carbon dioxide and as soot, which—being black—absorbs solar radiation and feeds back into the warming itself. No previous year has come close.
If recent trends hold, the 1.5°C threshold will fall sooner than the Paris signatories anticipated. Projecting the past 30 years' rate of warming forward gives, crudely, an arrival in the closing year of this decade—a finding consistent with other calculations released late last year. Carlo Buontempo, who heads Europe's Copernicus Climate Change Service, argues that the framing must shift: the question, he says, is no longer whether the 1.5°C overshoot can be avoided, but how it is to be managed. The next twelve months might still and bring relief, yet that looks improbable. With El Niño expected to return later this year, forecasters already pencil in 2026 as another contender for the .
Questions
Check your understanding
- 01
Why does the article describe 2025's ranking as especially striking, given that it sat below 2024 in absolute terms?
- 02
How does the article use the early-2000s 'climate hiatus' within its overall argument?
- 03
Why is the decline of atmospheric sulphates described as adding to warming?
- 04
Assess the claim that the evidence presented in the article justifies treating warming as 'accelerating' rather than merely 'continuing'. Use at least two of the article's evidence lines in your answer.
Suggested length: ~100 words
- 05
Argue whether Buontempo's reframing—from 'avoiding 1.5°C' to 'managing the overshoot'—represents a realistic policy adjustment or a quiet retreat from the Paris commitment.
Suggested length: ~100 words
Questions
Check your understanding
- 01
Why does the article describe 2025's ranking as especially striking, given that it sat below 2024 in absolute terms?
- 02
How does the article use the early-2000s 'climate hiatus' within its overall argument?
- 03
Why is the decline of atmospheric sulphates described as adding to warming?
- 04
Assess the claim that the evidence presented in the article justifies treating warming as 'accelerating' rather than merely 'continuing'. Use at least two of the article's evidence lines in your answer.
Suggested length: ~100 words
- 05
Argue whether Buontempo's reframing—from 'avoiding 1.5°C' to 'managing the overshoot'—represents a realistic policy adjustment or a quiet retreat from the Paris commitment.
Suggested length: ~100 words