Recent global temperature surge intensified by record-low planetary albedo

2024/12/05 by Helge Goessling, Thomas Rackow, Thomas Jung · 5 voices · 144 citations
Earth and Planetary Sciences · Environmental Science · #Albedo (alchemy) #Atmospheric Ozone and Climate #Atmospheric and Environmental Gas Dynamics #Atmospheric sciences #Climate change #Climate variability and models #Climatology #Cloud albedo #Cloud computing #Cloud cover #Environmental science #Geography #Geology #Global warming #Latitude #Meteorology #Oceanography

paper · doi:10.1126/science.adq7280

published in Science 387(6729), 68-73 (American Association for the Advancement of Science)

openalex publication_date 2024/12/05 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/01

Abstract

In 2023, the global mean temperature soared to almost 1.5 kelvin above the preindustrial level, surpassing the previous record by about 0.17 kelvin. Previous best-guess estimates of known drivers, including anthropogenic warming and the El Niño onset, fall short by about 0.2 kelvin in explaining the temperature rise. Using satellite and reanalysis data, we identified a record-low planetary albedo as the primary factor bridging this gap. The decline is apparently caused largely by a reduced low-cloud cover in the northern mid-latitudes and tropics, in continuation of a multiannual trend. Further exploring the low-cloud trend and understanding how much of it is due to internal variability, reduced aerosol concentrations, or a possibly emerging low-cloud feedback will be crucial for assessing the present and expected future warming.

Citations

• Extended Reconstructed Sea Surface Temperature, Version 5 (ERSSTv5): Upgrades, Validations, and Intercomparisons

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Discussions

• We have a new paper out in @science.org today, led by Helge Goessling from #AWI: The recent global temperature surge in 2023 was intensified by a record-low planetary #albedo 👉 doi.org/10.1126/scie [bsky, 374 points, 13 comments]
• Earth shattered heat records in 2023 and 2024: is global warming speeding up? (short answer: it's complicated) [lemmy, 105 points, 12 comments]
• How declining cloudiness is accelerating global warming [lemmy, 18 points, 0 comments]
• Interesting paper suggests a reason for why 2023 was so exceptionally warm - less low-level cloud-cover: www.science.org/doi/10.1126/.... These results may be related to our own papers which also find [bsky, 8 points, 1 comments]
• Guest post: How declining cloudiness is accelerating global warming [lemmy, 1 points, 0 comments]

Related

• Recent global temperature surge amplified by record-low planetary albedo
• Darker, Less Cloudy Earth Contributed to Record Heat
• Physical understanding of the extreme global temperature jump in 2023
• Global warming acceleration in satellite observed lower-tropospheric temperature
• Atypical warming pattern of strong 2023-24 El Niño boosts global temperatures to new 1.5 °C record