Global Ocean to Set Record Temperature in 2024

An international team of climate scientists has discovered that the global ocean absorbed a record 16 zettajoules of heat last year, raising its average annual temperature by 0.07 degrees Celsius.

“Three independent teams of researchers have reached the same conclusion – the ocean continues to warm rapidly, and in 2024 its average temperature will set a new record,” the press office of the Institute of Atmospheric Physics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences reported.

The report noted, "Its upper layers, which are 2 km thick, absorbed a huge amount of heat (10 percent) of the total amount of heat in the world. This is 140 times greater than the amount of energy generated by power plants in the world in 2023."

These findings were reached by a team of scientists consisting of dozens of leading international climate experts, led by Professor Zheng Lijing from the Institute of Atmospheric Physics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

This team annually tracks how key climate indicators related to the world's oceans are changing, including their surface temperature and the amount of heat their waters absorb.

According to climate scientists, the ocean remains the main natural brake on global warming. Since pre-industrial times, its waters have absorbed about 90 percent of the heat and about a third of the carbon dioxide emitted by industrial plants, cars, and other products.

Scientists fear that this process could slow climate change and cause radical changes in marine ecosystems.

Scientists' calculations show that in 2024 the global ocean absorbed a record amount of heat for the fifth time in a row, amounting to 16 zettajoules of energy, which is one zettajoule more than in 2023.

This increase, according to the researchers, is particularly significant and significant because the acceleration in global ocean temperature is occurring against the backdrop of a weak El Niño climate phenomenon that has intensified global warming in the past two years.

Scientists point out that in addition, calculations have shown that heat is accumulating especially rapidly in the northern part of the Pacific Ocean, in the Mediterranean Sea, in the southern and polar regions of the Atlantic Ocean, as well as off the coast of Antarctica.

Surface temperatures are also rising in these areas of the global ocean, contributing to sea level rise and negatively impacting surface and deep ecosystems in these areas of the hydrosphere.

Source: Russian Press