Climate emergency threatens to deepen energy and humanitarian crisis

Campaign group 350.org has responded to the World Meteorological Organisation’s (WMO) latest report. It sounds the alarm on a global climate “state of emergency”, saying that the crisis will worsen the humanitarian toll of soaring oil and gas prices driven by the Iran war. 350.org urged countries to protect their citizens from climate harm and rising costs, and to start urgently transitioning their economies away from fossil fuels.

The World Meteorological Organisation’s ​​State of the ​Global Climate 2025 pronounced 2015-2025 as the hottest ​11 years on record. And it warns that weather has become more extreme on a day-to-day basis, impacting millions of people and causing billions in economic losses.

The report also said that the increase in the annual carbon dioxide concentration in 2024 was the largest annual increase recorded, driven by continued fossil fuel emissions. Amid an energy crisis described by the International Energy Agency as the ‘worst’ in decades, United Nations ​secretary-general Antonio Guterres points to “our addiction to fossil fuels” as destabilising both the climate and global security.

The UN’s World Food Programme has warned that if the Iran conflict continues, 45 million more people could face acute hunger due to rising prices. Meanwhile, scientists warn of the possibility of El Niño pushing heat records to record highs and causing severe heatwaves, droughts and floods this year.

Anne Jellema, 350.org executive director said:

Soaring prices for fuel, fertiliser and food could be the last straw for millions of families in the global South already pushed into poverty by climate change.

Governments must act now to stop oil and gas companies profiting from the war— by taxing their windfall profits to finance protections for ordinary people. Some of the revenues should be used to fund wider access to rooftop and balcony solar and other renewable solutions that will immediately reduce families’ bills while also strengthening national energy security.

If governments care about their people, the time is now to end our addiction to crisis-ridden and planet-destroying fossil fuels.

On 24-29 April, the first conference on transitioning away from fossil fuels will take place in Santa Marta, co-hosted by the governments of Colombia and the Netherlands. 350.org urges all governments to join this momentous gathering of countries to plan a fossil fuel phaseout, pursuing a global commitment first made at the COP28 UN climate talks.

Featured image via the Canary