{"id":715,"date":"2026-06-10T23:54:50","date_gmt":"2026-06-10T23:54:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/2026\/06\/10\/earths-energy-imbalance-has-doubled-heres-why-that-matters\/"},"modified":"2026-06-10T23:54:50","modified_gmt":"2026-06-10T23:54:50","slug":"earths-energy-imbalance-has-doubled-heres-why-that-matters","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/2026\/06\/10\/earths-energy-imbalance-has-doubled-heres-why-that-matters\/","title":{"rendered":"Earth\u2019s energy imbalance has doubled \u2013\u00a0here\u2019s why that matters"},"content":{"rendered":"
Our planet is absorbing more solar energy than it is reflecting.<\/span> Triff \/ shutterstock<\/span><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Heatwaves<\/a> across Europe and south Asia have dominated the news recently. But these events are really a surface expression of more fundamental changes that are affecting our planet: the Earth itself is accumulating heat faster than ever before.<\/p>\n

We lead a large international team of scientists who come together every year to provide an update on the state of the climate system. This year, we find that Earth\u2019s energy imbalance \u2013 the difference between the amount of energy entering and leaving the planet \u2013 has doubled in recent decades<\/a>, and is now at record levels.<\/p>\n

This extra heat is a key indicator of the pace and scale of human-caused climate change. In a climate unaffected by human greenhouse gas emissions, the Earth\u2019s energy imbalance would be zero. But, since the 1970s, the Earth has become increasingly out of balance. This rate of increase is faster than expected, and work is underway to understand exactly why this is happening.<\/p>\n

Where the extra heat goes<\/h2>\n

Most of this excess heat doesn\u2019t stay in the atmosphere. Around 90% of it is being absorbed by the oceans, which act as a vast heat sink, but the consequences are playing out across the entire Earth system. The oceans are warming, ice sheets and glaciers are melting, and permafrost is thawing.<\/p>\n

Sea levels are rising too, driven by thermal expansion of the warming ocean (a physical increase in the volume of seawater as it absorbs heat) and melting of land-based ice. Since 1901, the global sea level has increased by about 23cm. That might not sound dramatic, but even relatively small increases in sea levels can make storm surges more dangerous, increase coastal flooding and damage ecosystems and infrastructure.<\/p>\n

The rate of sea level rise is also speeding up. Between 1901 and 2018, it rose by around 1.7mm per year. In the past decade (2006-25), this rate has more than doubled to over 3.6mm per year.<\/p>\n

\n \"Sea<\/a>
\n Small rises in average sea levels can mean big changes for people living on the coast.<\/span>
\n Arthur Villator \/ shutterstock<\/span><\/span>
\n <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The oceans themselves, warmed by all that stored energy, are also increasing the odds of more extreme events. Marine heatwaves \u2013 prolonged periods of unusually high ocean temperatures \u2013 are now around three times more frequent than they were in the early 1990s. In 2025, an average area in the ocean would have experienced about 65 marine heatwave days \u2013 nearly one day in five \u2013 although some regions saw far more and others far fewer.<\/p>\n

This is substantially higher than in previous decades and without human intervention, we would only expect to see around three to four days of heatwaves a year. Marine heatwaves can devastate marine life, disrupt fisheries, and weaken the natural coastal protections that many communities rely on.<\/p>\n

The impacts of the energy imbalance also don\u2019t stay at sea. Warmer oceans lead to stronger evaporation and a moister atmosphere, making weather extremes such as continental heatwaves, intense rainfall and droughts more likely too.<\/p>\n

A warming world meets El Ni\u00f1o<\/h2>\n

On top of the changes caused by human activity, the energy imbalance combines with natural climate patterns such as El Ni\u00f1o \u2013 a periodic warming of the tropical Pacific Ocean that shifts weather patterns across the globe. While El Ni\u00f1o events themselves are natural, today\u2019s are happening in a world that already has a warmer baseline.<\/p>\n

Scientists are currently watching for the development of a particularly strong \u201cGodzilla\u201d El Ni\u00f1o<\/a>, driven by exceptionally warm ocean conditions. As UN Secretary-General Ant\u00f3nio Guterres<\/a> put it, El Ni\u00f1o can \u201cpour fuel on the fire of a warming world\u201d. <\/p>\n

And that fuel shows up in many ways: not just higher temperatures, but also shifts in rainfall patterns. Some regions, such as Australia, may experience drought, while others will see heavier downpours and flooding. No matter what the changes are, they reflect a system holding more energy to drive extreme events and deliver potentially catastrophic impacts.<\/p>\n

Whatever our experiences of the upcoming El Ni\u00f1o, the underlying driver of longer-term climate change remains the same. Both the Earth\u2019s energy imbalance and global temperatures are increasing due to record greenhouse gas emissions.<\/p>\n

In 2025, human-caused global warming reached about 1.37\u00b0C above pre-industrial levels, edging closer to the 1.5\u00b0C threshold associated with a dramatic escalation in climate risks and impacts. At the current pace of global warming, that limit could be crossed in around four years. <\/p>\n

The prospect of a strong El Ni\u00f1o in the very near future is a stark reminder of how natural variations in the climate system and human-caused warming can combine to produce particularly intense impacts. But it is the steady, continuous build-up of heat in the Earth system that will shape the decades ahead.<\/p>\n

The key point is that as long as more heat enters the Earth system than leaves it, temperatures will continue to rise. Until we bring the planet back into balance \u2013 by drastically reducing greenhouse gas emissions and ultimately reaching net zero \u2013 that heat will keep building. And as it does, the extremes we are experiencing now will only become more frequent, more intense and harder to manage.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

Piers Forster receives funding from UK and international research funding organisations. He is as member of the UK Climate Change Committee <\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

Debbie Rosen has received external funding from UK and international research funding organisations. <\/span><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Our planet is absorbing more solar energy than it is reflecting. Triff \/ shutterstock Heatwaves across Europe and south Asia have dominated the news recently. But these events are really a surface expression of more fundamental changes that are affecting our planet: the Earth itself is accumulating heat faster than ever before. We lead a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-715","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/715","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=715"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/715\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=715"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=715"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=715"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}