Global warming acceleration in satellite observed lower-tropospheric temperature

We analyze accelerated global warming over 1981–2025 using satellite-derived lower-tropospheric temperature (TLT) data and examine its relationship to the pronounced warming observed during 2023–2024. To reduce uncertainty and improve the robustness of acceleration detection, an adjusted TLT record is constructed by removing ENSO- and aerosol-related variability. This adjustment reduces the magnitude of TLT annual variability by nearly 50%, which greatly increases the robustness and reliability of acceleration detection. We therefore recommend using the ENSO–aerosol-adjusted TLT for long-term trend and acceleration analyses. With the adjusted TLT, statistically significant warming trends of up to 0.482 ± 0.113°C decade⁻¹ are found from 2015 onward across all satellite and reanalysis datasets examined in this study, representing an increase of approximately four to five times relative to the pre-2015 period. This large trend, however, is only a conservative estimate. At the upper end, statistically significant acceleration rates of up to 0.48 ± 0.12°C decade⁻² are inferred near 2024, indicating that the recent temperature jumps are part of an ongoing acceleration amplified by the El Niño event. Projections based on the accelerated trend estimates suggest the potential for an additional 0.5–1.0°C of warming within the next decade.