A recently released annual climate report for 2025 reveals our planet is enduring an unprecedented hot streak. Last year was the third-warmest year on record, and the last 11 years have ranked as the 11 warmest years on record.
The hot streak has raised the concern of people in Ireland, a country that has been feeling the heat, too. The last four years have been Ireland's top four warmest years in its more than 150 years of climate records. 2025 was Ireland's second-warmest year on record, a year punctuated by several extreme weather events
"Those are stark findings," climatologist Paul Moore with Met Éireann, the national meteorological service of Ireland, told the Irish Times. "It shows that we have already reached a new spike [in temperatures] and we're on course for another one. And as we know, as temperatures warm, the extreme weather events get more extreme and more frequent."
The Copernicus Climate Change Service's 2025 global climate assessment reports that the world has warmed beyond a crucial benchmark defined by the 2015 Paris Agreement, the international treaty endorsed by nearly every nation to protect the planet from its most dangerous warming impacts.
"Global temperatures from the past three years (2023-2025) averaged more than 1.5°C [2.7 degrees Fahrenheit] above the pre-industrial level (1850–1900)," noted the authors of the assessment. "This marks the first time a three-year period has exceeded the 1.5°C limit."
Ireland crossed this important threshold last year. The country's average annual air temperature last year was 11.14 degrees Celcius (52.05 degrees Fahrenheit) — 1.59 degrees Celcius (2.86 degrees Fahrenheit) above the 1961-1990 long-term average.
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"The warming trend is very clear with the last four years being the warmest four years on record in Ireland, since 1900. 2025 saw not only our warmest spring, but also our warmest summer on record, with high nighttime temperatures contributing to the summer record," commented Moore in Met Éireann's annual climate statement for 2025. "We experienced five named storms in 2025, as well as a number of impactful rain events. The continued warming brings with it the increasing risk of severe weather events."
Ireland saw more than its fair share of severe weather events in 2025. Storm Éowyn hit Ireland hard early last year. The storm whipped up hurricane-force winds in January, setting new wind speed records for the country. In early August, Storm Floris produced gales of around 64 miles per hour at Malin Head in County Donegal. Storm Amy hit in early October, producing storm-force winds and setting October records for 10-minute mean wind speeds at five stations.
Ireland's Central Bank warns that climate-driven economic instability is no longer a distant threat; it is already transforming the nation's financial system. Ireland is taking action to avoid some of the serious risks a warming world poses to the country. After more than 40 years, Ireland closed its final coal-fired power station in County Clare last year, officially ending coal-based electricity.
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