Paris, France:

With the UN climate summit starting in Azerbaijan in a week, here’s a recap of 10 key facts in the fight against global warming.

1988: Creates a key UN body

Alerted by scientists to signs that the Earth’s surface is warming, the United Nations in 1988 sets up the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to investigate.

Two years later, the panel reports that heat-trapping “greenhouse” gases generated by human activity are increasing and could intensify global warming.

In a number of studies, evidence is accumulating that human activities — burning coal, oil and gas; deforestation and destructive agricultural practices — are warming the Earth’s surface, a prelude to disruption of its climate system.

1992: Earth Summit

A 1992 “Earth Summit” in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, creates the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) with the goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

Since 1995, so-called “Conferences of the Parties” or COPs have met to pursue this elusive goal.

1997: The Kyoto Protocol

In 1997, nations agreed in Kyoto, Japan, to a 2008-2012 timeframe for industrialized countries to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by an average of 5.2 percent from 1990 levels.

Developing countries, including China, India and Brazil, are not required to commit to binding targets.

But in 2001, the United States, at the time the world’s largest carbon emitter, refused to ratify the protocol, which entered into force in 2005.

2007: Nobel Prize

The IPCC reports in 2007 that the evidence for global warming is now “unequivocal” and that extreme weather events are likely to increase.

In October 2007, the UN panel shared the Nobel Peace Prize with former US Vice President Al Gore for their efforts to sound the alarm on climate change.

2009: The collapse of Copenhagen

Participants at the COP15 meeting in the Danish capital Copenhagen fail to reach an agreement for the post-2012 period.

Several dozen major emitters, including China and the US, announce a goal of limiting global temperature increases to two degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, but are vague about how that goal will be met.

2015: Paris landmark agreement

In December 2015, nearly every nation on Earth committed to limiting warming to “well below” two degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.

A more ambitious limit of 1.5 Celsius is also being adopted in the French capital, Paris, as the preferred target.

2018: Greta Thunberg

In 2018, Swedish teenager Greta Thunberg begins skipping school on Fridays to stand in front of the Swedish parliament, demanding more substantial action to combat climate change.

Despite ending her Friday protests in 2023 after graduation, her protest inspires students around the world to skip class every Friday in an attempt to demand more from global leaders.

2022: biodiversity agreement

In December 2022, a biodiversity agreement is reached in Montreal, Canada, which calls for the designation of 30% of the planet’s land and oceans as protected areas by 2030 and an end to the extinction of threatened species due to human activities.

2023: the ‘beginning of the end’ for fossil fuels

COP28 in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, concludes with a landmark agreement to transition away from fossil fuels.

EU climate chief Wopke Hoekstra calls the deal “long, long overdue,” saying it took nearly 30 years of climate meetings to “reach the beginning of the end of fossil fuels.”

2024: the strongest in history

The northern summer of 2024 records the warmest global temperatures ever recorded.

The August 2024 global average temperature at the Earth’s surface is 16.82 C, according to the EU’s Copernicus climate monitor.

This exceeds the level of 1.5 C above the pre-industrial average — the key threshold for limiting the worst effects of climate change.

(This story was not edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)