Climate and environment updates: EV sales are surging globally despite Trump administration pullback

It's been more than 50 years since the first Earth Day in the United States. On April 22, 1970, people gathered at events across the country to raise awareness about the environmental issues impacting our nation and the planet. While the Earth Day movement has helped raise awareness about human-amplified climate change and has led to some regulatory actions, 5 1/2 decades later, the planet continues to warm at an alarming rate, with the impacts of that warming worsening with each passing decade.

Climate scientists have long recognized that increasing levels of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases that trap heat in the atmosphere contribute directly to global warming. There is a strong and well-established link between rising global temperatures and extreme heat events as a result of human-induced climate change.

Since the first Earth Day, the annual average concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has increased by more than 30%. It is now rising at the fastest rate on record, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

All 50 states and 240 cities across the U.S. have experienced warming since the first Earth Day, according to an analysis by Climate Central, a nonprofit climate research group. Alaska has warmed the fastest, followed by Delaware, Massachusetts and New Jersey.

The Arctic region is heating much faster than the global average, which has pushed Alaska to the top of the list, with its average annual temperature rising by 4.3 degrees Fahrenheit since 1970. Among cities, the fastest-warming over the past 55 years include Reno and Las Vegas in Nevada, El Paso and Tyler in Texas and Burlington, Vermont.

Overall, the contiguous United States is now about 2.8 degrees Fahrenheit warmer than it was in 1970, based on average annual temperatures.

Warming global temperatures are also driving sea-level rise, which has been accelerating in recent decades due to melting glaciers and ice sheets, as well as the thermal expansion of seawater as it warms.

Since 1970, sea levels have risen by more than half a foot, on average, across the contiguous United States, according to the Interagency Task Force on Sea Level Change. Some regional coastlines, states and cities have experienced even greater increases. Sea-level rise varies regionally along the nation's coastlines due to shifts in both land elevation and ocean height.

The Northeast coastline, for example, has recorded an average increase of 9 inches since 1970. Florida has seen a rise of 7 inches over the past 5 1/2 decades, while in Washington, D.C., the sea level is now 8 inches higher than in 1970.

-ABC News meteorologist Dan Peck

Artificial intelligence is growing at a meteoric rate, requiring a larger share of the world's energy. Powering AI is a vast infrastructure of data centers, cloud networks and computing systems that are fueling a growing energy demand.

In a first-of-its-kind comprehensive report on AI and energy, the International Energy Agency said the global expansion of AI data centers is likely to drive some of the fastest growth in global electricity demand seen in recent years.

"With the rise of AI, the energy sector is at the forefront of one of the most important technological revolutions of our time," IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol said.

The IEA projects electricity demand from global data centers will more than double over the next five years and, by 2030, consume as much as the nation of Japan does today.

According to the report, data centers in the United States are likely to account for almost half of the growth in electricity demand. The report emphasizes that by 2030, the U.S. economy will use more electricity for data processing than for producing all energy-intensive goods combined, such as steel, aluminum, cement and chemicals.

Despite concerns over rising global energy demand, the IEA said their analysis shows positive impacts, like increased productivity, enhanced competitiveness and cost reductions, could outweigh the negative effects. In fact, the growth of AI in the energy sector could even help reduce global energy-related emissions, a reduction that could be far larger than new emissions from data centers, the report found.

While a mix of energy sources will be needed to meet the world's growing data center electricity demands, renewable sources are expected to supply roughly half of the global demand growth over the next five years, according to the report. Data centers may also serve as hubs for new low-emission energy projects. And as AI becomes more integrated into scientific research, the IEA said it could help accelerate innovation in energy technologies such as batteries and solar PV.

For example, leaks are a significant source of methane emissions in oil and gas production. The report said AI can facilitate rapid leak detection so that repairs happen sooner, limiting total emissions. AI could also help reduce transportation-related emissions by choosing the most efficient travel routes in real time, according to the report.

-ABC News meteorologist Dan Peck

It has been an active start to the severe weather season. According to a new report from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, U.S. tornado activity in March was more than twice the monthly average, with over 200 tornadoes recorded.

This trend continued through the first week of April, with more than 150 tornado reports across the South and Midwest during a devastating multi-day stretch of life-threatening weather conditions.

The report also highlighted notable temperature and precipitation trends nationwide in March. Last month, the average temperature of the contiguous U.S. was 46.9 degrees Fahrenheit, more than 5.4 degrees Fahrenheit above average. That ranked last month as the nation's sixth warmest March on record. Above-average to way above-average temperatures were observed across most of the Lower 48, except for parts of California and the Southeast.

Precipitation was below average across much of the Plains and South in March, which brought expanding and intensifying drought conditions to states like Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas. Persistently dry conditions also kept a drought in place across much of the Carolinas, fueling the destructive wildfires that ravaged both states last month.

North Carolina experienced its driest March since 2016, and South Carolina has had its driest first three months of the year in nearly 40 years. The extremely dry conditions were a primary contributor to the rapid spread of the flames, which was exacerbated by the millions of downed trees in the region due to Hurricane Helene last fall. This created an abundance of dry fuel, allowing wildfires to explode in size. Drought conditions are likely to persist across the Carolinas through the end of the month.

According to the latest U.S. Drought Monitor report released on April 1, about 43.4% of the contiguous U.S. is experiencing drought.

-ABC News meteorologist Dan Peck

Last month was the second-warmest March on record globally, according to new data analyzed by the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S). And once again, the planet exceeded 1.5 degrees Celsius, as established by the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement, coming in slightly above that at 1.6 degrees Celsius above the pre-industrial average (1850-1900).

Last month marked the 20th of the previous 21 months to exceed the warming threshold established in the Agreement. The 1.5-degree ceiling was established because scientists and international climate organizations say limiting global temperatures to that level significantly reduces the risks and impacts of climate change.

It is important to note that exceeding the 1.5 degree Celsius threshold temporarily is not seen as a failure to limit warming under the Agreement since it looks at the climate average over multiple decades. Still, the trend is concerning.

The planet may have fallen just short of breaking another global temperature record for March, but Europe soared to a new record. The March average temperature over that continent was 2.41 degrees Celsius, or 4.34 degrees Fahrenheit, above the 1991-2020 average for the month, making it the warmest March on record.

Globally, the average surface air temperature was 14.06 degrees Celsius, or 57.31 degrees Fahrenheit.

Global daily sea surface temperatures across most of the world’s oceans remain well above average, including across the Atlantic Basin. The report found that the average global sea surface temperature for March 2025 was 69.73 degrees Fahrenheit, the second-highest value on record for the month.

Unusually warm sea surface temperatures could once again play a major role in tropical cyclone development during the upcoming Atlantic Hurricane Season, which begins on June 1. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration will release its official outlook for the forthcoming season later next month.

Arctic sea ice extent dipped to its lowest value on record for the month of March at 6% below average. This was the fourth straight month with record-low ice cover for the corresponding month. Antarctic sea ice extent was 24% below average for the month, according to Copernicus.

-ABC News meteorologist Dan Peck