Weather and climate disasters, from extreme floods to heat and drought, hit millions and cost billions in 2022, the UN weather agency said Friday.

The clear need to do much more to cut greenhouse gas emissions was again underscored throughout events in 2022, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) added.

"This year we have faced several dramatic weather disasters which claimed far too many lives and livelihoods and undermined health, food, energy and water security and infrastructure," WMO chief Petteri Taalas said.

"There is a need to enhance preparedness for such extreme events and to ensure that we meet the UN target of Early Warnings for All in the next five years."

While Global temperature figures for 2022 will be released in mid-January, the past eight years are on track to be the eight warmest on record, according to the WMO.

While the persistence of a cooling La Niña event, now in its third year, means that 2022 will not be the warmest year on record, its cooling impact will be short-lived and not reverse the long-term warming trend caused by record levels of heat-trapping greenhouse gases in our atmosphere.

Also, this will be the tenth successive year that temperatures have reached at least 1°C above pre-industrial levels – likely to breach the 1.5°C limit of the Paris Agreement.

The WMO will promote a new way of monitoring the sinks and sources of carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide by using the ground-based Global Atmosphere Watch, satellite and assimilation modelling, which allows a better understanding of how key greenhouse gases behave in the atmosphere.

Greenhouse gases are just one climate indicator used to observe levels.

Sea levels, which have doubled since 1993; ocean heat content; and acidification are also at recorded highs.

The past two and a half years alone account for 10 percent of the overall sea level rise since satellite measurements started nearly 30 years ago, the WMO's provisional State of the Global Climate in 2022 report said.

And 2022 took an exceptionally heavy toll on glaciers in the European Alps, with initial indications of record-shattering melt.

The Greenland ice sheet lost mass for the 26th consecutive year and it rained – rather than snowed – on the summit for the first time in September.

Although 2022 did not break global temperature records, it topped many national heat records throughout the world.

India and Pakistan experienced soaring heat in March and April. China had the most extensive and long-lasting heatwave since national records began and the second-driest summer on record.

And parts of the northern hemisphere were exceptionally hot and dry.

Read more: Summer droughts now 20 times more likely due to climate change

A large area centred around the central-northern part of Argentina, as well as in southern Bolivia, central Chile, and most of Paraguay and Uruguay, experienced record-breaking temperatures during two consecutive heatwaves in late November and early December 2022.

"Record-breaking heatwaves have been observed in China, Europe, North and South America," the WMO chief said. 'The long-lasting drought in the Horn of Africa threatens a humanitarian catastrophe."

And while large parts of Europe sweltered in repeated episodes of extreme heat, the UK hit a new national record in July, when the temperature topped more than 40°C for the very first time.

In East Africa, rainfall was below average throughout four consecutive wet seasons – the longest in 40 years – triggering a major humanitarian crisis affecting millions of people, devastating agriculture, and killing livestock, especially in Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia.

Record-breaking rain in July and August led to extensive flooding in Pakistan, which caused at least 1,700 deaths, displaced 7.9 million and affected 33 million people.

Read more: UN chief appeals to world to help badly flood-hit Pakistan