Labor and the Greens are pressuring the Government to do more to combat climate change, in light of a new report showing 2014 as the hottest year in modern history.

The data from America's space agency NASA shows that not only was 2014 the warmest year recorded since 1880, 10 of the hottest years on record have happened since 1998.

Researchers said the long-term trend was being driven by human emissions of greenhouse gases, particularly the burning of fossil fuels.

Opposition environment spokesman Anthony Albanese said the Government simply does not get it.

"It's putting ideology in front of common sense," he said.

"Whilst we know that we can't attribute specific events to climate change, what we can say is that extreme occurrences are happening more regularly and are more extreme."

Greens leader Christine Milne said the climate was "getting out of control".

"If Tony Abbott is serious when he says he doesn't want to run up the credit card for our children, then don't run up the debt on the environment," she said.

The Government consistently said Australia was on track to cut emissions by 5 per cent by 2020.

But Will Steffan, the head of the Australian National University's Climate Change Institute, said more needed to be done.

Space to play or pause, M to mute, left and right arrows to seek, up and down arrows for volume. Listen Duration: 3 minutes 32 seconds 3 m 32 s Listen to the interview with ANU's Will Steffen Download 6.5 MB

He said effects of the steadily warming climate such as heatwaves, bushfires and extreme weather were happening more frequently and closer together.

"Historically in Australia, more people die from heatwaves than they do from any other type of natural disaster," Professor Steffen told ABC's AM program.

"It does have consequences and it isn't the meteorological record that scientists and geeks like to look at, it's actually affecting us on the ground, now.

"There is no doubt that to really get on top of this problem we have to have deeper targets, more ambitious targets for 2020."

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The NASA analysis is backed up by a separate, independent report from NASA's sister agency, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) - as well as the British and Japanese weather offices.

Parts of the world that saw record heat included Russia, western Alaska, the western US, parts of interior South America, parts of eastern and western coastal Australia, north Africa and most of Europe.

Record cold for the year was apparent only in some parts of the eastern and central US.

Scientists have warned of grave consequences this century if global temperatures keep rising as anticipated, including heavily populated coastal regions being swamped by rising ocean levels, more deadly extreme weather events and droughts that may harm food production.

This year representatives of about 200 governments will meet in Paris to try to forge a deal to limit global warming to avoid floods, droughts, heatwaves and rising sea levels blamed on increasing emissions of greenhouse gases, which result from burning fossil fuels such as coal and oil.

ABC/wires