Climate fears ‘being realised’
The worst-case scenarios on climate change envisaged by the UN two
years ago are already being realised, say scientists at an international
meeting.
In a statement in Copenhagen on their six key messages to political
leaders, they say there is a increasing risk of abrupt or irreversible
climate shifts. Even modest temperature rises will affect millions of
people, particularly in the developing world, they warn.
But, they say, most tools needed to cut carbon dioxide emissions
already exist. More than 2,500 researchers and economists attended this
meeting designed to update the world on the state of climate research
ahead of key political negotiations set for December this year.
New data was presented in Copenhagen on sea level rise, which
indicated that the best estimates of the Intergovernmental Panel on
Climate Change (IPCC) made two years ago were woefully out of date.
Scientists heard that waters could rise by over a metre across the
world with huge impacts for hundreds of millions of people.
There was also new information on how the Amazon rainforest would
cope with rising temperatures. A UK Meteorological Office study
concluded there would be a 75% loss of tree cover if the world warmed by
three degrees for a century.
The scientists hope that their conclusions will remove any excuses
from the political process. Dr. Katherine Richardson, who chaired the
scientific steering committee that organised the conference, said the
research presented added new certainty to the IPCC reports.
“We’ve seen lots more data, we can see where we are, no new
surprises, we have a problem.”
The meeting was also addressed by Lord Stern, the economist, whose
landmark review of the economics of climate change published in 2006
highlighted the severe cost to the world of doing nothing.
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