Climate Change

Climate change is one of the greatest environmental, social and economic threats facing the planet.
The warming of the climate system is unequivocal, as is now evident from observations of increases in global average air and ocean temperatures, widespread melting of snow and ice, and rising global mean sea level. The Earth’s average surface temperature has risen by 0.76° C since 1850. Most of the warming that has occurred over the last 50 years is very likely to have been caused by human activities. In its Fourth Assessment Report (AR4), published on 2 February 2007, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) projects that, without further action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the global average surface temperature is likely to rise by a further 1.8-4.0°C this century. Even the lower end of this range would take the temperature increase since pre-industrial times above 2°C, the threshold beyond which irreversible and possibly catastrophic changes become far more likely.
Projected global warming this century is likely to trigger serious consequences for humanity and other life forms, including a rise in sea levels of between 18 and 59 cm which will endanger coastal areas and small islands, and a greater frequency and severity of extreme weather events.
Human activities that contribute to climate change include in particular the burning of fossil fuels, agriculture and land-use changes like deforestation. These cause emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2), the main gas responsible for climate change, as well as of other ‘greenhouse’ gases. To bring climate change to a halt, global greenhouse gas emissions must be reduced significantly.
The European Union is at the forefront of international efforts to combat climate change and has played a key role in the development of the two major treaties addressing the issue, the 1992 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and its Kyoto Protocol, agreed in 1997.
The EU has been taking serious steps to address its own greenhouse gas emissions since the early 1990s. In March 2000 the Commission launched the European Climate Change Program (ECCP). The ECCP has led to the adoption of a wide range of new policies and measures. Among these is the pioneering EU Emissions Trading Scheme, launched on 1 January 2005, which has become the cornerstone of EU efforts to reduce emissions cost-effectively.
Monitoring data and projections indicate that the 15 European Union members at the time of the EU’s ratification of the Kyoto Protocol in 2002 (EU-15) will reach their Kyoto Protocol target for cutting greenhouse gas emissions. This requires emissions in 2008-2012 to be 8% below 1990 levels.
However, Kyoto is only a first step. Ambitious action to reduce global emissions is needed after 2012, when Kyoto’s targets expire, in order to limit global warming to 2°C. In January 2007 the European Commission set out proposals and options for achieving this in its Communication “Limiting Global Climate Change to 2 degrees Celsius: The way ahead for 2020 and beyond” The key targets in the Communication, as well as the broad thrust of the integrated energy and climate change strategy of which it forms part, were endorsed by EU leaders at their summit in Brussels on 8-9 March 2007.
 The IPCC’s latest scientific assessment “Climate Change 2007” can be downloaded here. Working Group I of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) finalized the Summary for Policymakers of the first volume of “Climate Change 2007”, also known as the Fourth Assessment Report (AR4). The report “Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis”, assesses the current scientific knowledge of the natural and human drivers of climate change, observed changes in climate, the ability of science to attribute changes to different causes, and projections for future climate change.
(Climate Action Energy for a Changing World)

How climate change could affect you

Our climate is changing – both in Britain and round the world. Because of man-made pollution that traps the sun’s heat, the planet may never have warmed as fast as it has in the past 25 years. The years 2005 and 1998 were probably the warmest years of the last millennium. The 1990s was the warmest decade and the 20th century the warmest century.
This is going at affect us all, and the evidence of the first signs of climate change is all around us. In Europe, the glaciers of the Alps are disappearing and droughts in the Mediterranean are worsening. Southern Spain is turning to desert. In the tropics, high sea temperatures whip up unprecedented storms and hurricanes that bring floods and lethal landslides. In Siberia, roads buckle as permafrost melts. And, as ice melts and oceans warm, sea levels worldwide are rising.
We are at risk because warmer temperatures are likely to dry out soils and reduce rainfall. In southeast England rainfall could, according to the Met Office researchers, be halved in the next 40 years, posing big threats to water supplies. But elsewhere there will be worse storms and floods. Fewer people may die of cold in the winter, but very many more could die of heatstroke in the summer. In the summer of 2003, some 20,000 people died during a heatwave in France; the same could soon happen in Britain.
If, as some glaciologists fear, the Greenland and Antarctic ice caps start to collapse in the coming decades, sea levels could eventually rise by several metres, flooding large areas of eastern England and the Thames estuary.
Such arguments have persuaded the great majority of the world’s governments to sign treaties such as the Kyoto Protocol to cut greenhouse gas emissions, the likely cause of the warming. Britain is at the forefront of this effort with its scientific leadership of the International Panel on Climate Change and the government’s lobbying to get the Kyoto Protocol entered into force. In addition, Britain has set itself tough domestic targets for reducing emissions and switching to cleaner sources of energy. But so far progress in reaching them has been slow.
The Environment Agency is taking a leading role in advising government, regulating emissions of greenhouse gases, predicting impacts and helping the country plan for and protects itself from a future of climatic uncertainty and rising sea levels. (Environment Agency)