Re: SC36

http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1584992,00.html

Climate Change

The debate on global warming is over.

That's the ultimate message from the report released in Paris today by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the U.N. body of leading researchers charged with analyzing climate science and producing the final word on what is happening — and will happen — to our planet. IPCC scientists now say that it is "very likely" that global warming is chiefly driven by the buildup of carbon dioxide (CO2) and other greenhouse gases caused by human activity, and that dangerous levels of warming and sea rise are on the way.

Those two words — the product of 2,500 scientists, 130 nations and 6 years of work — translates into a certainty of over 90%, up from the 66 to 90% chance the panel reported in its last major climate change assessment in 2001. That might not seem like a big difference, but in science, especially in a field as rapidly developing as climate studies, 90% is as good as it gets. The new report effectively completes a scientific revolution that began at the end of the 19th century, when a Swedish geochemist named Svante Arrhenius first proposed that CO2 released into the atmosphere by burning fossil fuels could change the planet's climate. "The message of this report is that the time for sitting on the fence is finished," says Robert Watson, chief scientist at the World Bank and a former chair of the IPCC. "Now is the time for action."

Action will need to be quick and substantial. The IPCC estimated that should the concentration of carbon dioxide reach twice the pre-industrial level of 280 parts per million, temperatures could rise between 3.2 to 7.1 degrees (Fahrenheit) — with a more than 1 in 10 change of far greater warming. Sea levels could rise between 7 and 23 inches. Heat waves and droughts will become more intense and longer-lived. Though the new IPCC assessment doesn't go into the social impacts of climate change, past studies indicate that the changes predicted will have a profound effect on humanity. Even if we were somehow able to end all greenhouse gas emissions today the world would continue to warm, thanks to the gases we've already added to the atmosphere — which now has a higher level of carbon than at any time over the past 650,000 years. "We're already committed to future changes," said Susan Solomon, a U.S. climatologist and co-chair of the new IPCC assessment............

But, will humanity take heed, and begin the drastic alterations in the ways we live our lives needed to even prevent the most dramatic climate change senarios predicted. Here in the US, Exxon is offering 10,000 dollars to scientist who will write reports that would show the IPCC report information is not accurate. The huge changes that are needed to address the massive introduction of CO2 into our atmosphere, are bad news for Big Oils mindboggling profit gains of late. If Exxon can create confusion within the public about the reality of Global Warming, the may avoid the huge expense of abiding by policies meant to reign in CO2 emmisions. After the IPCC report was released yesterday, the US Energy Secretary made comments that implied that the US is only a very small part of the problem, therefore infereing there wasn't much we as a nation should have to do. The US consumes 25% of the world's energy, and produces by consequence a similiar amount CO2 gases because of these burned fuels. From the point of view of those outside the insulated mindset of most in the US, we represent the biggest part of the world CO2 problem, and should therefore be obligated to responsibly as a nation, take the lead in trying to develop strategies to help mitigate the grave threat that Global Warming will present to the world's population's. Bush's meaningless and hollow jestures proposed as solutions for Global Warming have shown themselves to be consistently lacking any credible reality to thier premises. He has no intention of really addressing coming Climate Change, and its clear to see, since he has accomplished essential nothing of positive value in reference to reigning in Greenhouse Gases.