UN Panel: Climate Change Accelerating
By ARTHUR MAX, Associated Press Writer

Saturday, November 17, 2007

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(11-17) 05:43 PST VALENCIA, Spain (AP) --


The Earth is hurtling toward a warmer climate at a quickening pace, a
Nobel-winning U.N. scientific panel said in a landmark report released
Saturday, warning of inevitable human suffering and the threat of
extinction for some species.


As early as 2020, 75 million to 250 million people in Africa will
suffer water shortages, residents of Asia's megacities will be at
great risk of river and coastal flooding, Europeans can expect
extensive species loss, and North Americans will experience longer and
hotter heat waves and greater competition for water, the report from
the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says.


U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon said climate change imperils "the
most precious treasures of our planet."


The potential impact of global warming is "so severe and so sweeping
that only urgent, global action will do," Ban told the IPCC after it
issued its fourth and final report this year.


The IPCC adopted the report, along with a summary, after five days of
sometimes tense negotiations. It lays out blueprints for avoiding the
worst catastrophes -- and various possible outcomes, depending on how
quickly and decisively action is taken.


The document says recent research has heightened concern that the poor
and the elderly will suffer most from climate change; that hunger and
disease will be more common; that droughts, floods and heat waves will
afflict the world's poorest regions; and that more animal and plant
species will vanish.


The Summary for Policymakers, and the longer version, called the
synthesis report, distill thousands of pages of data and computer
models from six years of research compiled by the IPCC.


The information is expected to guide policy makers meeting in Bali,
Indonesia, next month to discuss an agreement to succeed the Kyoto
Protocol, which expires in 2012.


The panel was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize this year along with
former Vice President Al Gore for their efforts to raise awareness
about the effects of climate change.


The report is important because it is adopted by consensus, meaning
countries accept the underlying science and cannot disavow its
conclusions. While it does not commit governments to a specific course
of action, it provides a common scientific baseline for the political
talks.


The U.N. says a new global plan must be in place by 2009 to ensure a
smooth transition after the expiration of the Kyoto terms, which
require 36 industrial countries to radically reduce their carbon
emissions by 2012.


"There are real and affordable ways to deal with climate change," Ban
said. He said a new agreement should provide funding to help poor
countries adopt clean energy and to adapt to changing climates.


The report says emissions of carbon, which comes primarily from fossil
fuels, must stabilize by 2015 and go down after that. Otherwise the
consequences could be "disastrous," said IPCC chairman Rajendra
Pachauri.


In the best-case scenario, temperatures will continue to rise from
carbon already in the atmosphere, the report said. Even if factories
were shut down today and cars taken off the roads, the average sea
level will reach as high as 4 1/2 feet higher than the preindustrial
period, or about 1850.


"We have already committed the world to sea level rise," said
Pachauri. If the Greenland ice sheet melts, the scientists couldn't
even predict by how many meters the seas will rise, drowning coastal
cities.


Yet differences remain stark on how to control carbon emissions.


While the European Union has taken the lead in enforcing the carbon
emission targets outlined in Kyoto, the United States opted out of the
1997 accord.


President Bush described it as flawed because major developing
countries such as India and China, which are large carbon emitters,
were excluded from any obligations. He also favors a voluntary
agreement.


Sharon Hays, a White House science official and head of the U.S.
delegation, said the certainty of climate change was clearer now than
when Bush rejected Kyoto.


"What's changed since 2001 is the scientific certainty that this is
happening," she said in a conference call to reporters late Friday.
"Back in 2001 the IPCC report said it is likely that humans were
having an impact on the climate," but confidence in human
responsibility had increased since then.


"What's new is the clarity of the signal, how clear the scientific
message is," said Yvo de Boer, the U.N.'s top climate change official.
"The politicians have no excuse not to act."


Opening with a sweeping statement directed at climate change skeptics,
the summary declares that climate systems have already begun to
change.


Unless action is taken, human activity could lead to "abrupt and
irreversible changes" that would make the planet unrecognizable.


Advocacy groups hailed the report as indispensable for the 10,000
delegates expected at Bali.


"We expect to see their personal copies of the Synthesis Report return
from Bali, battered and worn from frequent use, with paragraphs
underlined and notes in the margin," said Stephanie Tunmore of
Greenpeace.