Globalwarming Awareness2007 - How Real is Global warming
Although atmospheric composition and the climate can vary on their own, there is near-universal scientific consensus that increased greenhouse gas emissions from human activity is causing the planet to warm, and that significant climatic changes will occur if nothing is done to reverse the trend.
Global warming has become a highly politicized issue over the past two decades, partly because reversing it requires significant policy and behavioral shifts, as well as federal legislation and leadership. A small number of well-funded skeptics, mostly with energy industry ties continue to doubt or challenge the consensus of the world’s scientific community that global warming has worsened because of human activity. Although their numbers are diminishing, these few argue, falsely, that global warming is either a myth or that there is dissent within the scientific community. This is not the case.
The 2001 Climate Change Assessment Report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a U.N. group, offers the consensus of more than 2,500 climate scientists from roughly 100 countries. The Natural Resources Defense Council has an annotated bibliography of global warming science that summarizes relevant scientific findings by year. In addition, the Pew Center on Global Climate Change offers the article, “Climate Change: Myths and Realities.”
The truth is-even if one wishes to argue about what causes global warming or how well we can stop it-no one can de ny that it is actually happening. The 1-degree temperature rise this past century has been documented. Snow cover has decreased, mountain glaciers have retreated, and the average sea levels and temperatures have risen. Global warming is happening now.