Posted on 23 September
2013 | Gland, Switzerland – Governments
will gather today in Stockholm to start
considering the final text for the latest
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
(IPCC) Working Group 1 report, widely expected
to highlight the drivers of climate change.
According to WWF Global
Climate and Energy Initiative leader Samantha
Smith, the report should give more clarity
on the science and increased certainty about
the causes of climate change.
“More than 800 scientists
from around the world have contributed to
writing a compelling scientific account
of the state of the earth. The report is
going to underscore a terrifying reality
– that the earth is warming at an alarming
rate and that these temperature changes
are already having serious consequences
for both people and planet,” she says.
Our natural world is
sending a distress signal and we’re ignoring
it at our own peril. But if governments
act now, comprehensively and immediately,
they will be able to do something to change
the dangerous path we are on, she says.
“The energy sector is
the main culprit causing runaway climate
change – but it also contains the solution
to this challenge. We expect this report
to confirm again that burning fossil fuels
is driving dangerous climate change. Extraction
of fossil fuels is also increasingly a driver
for direct loss of biodiversity. But at
the same time, renewable energy provides
a straightforward, proven and increasingly
affordable and safe solution, with far fewer
direct impacts.”
If we are to follow
the science, then we have to stop investing
in fossil fuels and increase investment
in sustainable renewable energy. WWF is
calling on investors and financiers around
the world to end their support for coal
and to increase investments in sustainable,
renewable energy, including energy access
for the poor.
“Getting a future where
our economies are powered by renewable energy
is not only within reach but is the only
option we have if we are to leave a sustainable
world to our children.”
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Unprecedented rate of
change in climate demands action
Posted on 27 September
2013 | Stockholm, Sweden – Climate change
is happening faster, more intensely and,
in many cases, at an unprecedented rate
of change, according to the Fifth Assessment
Working Group 1 report of the Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change. This demands action.
“There are few surprises in this report
but the increase in the confidence around
many observations just validates what we
are seeing happening around us,” said Samantha
Smith, leader of WWF’s Global Climate &
Energy Initiative. “Since the IPCC issued
its last big report in 2007, terrestrial
glacier loss and sea-level rise has dramatically
accelerated; the Arctic summer sea ice losses
are higher than originally projected and
the last decade was the warmest since 1850.”
Particular findings
show major impacts on our oceans are a huge
concern, as more than one billion people
live and depend on oceans as their main
source of food and livelihood. Ocean acidification
since 1900 has increased by almost 30% and
is probably at its strongest level over
many million years.
“It’s CO2, mainly from
burning fossil fuels, that dissolves in
oceans and may destroy an already fragile
ecosystem in an almost irreversible way
if mankind does not shift from fossil fuels
to renewables as soon as possible”, said
Dr Stephan Singer, WWF’s director of global
energy policy.
“Warmer and much more
acid oceans are detrimental for fish, coral
reefs and most other parts of marine ecosystems.”
It is incumbent on all
sectors of society, including governments,
to now act on the facts and science presented
in this report which has gone through an
unprecedented process of review, he said.
“Whichever facts may
be discussed, debated or distorted, we cannot
ignore the reality that we must act or face
frightening new impacts. We know that most
of the pollution that causes climate change
comes from burning fossil fuels. WWF calls
on governments and investors to stop investing
in dirty energy and start an immediate and
just transition by investing in renewables,”
says Smith.
