We’re ruining Earth, scientists warn

Droughts will be longer, flooding rains will be rarer but heavier. Cyclones will hit harder. Violent storms and extreme heatwaves will strike more frequently. Evaporation will suck up scarce inland water. Sea levels will creep up half a metre. Oceans will be so acidic that in some places shells and reefs will dissolve.

And humanity, not nature, will be to blame.

This is the assessment of the state of the planet according to what is possibly the most reviewed document in history.
Containing contributions from 2500 scientists, citing 6000 reports and reviewed by 750 experts operating under a United Nations banner, the first part of the report will be released on Friday after line-by-line consensus is reached on its conclusions.

The most important paragraph in the 1200-page report is the strength of the scientific statement on the question that has most inflamed climate change sceptics — what is driving global warming — according to internationally recognised climate expert Dr Graeme Pearman, a former CSIRO chief of atmospheric research.

“It makes a much stronger statement about unequivocal evidence of air and ocean temperature rises, of the melting of snow and ice and the raising of sea levels, and that the effect is from human activities,” he said. The report says the human influence on climate is at least five times that of any natural variation of the sun.

The Age