ABSTRACT
According to the Framework Convention on Climate Change, climate change refers to a change in climate which is directly or indirectly due to human activity altering the composition of the atmosphere and which can be observed over a given time period. This defi nition differs from that of the International Panel for Climate Change (IPCC), which defi nes climate change to mean any change in climate over time, whether due to natural variability or a result of human activities. This book uses the IPCC defi nition, based mainly on the fi ndings of the fourth assessment published in 2007 (IPCC 2007).
