ABSTRACT
The most authoritative attempts to look at the causes and consequences of climate change have been undertaken by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which has been collating existing data and coordinating new studies on the topic for two decades. The climate appears to respond in a more vigorous way than predicted by the magnitude of the solar energy change alone, and climate models indicate that some sort of positive feedback involving vegetation and greenhouse gases is also needed. Certain gases in the atmosphere, known as radiatively active gases, or greenhouse gases, absorb some of the upward-going long-wave radiation after it has left the Earth’s surface. Carbon is at the heart not only of life, but also of energy production and climate change. Scientists have used large volcanic eruptions to test their models of climate change scenarios and to separate human from natural effects. Developing countries will be more adversely affected by climate change than industrialised economies.
