Scientists are more certain than ever that greenhouse gases from human activities are heating the planet, Rajendra Pachauri, the head of the UN’s climate panel, says. Rajendra Pachauri made the comments in an interview with BBC News.
The panel is due to deliver its latest report on the state of the climate later this week in Stockholm, Sweden. Its last report was criticised after an error on glaciers unveiled other flaws, but Prof Pachauri said procedures had been reformed and strengthened.
He also dismissed suggestions of a slowdown in global warming. “There’s definitely an increase in our belief that climate change is taking place and that human beings are responsible,” he told me.
“I don’t think there is a slowdown (in the rate of temperature increase). I would like to draw your attention to the World Meteorological Organization which clearly stated on the basis of observations that the first decade of this century has been the warmest in recorded history.
“And I think the rest will be brought out by the report itself when it’s released.”
Prof Pachauri’s insistence that warming has not slowed hints at a focus of debate this week in Stockholm: Global temperatures have not been increasing as fast as scientists predicted, and several governments insist that this puzzle is properly addressed in the final summary.
Have computer climate models overestimated the sensitivity of the planet to increasing CO2? Or has excess heat been stored up in oceans whence it will emerge to super-heat the planet in decades to come? Or both?
Source: BBC News Science and Environment