IPCC - Start To Act Now - Right Now - On Climate, Or Inhabit An "Unrecognizable" Earth - AFP

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Without urgent, aggressive steps to stop greenhouse gas emissions, climate change will cause devastating heat waves, floods, starvation and disease, says a report written by the world's top climate scientists and endorsed by 140 nations yesterday.

Environment Minister John Baird immediately welcomed the document, from the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. "Canada, like the rest of the world, needs to take immediate action," he said in a written statement. But critics said the minister and the rest of the Conservative government still pay lip service to the problem while promoting a plan that would make it worse.

"The government is acting to protect industry and its shareholders instead of the planet and future generations," said John Bennett, of Ottawa-based ClimateforChange.

Impacts have already begun, declares a 23-page summary of thousands of pages of scientific evidence. Without action, human activity could lead to "abrupt and irreversible changes" that make Earth unrecognizable.

EDIT

http://www.thestar.com/sciencetech/article/277497

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1. terra incognito