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An official report from The Royal Society on Climate Change
issued on 30 September 2010. About
The Royal Society
Founded in 1660, the Royal Society is a registered charity
and is the independent scientific academy of the UK, dedicated to
promoting excellence in science.
The Royal Society is a Fellowship of more than 1400
outstanding
individuals from all areas of science, mathematics, engineering and
medicine, who form a global scientific network of the highest
calibre. The Fellowship is supported by over 130 permanent staff
with responsibility for the day-to-day management of the Society
and its activities. The Society encourages public debate on key
issues involving science, engineering and medicine, and the use of
high quality scientific advice in policy-making. We are committed to
delivering the best independent expert advice, drawing upon the
experience of the Society’s Fellows and Foreign Members, the
wider scientific community and relevant stakeholders
Glossary
Wm²
(watts per metre squared)
The amount of energy that falls on a square metre in one second.
Sometimes known as a flux.
Carbon cycle
The term used to describe the flow of carbon, in its various forms,
between the atmosphere, oceans, plants, soils and rocks. In the
atmosphere, carbon mostly exists as carbon dioxide, but it exists in
different forms in other components, such as organic carbon in the
soil.
Climate forcing (also known as
radiative forcing)
The imbalance in the Earth’s energy budget resulting from, for
example,
changes in the energy received from the Sun, changes in the amounts
or
characteristics of greenhouse gases and particles, or changes in the
nature of the Earth’s surface. Hence climate forcing can result from
both human activity and natural causes. It is given in units of Wm².
Climate sensitivity
This is the amount of climate change (as measured by the change in
globally-averaged surface temperature) for a given amount of climate
forcing. It is often quoted (as will be the case here) as the
temperature
change that eventually results from a doubling in CO2
concentrations,
which is calculated to cause a climate forcing of about 3.6 Wm².
Internal climate variability:
Climate change that occurs in the absence of natural or
human-induced
climate forcing as a result of interactions within and between the
various
components of the climate system (such as the atmosphere, the oceans
and the frozen world).
Introduction
1
Changes in climate have significant
implications for present lives, for future generations and for
ecosystems on which humanity depends. Consequently, climate change
has been and continues to be the subject of intensive scientific
research and public debate.
2
There is strong evidence that the warming of
the Earth over the last half-century has been caused largely by
human activity, such as the burning of fossil fuels and changes in
land use, including agriculture and deforestation. The size of
future temperature increases and other aspects of climate change,
especially at the regional scale, are still subject to uncertainty.
Nevertheless, the risks associated with some of these changes are
substantial. It is important that decision makers have access to
climate science of the highest quality, and can take account of its
findings in formulating appropriate responses.
3
In view of the ongoing public and political debates
about climate change, the aim of this document is to summarise the
current scientific evidence on climate change and its drivers. It
lays out clearly where the science is well established, where there
is wide consensus but continuing debate, and where there remains
substantial uncertainty. The impacts of climate change, as distinct
from the causes, are not considered here. This document draws upon
recent evidence and builds on the Fourth Assessment Report of
Working Group I of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC),
published in 2007, which is the most comprehensive source of climate
science and its uncertainties.
Climate and
climate change: some background science
The greenhouse
effect
4 The Sun is the primary source of energy for the Earth’s climate.
Satellite observations show that about 30% of the Sun’s energy that
reaches the Earth is reflected back to space by clouds, gases and
small particles in the atmosphere, and by the Earth’s surface. The
remainder, about 240 Watts per square metre (Wm²) when averaged over
the planet, is absorbed by the atmosphere and the surface.
5 To balance the absorption of 240 Wm² from the Sun, the Earth’s
surface and atmosphere must emit the same amount of energy into
space; they do so as infrared radiation. On average the surface
emits significantly more than 240 Wm², but the net effect of
absorption and emission of infrared radiation by atmospheric gases
and clouds is to reduce the amount reaching space until it
approximately balances the incoming
energy from the Sun. The surface is thus kept warmer than it
otherwise would be because, in addition to the energy it receives
from the Sun, it also receives infrared energy emitted by the
atmosphere. The warming that results from this infrared energy is
known as the greenhouse effect.
6 Measurements from the surface, research aircraft and satellites,
together with laboratory observations and calculations, show that,
in addition to clouds, the two gases making the largest contribution
to the greenhouse effect are water vapour followed by carbon dioxide
(CO2). There are smaller contributions from many other gases
including ozone, methane, nitrous oxide and human-made gases such as
CFCs(chlorofluorocarbons).
Climate change
7 Climate change on a global scale, whether natural or due to human
activity, can be initiated by processes that modify either the
amount of energy absorbed from the Sun, or the amount of infrared
energy emitted to space.
8 Climate change can therefore be initiated by changes in the energy
received from the Sun, changes in the amounts or characteristics of
greenhouse gases, particles and clouds, or changes in the
reflectivity of the Earth’s surface. The imbalance between the
absorbed and emitted radiation that results from these changes will
be referred to here
as “climate forcing” (sometimes known as “radiative forcing”) and
given in units of Wm-2. A positive climate forcing will tend to
cause a warming, and a negative forcing a cooling. Climate changes
act to restore the balance between the energy absorbed from the Sun
and the infrared energy emitted into space.
9 In principle, changes in climate on a wide range of timescales can
also arise from variations within the climate system due to, for
example, interactions between the oceans and the atmosphere; in this
document, this is referred to as “internal climate variability”.
Such internal variability can occur because the climate is an
example of a chaotic system: one that can exhibit complex
unpredictable internal variations even in the absence of the climate
forcings discussed in the previous paragraph.
10 There is very strong evidence to indicate that climate change has
occurred on a wide range of different timescales from decades to
many millions of years; human activity is a relatively recent
addition to the list of potential causes of climate change.
11 The shifts between glacial and interglacial periods over the past
few million years are thought to have been a response to changes in
the characteristics of the Earth’s orbit around the Sun. While these
led to only small changes in the total energy received from the Sun,
they led to significant changes in its geographical and seasonal
distribution. The large changes in climate, in moving in and out of
glacial periods, provide evidence of the sensitivity of climate to
changes in the Earth’s energy balance, whether attributable to
natural causes or to human activity.
Mechanisms of global
climate change
12 Once a climate forcing mechanism has
initiated a climate response, this climate change can lead to
further changes; for example, in response to a warming, the amount
of water vapour is expected to increase, the extent of snow and ice
is expected to decrease, and the amount and properties of clouds
could also change. Such changes can further modify the amount of
energy absorbed from the Sun, or the amount of energy emitted by the
Earth and its atmosphere, and lead to either a reduction or
amplification of climate change.
13 The overall effect of the changes resulting from climate forcing
determine a key characteristic of the climate system, known as the
“climate sensitivity” – this is the amount of climate change (as
measured by the equilibrium change in globally-averaged surface
temperature) caused by a given amount of climate forcing. It is
often quoted (as
will be the case here) as the temperature change that eventually
results from a doubling in CO2 concentrations since pre-industrial
times, and is calculated to cause a climate forcing of about 3.6
Wm-2.
14 The nature of the climate system is determined by interactions
between the moving atmosphere and oceans, the land surface, the
living world and the frozen world. The rate at which heat is moved
from the surface to the ocean depths is an important factor in
determining the speed at which climate can change in response to
climate forcing.
15 Since variations in climate can result from both climate forcing
and internal climate variability, the detection of forced climate
change in observations is not always straightforward. Furthermore,
the detection of climate change in observations, beyond the expected
internal climate variability, is not the same as the attribution of
that change to a particular cause or causes. Attribution requires
additional evidence to provide a
quantitative link between the proposed cause and the observed
climate change.
Modelling the climate
system
16 Current understanding of the physics
(and increasingly the chemistry and biology) of the climate system
is represented in a mathematical form in climate models, which are
used to simulate past climate and provide projections of possible
future climate change. Climate models are also used to provide
quantitative estimates to assist the attribution of observed climate
change to a particular cause or causes.
17 Climate models vary considerably in complexity. The simplest can
be described by a few equations, and may represent the climate by
global-average surface temperature alone. The most complicated and
computer-intensive models represent many details of the interactions
between components of the climate system. These more complex models
represent variations in parameters such as temperature, wind and
humidity with latitude, longitude and altitude in the atmosphere,
and also represent similar variations in the ocean. In complex
climate models climate sensitivity emerges as an output; in the
simpler calculations it is specified either as an input or it
emerges as a consequence of simplified (but plausible) assumptions.
18 By applying established laws of fluid dynamics and
thermodynamics, the more complex climate models simulate many
important weather phenomena that determine the climate. However,
limitations of computer power mean that these models cannot directly
represent phenomena occurring at small scales. For example,
individual clouds are represented by more approximate methods. Since
there are various ways to make these approximations, the
representation can vary in climate models developed at different
climate institutes. The use of these different approximations leads
to a range of
estimates of climate sensitivity, especially because of differences
between models in the response of clouds to climate change. There
are intensive efforts to compare the models with observations and
with each other. The spread of results from these models gives
useful information on the degree of confidence in the reliability of
projections of climate change.
19 Unlike weather-forecast models, climate models do not seek to
predict the actual weather on a particular day at a particular
location. The more complex models do however simulate individual
weather phenomena, such as mid-latitude depressions and
anticyclones, and aim to give simulations of possible weather
sequences much farther into the future than weather forecast models.
From such simulations, one can derive the characteristics of climate
likely to occur in future decades, including mean temperature and
temperature extremes.
Aspects of
climate change on which there is wide agreement
Changes in
global-average surface temperature
20 Measurements suitable for showing how surface temperature has
changed with time across the world became available around 1850.
Analyses of these data, in a number of institutes, try to take into
account changing distributions of measurements, changing observation
techniques, and changing surroundings of observing stations (e.g.
some stations become more urban with time, which can make
measurements from them less representative of wider areas).
21 Measurements show that averaged over the globe, the surface has
warmed by about 0.8oC (with an uncertainty of about ±0.2oC) since
1850. This warming has not been gradual, but has been largely
concentrated in two periods, from around 1910 to around 1940 and
from around 1975 to around 2000. The warming periods are found in
three independent temperature records over land, over sea and in
ocean surface water. Even
within these warming periods there has been considerable
year-to-year variability. The warming has also not been
geographically uniform – some regions, most markedly the
high-latitude northern continents, have experienced greater warming;
a few regions have experienced little warming, or even a slight
cooling.
22 When these surface temperatures are averaged over periods of a
decade, to remove some of the year-to-year variability, each decade
since the 1970s has been clearly warmer (given known uncertainties)
than the one immediately preceding it. The decade 2000-2009 was,
globally, around 0.15oC warmer than the decade 1990-1999.
23 Local temperatures are generally a poor guide to global
conditions. For example, a colder-than-average winter in the UK does
not mean that colder-than-average conditions are experienced
globally. Similarly, observed variations in global temperature over
a period of just a few years could be a misleading guide to
underlying longer-term trends in global temperature.
Other changes
in climate
24 Not all aspects of the climate system have been observed over as
long a period as surface temperatures – for example, those based on
satellite observations date back, at best, to the 1970s. Nor are the
measurements of other aspects of the climate system always of the
same quality. Collectively, however, they provide much evidence of
climate change consistent with the surface temperature changes. This
includes increases in the average temperature of both the upper 700m
of the ocean and the
troposphere (the atmosphere up to 10-18km), widespread (though not
universal) decreases in the length of mountain glaciers and
increases in average sea level. There has been an overall decline in
the area covered by sea-ice floating on the Arctic Ocean over the
past 30 years (although there has been a small increase in the area
covered by sea-ice around Antarctica).
Changes in
atmospheric composition
25 Global-average CO2 concentrations have been observed to increase
from levels of around 280 parts per million (ppm) in the mid-19th
century to around 388 ppm by the end of 2009. CO2 concentrations can
be measured in “ancient air” trapped in bubbles in ice, deep below
the surface in Antarctica and Greenland; these show that present-day
concentrations are higher than any that have been observed in the
past 800,000 years,
when CO2 varied between about 180 and 300 ppm. Various lines of
evidence point strongly to human activity being the main reason for
the recent increase, mainly due to the burning of fossil fuels
(coal, oil, gas) with smaller contributions from land-use changes
and cement manufacture. The evidence includes the consistency
between calculations of the emitted CO2 and that expected to have
accumulated in the atmosphere, the analysis of the proportions of
different CO2 isotopes, and the amount
of oxygen in the air.
26 These observations show that about half of the CO2 emitted by
human activity since the industrial revolution has remained in the
atmosphere. The remainder has been taken up by the oceans, soils and
plants although the exact amount going to each of these individually
is less well known.
27 Concentrations of many other greenhouse gases have increased. The
concentration of methane has more than doubled in the past 150
years; this recent and rapid increase is unprecedented in the
800,000 year record and evidence strongly suggests that it arises
mainly as a result of human activity.
Climate forcing by greenhouse gas changes
28 Changes in atmospheric composition resulting from human activity
have enhanced the natural greenhouse effect, causing a positive
climate forcing. Calculations, which are supported by laboratory and
atmospheric measurements, indicate that these additional gases have
caused a climate forcing during the industrial era of around 2.9
Wm-2, with an uncertainty of about ±0.2 Wm-2. Other climate change
mechanisms resulting from
human activity are more uncertain (see later); calculations that
take into account these other positive and negative forcings
(including the role of atmospheric particles) indicate that the net
effect of all human activity has caused a positive climate forcing
of around 1.6 Wm-2 with an estimated uncertainty of about ±0.8 Wm-2.
29 Application of established physical principles shows that, even
in the absence of processes that amplify or reduce climate change
(see paragraphs 12 & 13), the climate sensitivity would be around
1oC, for a doubling of CO2 concentrations. A climate forcing of 1.6
Wm-2 (see previous paragraph) would, in this hypothetical case, lead
to a globally averaged surface warming of about 0.4oC. However, as
will be discussed in paragraph 36, it is expected that the actual
change, after accounting for the additional processes, will be
greater than this.
Carbon dioxide and climate
30 Evidence from ice cores indicates an active role for CO2 in the
climate system. This is because the amount of carbon held in oceans,
soils and plants depends on temperature and other conditions. In
other words, changes in CO2 can lead to climate change and climate
change can also alter the concentrations of CO2.
Aspects of
climate change where there is a wide consensus but continuing debate
and discussion
The carbon cycle and climate
31 Once atmospheric CO2
concentrations are increased, carbon cycle models (which simulate
the exchange of carbon between the atmosphere, oceans, soils and
plants) indicate that it would take a very long time for that
increased CO2 to disappear; this is mainly due to well-known
chemical reactions in the ocean. Current understanding indicates
that even if there was a complete cessation of emissions of CO2
today from human activity, it would take several millennia for CO2
concentrations to return to preindustrial concentrations.
Other drivers
of global climate change
32 In addition to changes in
greenhouse gas concentrations, there are a large number of less well
characterised contributions to climate forcing, both natural and
human induced.
33 Volcanic eruptions are examples of a natural climate forcing
mechanism. An individual volcanic eruption has its largest effects
on the climate for only a few years after the eruption; these
effects are dependent on the location, size and type of the
eruption.
34 Natural forcing due to sustained variations in the energy emitted
by the Sun over the past 150 years is estimated to be small (about
0.12 Wm-2); however, direct observations of the energy emitted by
the Sun only became available in the 1970s and estimates over longer
periods rely on observations of changes in other characteristics of
the Sun. A number of mechanisms have been proposed that could reduce
or amplify the effect of
solar variations; these remain areas of active research.
35 Human activity results in emissions of many short-lived gases
(such as carbon monoxide and sulphur dioxide) and particles into the
atmosphere. These affect the atmospheric concentrations of other
climate-important gases such as ozone, and other particles which
lead to a climate forcing. Calculations, coupled to a variety of
atmospheric observations, indicate that particles have caused a
negative climate forcing of around 0.5 Wm²
with an uncertainty of ±0.2 Wm².
The particles also directly influence cloud properties; this more
uncertain effect is discussed in paragraph 47.
Climate
sensitivity
36 The more complex climate models, supported by observations, allow
climate sensitivity to be calculated in the presence of processes
that amplify or reduce the size of the climate response. Increases
in water vapour alone, in response to warming, are estimated to
approximately double the climate sensitivity from its value in the
absence of amplifying processes. There nevertheless remain
uncertainties in how much water
vapour amounts will change, and how these changes will be
distributed in the atmosphere, in response to a warming. Climate
models indicate that the overall climate sensitivity (for a
hypothetical doubling of CO2 in the atmosphere) is likely to lie in
the range 2oC to 4.5oC; this range is mainly due to the difficulties
in simulating the overall effect of the response of clouds to
climate change mentioned earlier.
Attribution
of climate change
37 The size and sustained nature
of the observed global-average surface warming on decadal and longer
timescales greatly exceeds the internal climate variability
simulated by the complex climate models. Unless this variability has
been grossly underestimated, the observed climate change must result
from natural and/or human-induced climate forcing.
38 When only natural climate forcings are put into climate models,
the models are incapable of reproducing the size of the observed
increase in global-average surface temperatures over the past 50
years. However, when the models include estimates of forcings
resulting from human activity, they can reproduce the increase. The
same result is found, albeit with a greater spread between different
models, for the simulation
of observed surface temperature changes for each of the habitable
continents separately.
39 When known uncertainties in both observed trends and climate
models are taken into account, the observed vertical and latitudinal
variations of temperature change are also broadly consistent with
those expected from a dominant role for human activity. There is an
ongoing controversy concerning whether or not the increased warming
with height in the tropical regions given by climate models is
supported by satellite measurements.
Future
climate change
40 As with almost any attempts to
forecast future conditions, projections of future climate change
depend on a number of factors. Future emissions due to human
activity will depend on social, technological and population changes
which cannot be known with confidence. The underlying uncertainties
in climate science and the inability to predict precisely the size
of future natural climate forcing mechanisms mean that projections
must be made which take into account the range of uncertainties
across these different areas.
41 The 2007 assessment by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change (IPCC) made projections of future changes using a number of
possible scenarios of future emissions, based on a diverse range of
assumptions. The IPCC’s best estimate was that globallyaveraged
surface temperatures would be between 2.5 - 4.7oC higher by 2100
compared to pre-industrial levels. The full range of projected
temperature increases by 2100 was found to be 1.8 - 7.1oC based on
the various scenarios and uncertainties in climate sensitivity.
42 Even in the extremely unlikely event that there is no further
increase in climate forcing, a further warming would be expected to
occur as the oceans slowly respond to the existing climate forcing,
amounting to a further few tenths of a degree centigrade by the year
2100.
43 The uncertainty in the predicted warming as a result of human
activity over the next two decades is smaller, the range being 0.2
to 0.4oC per decade. On these shorter timescales, the actual change
could however be reduced or enlarged significantly by internal
climate variability and natural climate forcings.
44 Increases in temperature are predicted to be larger on land,
particularly on the northern continents in winter. Less warming is
predicted, for example, over the North Atlantic Ocean. Climate
models tend to predict that precipitation will generally increase in
areas with already high amounts of precipitation and generally
decrease in areas with low amounts of precipitation.
45 Because of the thermal expansion of the ocean, it is very likely
that for many centuries the rate of global sea-level rise will be at
least as large as the rate of 20 cm per century that has been
observed over the past century. Paragraph 49 discusses the
additional, but more uncertain, contribution to sea-level rise from
the melting of land ice.
Aspects that
are not well understood
46 Observations
are not yet good enough to quantify, with confidence, some aspects
of the evolution of either climate forcing or climate change, or for
helping to place tight bounds on the climate sensitivity.
Observations of surface temperature change before 1850 are also
scarce.
47 As noted above, projections of climate change are sensitive to
the details of the representation of clouds in models. Particles
originating from both human activities and natural sources have the
potential to strongly influence the properties of clouds, with
consequences for estimates of climate forcing. Current scientific
understanding of this effect is poor.
48 Additional mechanisms that influence climate sensitivity have
been identified, including the response of the carbon cycle to
climate change, for example the loss of organic carbon currently
stored in soils. The net effect of changes in the carbon cycle in
all current models is to increase warming, by an amount that varies
considerably from model to model because of uncertainties in how to
represent the relevant processes.
The future strength of the uptake of CO2 by the land and oceans
(which together are currently responsible for taking up about half
of the emissions from human activity – see paragraph 26) is very
poorly understood, particularly because of gaps in our understanding
of the response of biological processes to changes in both CO2
concentrations and climate.
49 There is currently insufficient understanding of the enhanced
melting and retreat of the ice sheets on Greenland and West
Antarctica to predict exactly how much the rate of sea level rise
will increase above that observed in the past century (see paragraph
45) for a given temperature increase. Similarly, the possibility of
large changes in the circulation of the North Atlantic Ocean cannot
be assessed with confidence. The latter
limits the ability to predict with confidence what changes in
climate will occur in Western Europe.
50 The ability of the current generation of models to simulate some
aspects of regional climate change is limited, judging from the
spread of results from different models; there is little confidence
in specific projections of future regional climate change, except at
continental scales.
Developments in
climate science
51 Climate change
science has advanced markedly over the past 20 years, as a result of
many factors. These include improved methods for handling long-term
climate data sets, the ever-lengthening record of climate
observations, improved measurement techniques, including those from
satellites, better understanding of the climate system, improved
methods for simulating the climate system, and increased computer
power.
52 One indication of these advances is the increasing degree of
confidence in the attribution of climate change to human activity,
as expressed in the key conclusions of IPCC Working Group 1 (WG1) in
its assessments.
53 In its first assessment published in 1990, IPCC WG1 concluded
that the “size of [the observed surface] warming is broadly
consistent with predictions of climate models [which simulate the
impact of human activity], but it is also of the same magnitude as
natural climate variability”. Its second assessment, published in
1995, concluded that
“the balance of evidence suggests that there is a discernible human
influence on climate change”. Its fourth, and most recent,
assessment, published in 2007, concluded that “most of the observed
increase in globally average [surface] temperatures since the
mid-20th century is very likely due to the observed increase in
anthropogenic greenhouse gas concentrations”.
54 Remaining uncertainties are the subject of ongoing research
worldwide. Some uncertainties are unlikely ever to be significantly
reduced, because of, for example, the lack of observations of past
changes relevant to some aspects of both climate forcing and climate
change.
55 Other uncertainties may start to be resolved. For example,
satellites now incorporate improved techniques to measure cloud
characteristics across the globe. Using climate models for
day-to-day weather prediction will enable, for example,
identification of errors in the representation of clouds in models;
any such errors will lead to errors in forecasts of maximum and
minimum temperatures (which are easily observed). New
high-performance computers will allow climate models to represent
some smaller-scale phenomena (including cloud systems and details of
tropical storms) directly, and are expected to improve confidence in
regional predictions.
56 There remains the possibility that hitherto unknown aspects of
the climate and climate change could emerge and lead to significant
modifications in our understanding.
Concluding
remarks
57 There is strong
evidence that changes in greenhouse gas concentrations due to human
activity are the dominant cause of the global warming that has taken
place over the last half century. This warming trend is expected to
continue as are changes in precipitation over the long term in many
regions. Further and more rapid increases in sea level are
likely which will have profound implications for coastal communities
and ecosystems.
58 It is not possible to determine exactly how much the Earth will
warm or exactly how the climate will change in the future, but
careful estimates of potential changes and associated uncertainties
have been made. Scientists continue to work to narrow these areas of
uncertainty. Uncertainty can work both ways, since the changes and
their impacts may be either smaller or larger than those projected.
59 Like many important decisions, policy choices about climate
change have to be made in the absence of perfect knowledge. Even if
the remaining uncertainties were substantially resolved, the wide
variety of interests, cultures and beliefs in society would make
consensus about such choices difficult to achieve. However, the
potential impacts of climate change are sufficiently serious that
important decisions will need to be made. Climate science –
including the substantial body of knowledge that is already well
established, and the results of future research – is the essential
basis for future climate projections and planning, and must be a
vital component of public reasoning in this complex and challenging
area.
Background
reading
Extensive
background references to the scientific literature, and summaries
thereof, can be found in the following two documents.
Contribution of Working Group I to the Fourth Assessment Report of
the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, 2007, Solomon, S., D.
Qin, M. Manning, Z. Chen, M. Marquis, K.B. Averyt, M. Tignor and
H.L. Miller (eds.), Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, United
Kingdom and New York, NY, USA. ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/wg1/en/contents.html
Advancing the Science of Climate Change, National Research Council,
2010. americasclimatechoices.org/panelscience.shtml
Acknowledgements
Working Group
The Royal Society would like to acknowledge the members of the
working group that produced this document:
Professor John Pethica FRS (Chair)
Physical Secretary of Royal Society
Ms Fiona Fox
Director, Science Media Centre, UK
Sir Brian Hoskins FRS
Director Grantham Institute for Climate Change, Imperial College, UK
Professor Michael Kelly FRS
Professor of Technology, University of Cambridge, UK
Professor John Mitchell FRS
Director of Climate Science, Met Office, UK
Professor Susan Owens
Professor of Environment and Policy, University of Cambridge, UK
Professor Tim Palmer FRS
Royal Society Research Professor, University of Oxford, UK
Professor John Shepherd FRS
Professorial Research Fellow in Earth System Science, University of
Southampton, UK
Professor Keith Shine FRS
Professor of Physical Meteorology, University of Reading, UK
Professor David Spiegelhalter FRS
Professor of the Public Understanding of Risk, University of
Cambridge, UK
Royal Society Science Policy Centre:
Rachel Garthwaite
Senior Policy Adviser
Stuart Leckie
Policy Adviser
Tony McBride
Head of Strategy
Review Panel
The Royal Society gratefully acknowledges the contribution of the
independent panel of reviewers. The review panel members were not
asked to endorse the final document’s conclusions.
Dame Jean Thomas FRS (Chair)
Biological Secretary of the Royal Society
Professor Alastair Fitter FRS
Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Research, University of York, UK
Dame Louise Johnson FRS
Senior Fellow at Diamond Light Sources, UK
Professor Brian Launder FRS
Research Professor, University of Manchester, UK
Professor John Pyle FRS
Co Director, Centre for Atmospheric Science, University of
Cambridge, UK
Professor Chris Rapley
Director, Science Museum, UK
Sir Alan Wilson FRS
Professor of Urban and Regional Systems, University College London,
UK
Contributors
The Royal Society gratefully acknowledges the contribution of
individuals who have commented on the document at earlier stages of
its preparation. These individuals were not asked to endorse the
document.
Professor David Fowler FRS
Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Edinburgh, UK
Professor Joanna Haigh
Professor of Atmospheric Physics, Imperial College, London, UK
Professor Cyril Hilsum FRS
Corporate Research Advisor / Visiting Professor of Physics,
University College London, UK
Professor Anthony Kelly FRS
Distinguished Research Fellow in the Department of Materials Science
and Metallurgy, University of Cambridge, UK
Professor John McWhirter FRS
Distinguished Research Professor at the School of Engineering,
Cardiff University, UK
Sir John Pendry FRS
The Blackett Laboratory, Imperial College, London, UK
Sir Alan Rudge FRS
Chairman, ERA Foundation Limited, UK
Sir William Stewart FRS
Former Chief Scientific Advisor (UK Government)
Professor Andrew Watson FRS
Royal Society 2010 Anniversary Research Professor, University of
East Anglia, UK
Sir Arnold Wolfendale FRS
Emeritus Professor of Physics, University of Durham, UK
Professor Carl Wunsch ForMemRS
Cecil and Ida Green Professor of Physical Oceanography,
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA
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How recycling mobile phones can benefit the
environment
Global warming, fact or fable
Bellamy, Climate Change not Man Made
Combating climate change- China’s contribution
to the expansion of Africa’s renewable energy sector
The Climate Change Challenge for British
Woodland
Do Volcanoes cause climate change
Disposable Nappies (diapers) - No
Worse for the Environment Than Cloth Nappies
Walking to the shops damages planet
more than going by car
Causes
of Climate Change
Causes of Climate Change slammed by 140 Scientists
86 million Americans without healthcare
The truth about climate change
Renewable energy from biomass and biofuel
The 10 big energy myths
The electric car
Lessons from the Copenhagen Climate Change
Conference
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