2007’s Warm, Erratic Global Weather

“I want to scare you about climate change. We are probably the last generation to be able to rely on a stable climate.”

- Fred Pearce, Environmental Reporter

August 8, 2007  Geneva, Switzerland - In mid-July at the Cheltenham Science Festival in England, global warming was a featured topic. One of the speakers was Fred Pearce, an environmental journalist and author of a new book entitled, The Last Generation: How Nature Will Take Her Revenge for Climate Change. He told his audience, “I want to scare you about climate change. We are probably the last generation to be able to rely on a stable climate. ... The truth is, the more we observe about the climate system, the more frightening the scenarios that scientists are starting to develop. Past climate change has been more violent and extreme than we have been led to believe. Tranquility looks like the exception rather than the rule. We could be measuring sea level rises in meters, not centimeters. Old ideas about climate chang are just not how the world works. When climate does change, it does so suddenly and violently.”