Last June, a National Academy of Sciences panel of top US scientists commissioned by the White House declared that global warming is getting worse. The panel said human activity was largely responsible but natural factors could not be ruled out.

A new National Academy of Sciences report, Abrupt Climate Change: Inevitable Surprises, released in December concluded that greenhouse gases and other pollutants could trigger large, abrupt and potentially disastrous climate changes. Roughly half of the warming that has occurred in the northern part of the Atlantic Ocean since the last ice age was achieved in only a decade, the report said.

"Abrupt climate changes were especially common when the climate system was being forced to change most rapidly," the study states. "Thus, greenhouse warming and other human alterations of the earth system may increase the possibility of large, abrupt, and unwelcome regional or global climactic events." The most immediate dangers posed by abrupt climate change are devastating droughts and floods, which could seriously affect both water supply and agriculture across vast stretches of the planet. Longer term impacts could include changes in the basic systems which determine regional global temperatures.

In adding a new wrinkle to the decades-long debate over global warming problems, the report should prompt the Bush administration to reconsider its opposition to Kyoto Protocol and deal seriously with the climate change issue.


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