No apology!

In 2007 the IPCC came out with predictions that got splashed across the media the world over. For the first time this body of hundreds of climate scientists agreed that climate change was happening, and it was happening as a result of human activity.

That the IPCC must have unanimous agreement before issuing its declarations is one of its great strengths. Fundamentally however, it is also its greatest weakness. The predictions that IPCC offer are wildly conservative: many would say dangerously and irresponsibly conservative.

This week in Copenhagen it was announced that rather than a sea level rise of about 40cm by the end of the century we are now looking at a rise of up to 120cm. Most of the evidence to support this prediction had already been collected in 2007 - but the scientific process is slow and it's taken two years for all the checks and balances in the process to be completed before this study could be released. If a panel of the general public had been asked to assess this data about melting ice sheets in 2007 - they would have agreed that they are melting faster than the IPCC accepted.

Similarly, we knew in 2007 that the oceans were acidifying at a frightening rate, but this research has only just been released in Copenhagen. This doesn't threaten sea level rise - just a complete collapse of the marine eco-system.

And in 2007 we also knew that the melting of the permafrost in the tundra was releasing millions of tonnes of methane - threatening a cataclysmic accelaration of climate warming. The scientific process has yet to unleash the impacts of this one on us.

On a happier note it is now thought that the Greenland ice sheet is more stable than we thought - so the 6 metre sea level rise is much less likely than some were saying in 2007. And this highlights the strength of the IPCC approach - nothing is announced until the evidence is unequivocal (or as near as dammit).

Less than two years before the 2007 IPCC reports, hurricane Katrina wreaked its havoc on New Orleans. One of the lasting effects of Katrina was the displacement of some 300,000 people. A massive human tragedy. But the revised projections for sea level rise are somewhat more devastating. A one metre sea level rise will displace not 300,000 people, or 3,000,000, or 30,000,000 or 300,000,000 but some 600,000,000. Roughly a tenth of the total human population on the planet.

Katrina had it's Gretna controversy. How will the world respond to 600 million displaced souls?

Is this boring you. Really? - How much more important does an issue need to be? When will you engage with it and try to do something?

But what to do eh? That's a huge and very difficult question.

My advice - do what you can - and feel good for doing it, and then next time to a bit more. But maybe also we need to accept that this thing is going to far too fast - and our politicians aren't up to the task of stopping it. So get prepared for the worst and start building resilience - Transition towns are a good start. Above all though, make sure you enjoy doing it. Transition Towns are as much about the joy of community as anything else - and leaving the car at home is about feeling alive to the air on your face, the oxygen coursing your veins and the wierdo on the bus!