Human-induced climate change is happening now and the people of Tuvalu are possibly more aware of this than anyone. As seas levels rise, this tiny Pacific island nation - the second smallest nation in the world - is starting to disappear beneath the waves and its population is steadily moving farther inland or emigrating to other nations.

It is expected that in the current century, hundreds of millions of people from some of the world's poorest living in low-lying areas of Bangladesh to some of the world's richest living in costal cities such as New York and London - will become "environmental refugees" as sea levels rise and claim their homes.

Scientists are now more than 90% certain that observed changes in our climate are the result of human activity that has released large quantities of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. We are already experiencing some negative consequences:

The World Health Organisation estimate that more than 150,000 people die prematurely each year because of climate change. In 2003 the hottest summer Europe has experienced in 500 years caused 28,000 deaths.

In the 1970's there were 16 major natural disasters, such as hurricanes, floods and droughts, worldwide. In the 1990s there were 70. Although we can't attribute individual major disasters to climate change, this dramatic increase is directly in line with a rise in emissions of greenhouse gases and a resulting rise in global temperatures.

The Arctic region is already experiencing positive feedbacks. This means that some of the consequences of climate change are actually causing further climate change. This creates an accelerating spiral of changes and causes temperatures to rise more rapidly.

Many scientists now agree that we should try to limit rises in average global temperatures to less than 2C above pre-industrial levels of 150 years ago. This will give us the best chance of being able to both adapt to changes which have already happened and prevent further, less manageable and potentially irreversible, changes.

The bad news is that the earth's surface is already 0.76C warmer on average than it was 150 years ago. Even if we cut our emissions of greenhouse-causing gases to zero right now, the earth's surface will continue to warm for some time because of emissions we have already created. The good news is that most scientists believe that we have a brief window of opportunity about 50 years in which to act to prevent this rise breaching the

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