Today’s papers contain three articles that summarise in very clear terms the dire state we’re in with climate change.  There have been very brief mentions on the Radio 4 News as well, but as usual they were dropped pretty quickly and so easily missed.  None of this is really news – it’s just bringing together what has been clear for a long time – but I know from the talks I have done that most people are completely unaware of this sort of message.
Take your pick from:
www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article5895518.ece
www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change/lord-stern-on-global-warming-its-even-worse-than-i-thought-1643957.html
www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/mar/13/stern-attacks-politicians-climate-change

To save you time I have copied below the Times article.  It’s the shortest and the only one with any optimism in it.

Nicholas Stern: politicians have no idea of the impact of climate change
         Lewis Smith, Environment Reporter / March 12, 2009
Politicians have yet to grasp how devastating climate change will be to human society over the next century, Professor Lord Nicholas Stern has said.  Wars, famine, floods and hurricanes will wreak havoc unless greenhouse gas emissions are controlled, he said at a climate change conference in Copenhagen, Denmark.  He told scientists who had gathered to share their latest findings on global warming that not only is the threat underplayed by politicians but that they don't even understand the extent of the problem.
"Do the politicians understand just how difficult it could be, just how devastating four, five, six degrees centigrade would be? I think, not yet," he said.  Lord Stern, an economist now at the London School of Economics, was the lead author of the highly influential Stern Report which in 2006 alerted the world to the financial costs of climate change when he was an adviser to the Treasury.
Rather than think of the potential damage caused by a two or three degree rise in temperatures they should, the conference was told, assume they will go up by four or more degrees without dramatic international measures.  Speaking in Copenhagen he told scientists it was beholden on them to tell politicians and the public "very clearly and strongly" how severe the risks are.  Only by ramming home the message in every country around the globe will world leaders appreciate the urgency of the problem when they meet in December in Copenhagen in an attempt to work out an international deal to dramatically cut emissions of greenhouse gases, such as carbon dioxide, which most scientists agree are warming the planet.  "We have to tell people, you have to tell people very clearly and strongly just how difficult four, five, six, seven degrees Centigrade are because we face very severe risks of going there," he said.
Among the consequences of a four or five degree rise over the next 100 years are forecast to be deserts spreading across much of Southern Europe, collapses in crop yields, rivers drying AND PERHAPS BILLIONS OF PEOPLE BEING FORCED TO LEAVE THEIR HOMES.  "What would be the implication of that?" he asked. "Extended social, extended conflict, social disruption, war essentially, over much of the world for many decades. This is the kind of implication that follows from temperature increases of that magnitude."
Despite the bleak forecasts he remained optimistic that a deal will be reached in December to stem and reverse emissions.  "We can get there. I'm more optimistic than I was two years ago. That doesn't mean it's going to be easy. We all know it's going to be tough but we can get there," he maintained.  Despite their failure to fully appreciate the difficulties posed by global warming he was confident politicians are beginning to head "in the right direction".
He admitted the Stern Review itself, which warned the financial cost of climate change could reach 20 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP) by the en[d] of the century, was an underestimate of the problem.  "I think that the damages were underestimated by the Stern Review and the costs of inaction were even bigger than we argued then," said Lord Stern, noting that the scientific understanding of greenhouse gas emission rates and the Earth's ability to absorb had advanced.  "The kinds of temperatures that could now arise from these greenhouse gases, some of them have higher probabilities than we might have thought."  He estimated that the costs to society of climate change are now likely to be as much as 50 per cent higher than his 2006 calculation.