An international panel of scientists has determined with “near certainty” that human activity is the cause of rising global temperatures, the New York Times reported Monday.
“It is extremely likely that human influence on climate caused more than half of the observed increase in global average surface temperature from 1951 to 2010,” a draft of the scientists’ United Nations climate report read, as quoted by the Times. “There is high confidence that this has warmed the ocean, melted snow and ice, raised global mean sea level and changed some climate extremes in the second half of the 20th century.”
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a Nobel-Prize-winning group of several hundred scientists, publishes findings every five to six years that are considered the authoritative reports on climate change. Its latest report said the odds are at least 95 percent that humans are the primary cause of warming, according to the Times.
