U.N. panel to blame mankind for global warming, explain 'hiatus'

U.N. panel to blame mankind for global warming, explain 'hiatus'

 A United Nations panel of experts met on Monday to review a draft report that raises the probability that climate change is man-made to 95 percent and warns of ever more extreme weather unless governments take strong action.

Scientists and officials from more than 110 governments began a four-day meeting in Stockholm to edit and approve the 31-page draft that also tries to explain a "hiatus" in the pace of global warming this century despite rising greenhouse gas emissions.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) will go through the document line by line and present it on Friday as a main guide for governments, which have agreed to work out a United Nations deal by the end of 2015 to fight global warming.

"I expect the world will understand the simplicity and the gravity of the message that we provide," Rajendra Pachauri, chairman of the IPCC, said after the opening session.

A shift towards a greener economy, based on renewable energies, would hold multiple benefits for society, he said.

IPCC drafts seen by Reuters say human activities, primarily burning fossil fuels, are "extremely likely" - at least a 95 percent probability - to be the main cause of global warming since the 1950s.

That is up from "very likely", or at least a 90 percent probability, in the last report in 2007 and 66 percent in 2001, draining hopes that natural variations in the climate might be the cause.

One of the hardest issues for the IPCC may be accounting for why temperatures have not risen much this century. "Fifteen-year-long hiatus periods are common," in historical climate records, an accompanying 127-page technical summary says.

A combination of natural variations, including a cyclical dip in energy emitted by the sun, and factors such as volcanic eruptions - which send ash into the atmosphere and help block sunlight - have caused the hiatus, it says, predicting a resumption of warming in coming years.

The report also finds that the atmosphere may be slightly less sensitive to a build-up of carbon dioxide than expected.

The range differs from scenarios of 1.1 to 6.4C gains by 2100 in 2007, largely because of new computer models.

The draft also says sea levels, which rose 19 cm (7.5 inches) in the 20th century, could rise by an extra 26 to 81 cm towards the end of this century, threatening coasts.

That rise is more than was projected in 2007, although that report did not take full account of melting ice in Greenland and Antarctica.