Our understanding of the climate system has continued to strengthen.
Over the past half-century rapid changes have been observed across the world in many features of the climate system, including heating of the ocean and the air; changing rainfall patterns; reduction in the area of Arctic sea-ice; mass loss of polar ice sheets; increasing sea level; and changes in life cycles and distribution of many plants and animals.
There is very strong consensus that the climate is changing and that human activities, like the burning of fossil fuels, are the primary cause.
Scientists are now moving to new challenges, for instance, improving our understanding of shifting rainfall patterns and of potential abrupt or irreversible changes in major features of the climate system.
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