United Nations Radio

INTRO: The time that CO2 remains in the atmosphere and the reason behind many countries wanting to limit the increase of the temperature of the Earth's surface to a maximum of 2 degrees Celsius within the next century are some of the ideas discussed in the next chapter of the UN Radio Series on Climate change. That's up next with Donn Bobb.

NARRATOR: Long, long ago, Mustapha Adamou´s ancestors used to fish in Lake Chad without any problem. It covered over 25,000 square kilometers and was then one of the largest in the world.

Today, Mustapha and his brothers have to struggle with the lake's shallow waters and the disappearance of many fish species.

MUSTAPHA: (voiceover)
When the water is low, we can still catch the fish, but then we have a problem because it is harder to row a boat.

NARRATOR: Lake Chad has shrunk 80%. The weather patterns have changed and the rising temperature is hastening the evaporation of its waters.

SFX Water from the glaciers in Peru.....

NARRATOR: Meanwhile, in the Andes, the glaciers are melting.

NARRATOR: Felipe Crispín Candori, a farmer who lives in Pucurami, by the side of the Ausagante Glacier in Peru, says that the future of his family is in jeopardy.

FELIPE: (Spanish, followed by English interpretation)
I am worried to see my children once the Ausagante is gone, once the snow has gone.

NARRATOR: Neither Mustapha nor Felipe doubt that the climate is changing. However, what is now obvious, until recently was met with skepticism.

SPX

NARRATOR: The scientific community voiced alarm for the first time some 40 years ago. But the phenomenon originated in the 19th century.

The industrial revolution led to the burning of ever-greater quantities of fossil oils, deforestation, and certain farming methods.

These increased the amounts of the so called "greenhouse gases" in the atmosphere, especially carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide.

Such gases occur naturally - they are critical for life on earth, they keep some of the sun's warmth from reflecting back into space, and without them the world would be a cold and barren place.

But in great and ever increasing quantities, they are pushing the global temperature to artificially high levels and altering the climate.

Since the late 1800s, the average temperature of the Earth's surface has risen by 0,74 degrees Celsius. That change took a century. It is expected to increase by another 1,8° to 4° by the year 2100.

In other words, even if the minimum predicted increase takes place, it will be higher than in any one century in the last 10,000 years.

MUSIC, UP, HOLD UNDER

NARRATOR: According to scientists, an increase of the Earth's temperature by 2°C above pre-industrial levels would unleash greater climatic changes than those reported today. Rajendra Pachauri, head of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says that some of the changes are irreversible. The UN body was the recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize in 2007.

Pachauri: Anything in excess of 1,5 to 2,5 increase in temperature would render 20 to 30% of all species to the brink of extinction. The other equally dangerous development that could take place would be the possibility of a collapse of the Greenland or West Antarctic ice sheets, which, if they were to occur, would lead to a sea level rise of several meters-.... There would be tens if not hundred of millions of climate change refugees.

NARRATOR: In December, governments will converge at a UN-sponsored Summit in Copenhagen to agree on how to reduce greenhouse emissions and by how much.

Some 100 countries are in favor of doing whatever is needed to keep the increase under 2° Celsius.

Mexican researcher and 1995 Nobel Laureate in Chemistry, Mario Molina comments.

Molina : (Spanish, followed by English interpretation)
"Science only establishes what is going to happen given certain emissions of greenhouse gases, but society as a whole must decide on what would be deemed an acceptable risk, and these 2° where there is consensus, that is considered a feasible goal, it would be prudent to agree not to exceed those conditions".

NARRATOR: Rajendra Pachauri finds it acceptable to set the limit at 2° C, but he warns:

Pachauri: If we want to attain that, we have only 6 years now, because we will have to make sure that global emissions of greenhouse gases peak in 2015, and start reducing them thereafter".

NARRATOR: The debate on formulas to mitigate the impact of global warming is intense and heated. On the one hand, developing countries are asking industrialized nations to substantially reduce their emissions. After all, they were mainly responsible for the current state of affairs.

The industrialized nations are willing to make some reductions. They also want emerging nations, such as China and India, to commit to reducing them as well.

SFX

NARRATOR: Meanwhile, as he walks over a dried lake, Samuel Kikoso, a Massai from the village of Ndope in Gagadi in Kenya, wonders what has happened.

KIKOSO 1: (voiceover)
"A long time ago life was much better. There was enough water and grass for the cows. But now the weather is unpredictable and the cows are dying because of the drought".

NARRATOR: The old climatic patterns are not occurring any more.

KIKOSO 2: (voiceover)
"If I look into the future, I don't think there will be any cows left in his area because the dry season is much too long and the cows won't survive."

MUSIC

NARRATOR: Over the last century, most of the changes that have taken place have been the result of human actions.

The manifestations of the process are becoming obvious with each passing day. For some people, concerns are exaggerated, for others; phenomena like the rising of the sea level are serious enough, and very likely to submerge a country, like the Maldives Islands in the Indian Ocean.

SFX bubbles Under water..... keep it under

NARRATOR: On October 24th the cabinet of the Maldives government met 20 feet beneath the waves. President Mohammed Nasheed and his ministers sat before desks in scuba gear to discuss the forthcoming submergence of their country, due to global warming. It was the world's first official underwater cabinet meeting. The stunt's goal was to remind participants in the conference in Copenhagen, that if action is not taken, by the year 2100 their choral archipelago might be totally underwater.

SFX: up and cross fade with MUSIC

NARRATOR: To resolve some of these climate threats, attention has been mainly focused on the reduction of greenhouse emissions through the use of efficient and renewable energies. Science has established that once that CO2 is thrown into the atmosphere, it takes centuries to dissipate. Therefore, it is so urgent to tackle the carbon dioxide emissions. Meanwhile, Nobel laureate Mario Molina suggests that the reduction of other polluting gases would help mitigate global warming

Molina : Carbon dioxide is just half of the problem. Other causes of climate change are the presence of black carbon, soot, present in the atmosphere, as well as tropospheric ozone. Their reduction would have an impact that would be perceived in the short term, as opposed to carbon dioxide that remains in the atmosphere for centuries.

NARRATOR: The meeting in Copenhagen will be crucial for the future of the Planet. This is why it is so important that the public be well informed about what is at stake, so that it can make its voice be heard.

Pachauri says that attention should be concentrated in two main aspects

Pachauri: "If we don't take action, the outcomes for human society and on all living species are certainly going to be very serious. And the second point we need to keep in mind is taking action is hardly costly... but this requires changes in mindset, it requires thinking out of the box, it probably also requires changes in lifestyles."

NARRATOR: Meanwhile, the Arctic ice sheets are melting, the droughts and storms are ever more extreme and...

SD FX Clock ticking

NARRATOR: And the irreversible clock ticking is getting louder

MUSIC: UP and out

Producers: Laura Kwiatkowski and Jorge Miyares
Narrator: Donn Bobb
duration:  11"24"