Finding out about global warming and climate change

Last updated: January 6, 2011.

Please note that this page is now archived. A number of the links are broken and we are very unlikely to revisit or update them. However, you can always track down an old page by copying its name into a search engine and looking for its new location.

Most of the world's scientists now agree that Earth is warming up.... but what will happen in the coming years, decades, and centuries? This is our handy guide to the best websites on global warming. If you're looking for public-domain (copyright-free) photos to illustrate a school project or report, please also take a look at our page ofclimate change and global warming photos.

Photo by courtesy of Great Images in NASA.

Contents: What's on this page?

• Cool stuff for schools (good introductions)
• General articles
• Science
• Impacts
• Solutions
• The Kyoto Protocol
• Government agencies and international organizations
• Scientific institutions
• Campaign groups, NGOs, etc.
• Reports
• Background, facts, data, and statistics
• News stories
• Politics
• Key players in the carbon war
• Sceptics
• Blogs
• Books
• Articles not on the web

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Cool stuff for schools (good introductions)

Here are some good places to start with global warming. These sites are not necessarily just for kids; they're good, concise introductions to the subject.

• Global warming and climate change A basic introduction from Explain that Stuff website.
• What is global warming? A clickable guide from BBC News
• NASA: Climate Change A detailed, easy-to-understand, and attractively presented introduction.
• What is the greenhouse effect? An excellent Flash animation from the BBC. See what happens as the planet warms up between 1855 and 2100.
• Carbon calculator: How much carbon dioxide go you produce?
• Encyclopedia of the Atmospheric Environment: Superb educational site!
• Global warming for kids: Information, games, and activities from the US EPA.
• New Scientist: Topics Guide: Climate change, includes a rundown of latest news stories from the popular science weekly
• Carbon for Kids: "Every year, the United States produces enough CO2 to cover its entire land surface, including Alaska and Hawaii, with 1 foot of CO2."
• NASA Earth Observatory: Global warming: A reliable introduction and lots of links
• Guardian UK: Special Report: Global Warming: Numerous good links, reports, activities, and latest news stories
• Wikipedia article on Climate change
• Wikipedia article on Global warming
• General article from Encyclopedia.com
• Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia (via Infoplease.com)
• Infoplease almanac (short article)
• US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Student Center
• UN Environment Programme: Climate Change Information Kit
• BBC UK: climate change in-depth
• BBC UK: I'm alright Jack - climate change game
• What Do You Know About Global Warming? A quiz from Environmental Defense.
• Search Yahooligans for "Global warming" sites
• Search Fact Monster for "Global warming"
• DMOZ Open Directory Project: Sites listed under "Climate change"
• About.com's geography guide to global warming and climate change
• Kids for Saving Earth
• Global warming international center
• NASA GISS: Climate Glossary: what do all the technical terms mean? Comprehensive A-Z glossary
• Global Climate Change Briefing Book: from NCSE Congressional Research Service
• Atmosphere, Climate & Environment Information Programme: from Manchester Metropolitan University. Provides acccess to the Programme's range of school resources, online encyclopedias and newsletters, and is an ideal resource for Key Stage 3-4 of the National Curriculum and A-level (K12 in the US), as well as for more general information concerning atmospheric issues.
• Key facts on global climate change: A short introduction from Oxfam.

General articles

• Climate change fact sheet Some of the key climate change data compiled by leading ocean scientist Stefan Rahmstorf. (PDF format, last updated November 2006).
• The Global Warming Debate: It's real, inexorable, and heading our way E Magazine, September/October 2000.
• The Great Climate Flip-Flop William H. Calvin, The Atlantic Monthly, January 1998 A theory that global warming could lead, paradoxically, to drastic cooling -- a catastrophe that could threaten the survival of civilization.
• Articles by James Hansen: A collection of articles from one of the world's top climate scientists. Many articles downloadable for free!
• Monbiot.com: Climate change archive: A collection of George Monbiot's newspaper articles about climate change.
• Global warming @ National Geographic Magazine: An introduction and links.
• Winning and losing the global warming debate Roger A. Pielke, Jr. and Daniel Sarewitz (PDF)
• The language of global warming Michael Glantz considers the importance of word-use in defining the significance of global warming.
• Global warming: it's happening: by Kevin Trenberth, naturalSCIENCE Volume 1, article 9, 1997.
• National Geographic: Earthpulse: Sea-level rise
• Opinion: Climate change and history: by Sir Crispin Tickell, the former British diplomat who helped to wake up the world to global warming.

Science

General

• The Wikipedia articles Climate change and Global warming are strong summaries of the science, though younger readers may find them too complex.
• US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Global Warming pages
• NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies: Contains reports of cutting-edge research into climate change. Explore the site and you'll find lots of useful new information.
• Climate Science from the UK Meteorological Office Hadley Centre
• The science of climate change: from Friends of the Earth UK
• Climate science: from Greenpeace International
• The climate conveyor theory of Wallace Broecker:
• Thermohaline Circulation, the Achilles Heel of Our Climate System: Will Man-Made CO2 Upset the Current Balance? Wallace Broecker, Science, Volume 278, Number 5343, Issue of 28 Nov 1997, pp. 1582-1588.
• What if the conveyor were to shut down?: by Wallace Broecker,GSA Today 9(1):1-7 (January 1999).
• The Great Climate Flip-Flop William H. Calvin, The Atlantic Monthly, January 1998. Outlines Broecker's climate conveyor theory that global warming could lead, paradoxically, to drastic cooling.
• Climate Impact of Quadrupling Atmospheric CO2
• Climate change and greenhouse gases by Tamara S. Ledley et al, EOS Volume 80 Number 39, September 28, 1999.
• European Network Activities on Global Change
• What if the conveyor were to shut down?: by Wallace Broecker,GSA Today 9(1):1-7 (January 1999).
• Science Magazine: Search for recent climate change articles.

Climate modelling

• Models 'key to climate forecasts' by Dr Vicky Pope of the UK's Hadley Centre.
• Global climate modelling: A more detailed explanation of modelling from NASA Goddard Insitute for Space Studies (GISS).
• ClimatePrediction.net: An collaborative modelling project you can join in with, along the lines of SETI@home.
• Climate change protection: the tolerable windows approach

Impacts

• General impacts
  • US EPA Climate Change: Includes impacts on different ecosystems and human health.
  • The Global Warming Debate: It's real, inexorable, and heading our way E Magazine, September/October 2000.
  • Effects: The current and future consequences of global change: From NASA.
  • Greenpeace climate impacts: Greenpeace's current information on impacts.
  • Greenpeace climate impacts database: This is an archive page on the Greenpeace website and may no longer contain current data.
  • The Pew Center on Global Climate Change - Reports and Environmental Policy Analysis: Selection of comprehensive reports on various impacts of climate change (sea-level rise, health, economic effects, etc.)
  • Environmental and Societal Impacts Group of National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) Social and economic impacts of weather
  • Now the Pentagon tells Bush: climate change will destroy us : A 2004 news story from The UK Observer.
  • Stark warning over climate change: BBC news story from April 2006.
• Impacts on economic activity
  • Stern Review on the Economics of Climate Change: A report published by the British government in October 2006 concluded that it makes sense to invest now to prevent economic losses from climate change in the future. You can download a summary and the full report from this site.
  • Climate Change Costs Could Top $300 Billion Annually: A 2001 news story: Leading reinsurance company Munich Re reports on the financial implications of climate change for the United Nations Environment Programme.
  • Climate Change and Tourism: A collection of material from the UN World Tourism Organization.
  • Climate change and tourism: responding to global challenges: A 2008 report from the UN World Tourism Organization.
• Impacts on health
  • US EPA Climate Change: Health: Considers direct temperature effects, extreme events, climate-sensitive diseases, air Quality, and other health linkages.
  • Climate change and health: Information from the World Health Organization.
  • Climate Change and Our Health: Information from the Government of Canada concludes "Climate change has the potential to have serious effects on your health."
  • UK Health Impacts of Climate Change: A short report from the UK Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology, 2004 (in PDF format).
  • Harvard Medical School: Center for Health and the Global Environment: Reports and information about health impacts of global climate change
  • Is global warming harmful to health? by Paul R. Epstein, from Scientific American, August 2000. "Computer models indicate that many diseases will surge as the earth's atmosphere heats up."
• Impacts on food supply
• Potential Impacts of Climate Change on Agriculture and Food Supply
• Climate change and world food supply
• Food security and climate change: from US Department of Agriculture (You need to downloadAdobe reader for this PDF file if you don't have it)
• NASA Goddard Institute: Publications by Cynthia E. Rosenzweig (Search on Rosenzweig)
• Climate change and agriculture Submission by Cynthia Rosenzweig to Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, Subcommittee on Clean Air, Climate Change, and Nuclear Safety, July 8, 2003.
• Impacts on coral reefs
• Climate Change, Coral Bleaching, and the Future of the World's Coral Reefs: a detailed 1999 report (and media briefing) from Greenpeace USA.
• US State Department: Coral Bleaching, Coral Mortality, and Global Climate Change: 99/03/05 report on coral and climate change
• Great Barrier Reef destruction from global warming from WWF
• Impacts on oceans
• Oceans and sea-level rise: A simple introduction from Climate Institute website.
• Current sea-level rise: Introductory Wikipedia article.
• Impacts on other ecosystems
  • The Carbon Bomb: Climate Change and the Fate of the Northern Boreal Forests a report from Greenpeace
• Impacts around the world:
• The Regional Impacts of Climate Change: An Assessment of Vulnerability: 1997 report from the IPCC
• High Water Blues: Impacts of Sea Level Rise on Selected Coasts and Islands: 1997 report from Environmental Defense - includes superb figures illustrating the progressive drowning of the world!
• Global warning: early warning signs: region by region analysis around the world, with clickable "hot map"
• IPCC assessment: Regional Impacts of Climate Change
• Climate change impacts: a summary from the Union of Concerned Scientists.
• Regional climate change impacts around the world: a series of short summaries from the Climate Institute, covering the following major regions: Africa, Asia, Australasia, Europe, Central and South America, North America, Polar Regions, Small Island States.
• Impacts on the USA:
• U.S. National Assessment:The Potential Consequences of Climate Variability and Change
• Climate change impacts on the United States
• UCS: Impacts on California
• California Global Warming Impacts from the Union of Concerned Scientists.
• Impacts of climate change: with particular emphasis on US coastal areas
• Impacts on the UK:
• How will climate change affect the UK? from BBC News, November 2000.
• UK Climate Impacts Program (UKCIP)
• UK Health Impacts of Climate Change: A short report from the UK Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology, 2004 (in PDF format).
• Impacts on Asia:
• Climate Change in Asia
• Impacts on polar regions
• Arctic Climate Impact Assessment (ACIA): Links to several excellent reports
• The Antarctica Project: climate change pages
• Global warming in the arctic and antarctic: Gary Braasch's photo album: from NRDC
• Answers from the Ice Edge: The Consequences of Climate Change on life in the Bering and Chukchi seas: A joint report from Artic Network and Greenpeace USA
• Sightline Institute
• NSF Office of Polar Programs: polar research by US scientists.
• Scott Polar Research Institute, Cambridge University
• World Glacier Monitoring Service
• US National Snow and Ice Data Center
• Cracks In the Ice: New Insights into Antarctic Ice Sheet Failures: from the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, January 2001.
• Impacts on the Gulf Stream
• BBC News Gulf Stream climate change page
• The climate conveyor theory of Wallace Broecker:
• The Great Climate Flip-Flop William H. Calvin, The Atlantic Monthly, January 1998: Outlines Broecker's climate conveyor theory that global warming could lead, paradoxically, to drastic cooling.
• Thermohaline Circulation, the Achilles Heel of Our Climate System: Will Man-Made CO2 Upset the Current Balance? Wallace Broecker, Science, Volume 278, Number 5343, Issue of 28 Nov 1997, pp. 1582-1588.
• What if the conveyor were to shut down?: by Wallace Broecker,GSA Today 9(1):1-7 (January 1999).

Solutions?

• Global warming and clean energy: from the Sierra Club USA
• Fight Global Warming: Tips from Environmental Defense
• World Wildlife Fund: Stopping Global Warming: Lots of practical tips that save money and the environment.
• Friends of the Earth UK climate change campaign
• Sustainable consumption Norman Myers, Science, 2000 March 31; 287: 2419.
• Switch on to green energy: from Friends of the Earth UK
• Greenpeace UK: Stop Climate Change
• Stop Climate Chaos: A group of environmental organizations highlight the problem and offer solutions.

Geoengineering

• Geoengineering A short introduction to artificial climate fixes by Explain that Stuff.
• Dumping Iron By Charles Graeber, Wired 8.11. An introduction to Michael Markels's iron-fertilizer proposal (to add nutrients to the ocean to create fisheries and soak up carbon dioxide). Sequestration of CO2 by Ocean Fertilization by Michael Markels, May 2001 is a more detailed explanation.
• Planting trees won't save the climate Scientific American, November 15 2000 The results of a new study, which looked at how increased carbon dioxide concentrations influence forest growth, are not as promising as some had expected
• Iron supplement for the sea Scientific American, October 12, 2000: How to encourage plants to soak up more carbon dioxide.
• Climate Solutions: Practical solutions to global warming

The Kyoto Protocol

• Full text of the Kyoto Protocol
• Congressional Research Service briefing on climate change: Last updated 2001.
• Kyoto Diary: one journalist's diary recalls the tension of the Kyoto negotiations
• Landmark global warming pact gains final approval: typical upbeat news story from CNN in 1997.
• Clean Development Mechanism (CDM):
  • Clean Development Mechanism: Information from the UNFCCC.
  • Clean Development Mechanism: A basic overview from Wikipedia.
  • How much sustainable development can we expect from the Clean Development Mechanism?: World Resources Institute briefing and background on CDM.
  • The Clean Development Mechanism: A Primer
  • Clean Development Mechanism: Perspectives from Developing Countries: A 1999 research report from the University of California at Berkeley.
  • FAQs on the Clean Development Mechanism: from Centre for Science and Environment, India

Government agencies and international organizations

• United Nations
• UNEP Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)
• UN Framework Convention on Climate Change
• Full text of the convention
• European Commission Environment Directorate: Climate change
• UK Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs: Climate change
• US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Global Warming pages
• US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Institution (NOAA): Climate pages
• NOAA's greenhouse warming links
• Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS)

Scientific institutions

• University of Bern: Climate and Environmental Physics
• Canadian Centre for Climate Modelling and Analysis
• University of East Anglia: Climatic research unit
• The Hadley Centre (UK Meteorological Office) 
• Environmental Change Institute, Oxford University, UK.
• International Research Institute for Climate Prediction
• Max Planck Institute for Meteorology
• NASAGoddard Institute for Space Studies
• NSF Office of Polar Programs: polar research by US scientists.
• Scott Polar Research Institute: Sea ice and polar oceanography
• Scripps Institution of Oceanography: Atmosphere and Climate
• Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research

Campaign groups, NGOs, etc.

• Indian Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) campaign on Global Climate
• Climate Action Network
• Climate Law: international lawyers taking legal action to protect the climate
• Environmental Defense- climate change pages
• Friends of the Earth UK: Climate change campaign
• Friends of the Earth US
• Greenpeace International: Climate campaign
• PewCentre on Global Climate Change: Useful reports and background info from non-partisan, non-profit organization.
• NRDC: National Resources Defense Council: Climate change campaign
• Rising Tide: A network of groups and individuals dedicated to taking local action and building a movement against climate change
• Sierra Club: Global warming campaign
• Union of Concerned Scientists
• US Global Change Research Information Office
• World Wildlife Fund (WWF): Climate Change campaign
• Worldwatch Institute: facts and data on the state of the world

Reports

• IPCC reports: All the definitive reports about climate change are available here.
• The Pew Center on Global Climate Change - Reports and Environmental Policy Analysis: Excellent selection of comprehensive reports on various impacts of climate change (sea-level rise, health, economic effects, etc.)
• Harvard Environmental School Center for Health and the Global Environment: numerous reports and factsheets on health, disease, pest transmission, etc.
• Environmental Defense: numerous reports and factsheets from US environmental NGO
• Climate change reports: From the David Suzuki foundation (numerous reports and factsheets, with a Canadian flavour).
• UK climate change publications: Useful reports and data from Defra

Background, facts, data, and statistics

• Climate change fact sheet Some of the key climate change data compiled by leading ocean scientist Stefan Rahmstorf. (PDF format, last updated November 2006).
• IPCC Data Distribution Center
• National Climate Data Center: World's largest archive of weather data
• National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), Climate Monitoring and Diagnostics Laboratory (CMDL), Carbon Cycle-Greenhouse Gases
• World Meteorological Organization (WMO): World climate data and monitoring programme
• US National Weather Service
• NOAA climate data archives
• World Resources Institute: Climate Change Facts and Figures
• US Energy Information Administration: World Energy Use and Carbon Dioxide Emissions: Lots of useful charts.
• Paleoclimate, Greenhouse warming, El Nino, and Climate change: Excellent links on many different aspects of the subject

News stories and journalism

• New Scientist: global warming news stories and comprehensive archive
Guardian UK: Special Report: Global Warming: Numerous good links, reports, activities, and latest news stories
• National Geographic News
• Popular Science magazine
• Scientific American
• UniSci.com: Daily University Science News
• Environmental News Network (ENN)

Politics

• Climatic change and world affairs: Full text of pioneering 1986 book by Sir Crispin Tickell.
• The Bush Administration's Approach to Climate Change Spencer Abraham Science 30 July 2004: Vol. 305. no. 5684, pp. 616-617: US Energy Secretary Abraham defends the Bush administration's record..
• The politics of global warming: from Wikipedia.

Key players in the carbon war

Short biographies of some of the key players in the science and politics of global warming.

• Dr James Hansen: Director of NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies
• Sir John Houghton: IPCC science co-chair
• Dr Jeremy Leggett: Greenpeace campaigner, climate scientist, author, and solar energy entrepreneur.
• Prof. Richard S. Lindzen: Leading global warming sceptic.
• Dr Michael Oppenheimer: EDF's former scientific adviser, now a professor at Princeton.
• Dr Stephen Schneider: Leading climate change scientist at Stanford.
• Dr Robert Watson: former IPCC science co-chair

Sceptics

Hundreds of scientists from around the world have been involved in preparing the IPCC reports and the broad agreement that a warming world is causing climate change. A few dissenting voices, most funded or supported by the vested interests of "the carbon club",  maintain the opposite view and have been remarkably successful in skewing the scientific debate.

• Global Climate Coalition: A now-defunct pro-industry lobby group.
• The Cooler Heads Coalition
• Prof. Richard Lindzen
• Global Warming: The Origin and Nature of the Alleged Scientific Consensus: by Richard S. Lindzen, a respected meteorologist and leading opponent of the global warming "consensus"
• Testimony: House Committee on Science, March 6, 1996 Richard S. Lindzen (PDF format)
• Get off the warming bandwagon By Professor William M Gray of Colorado State University "These small global temperature increases of the last 25 years and over the last century are likely natural changes that the globe has seen many times in the past."
• Global warming "not clear cut" BBC News, 22 Jan 2001 Scientists sceptical about the nature or pace of global warming challenged the "consensus" being presented on the issue by researchers working for the United Nations.
• Apocalpyse Not: Gary Taubes
• Global Warming: Industry Group Assails Climate Chapter : Peter Weiss, Science 1996 June 21; 272: 1734-0a
• Greenhouse wars from New Scientist: "They're among the world's top scientists. They don't believe in global warming. And they think their time has come. Fred Pearce went to meet the sceptics."
• Scientists Refute Argument of Climate Skeptics: A rebuttal of climate sketpics issued by NASA in January 2009.
• Open Directory Project: Society: Issues: Environment: Opposing Views: Climate Change Skeptics

Blogs

• Mark Lynas Climate Blog: From the author of two popular books about global warming.
• Climate Ark Climate Change Blog: Featuring a Genuine Climate Change Internet Search Engine.
• Climate Change Action: A blog mainly intended for UK climate change activists.
• Real Climate: Climate Science: Commentary on climate science news by working climate scientists for the interested public and journalists.
• Climate Science: Roger Pielke Sr.
• Climate Science Watch: A more government and policy oriented look at climate change.

Books

Six of the best

• Rough Guide to Climate Change by Robert Henson. Rough Guides, 2008. Best single-volume introduction.
• Global Warming: The Complete Briefing by John Houghton. Cambridge University Press, 2004. A good introduction to the science, but not an exciting read.
• High Tide: Notes from a Warming World by Mark Lynas. HarperCollins, 2005. What impact is climate change having worldwide?
• Six Degrees by Mark Lynas. Random House, 2008. Explores how the planet will change as it warms.
• The Heat Is On: The Climate Crisis, the Cover-up, the Prescription by Ross Gelbspan. Perseus Books, 1998. The politics of climate change and its skeptics.
• The Carbon War by Jeremy Leggett. Routledge, 2001. The monumental challenge we face in overcoming a carbon-based economy.

Some of the rest

• Dessler, Andrew and Edward Parson. Tim. The Science and Politics of Global Climate Change: A Guide to the Debate. Cambridge University Press, 2006.
• Drake,Frances. Global Warming: The Science of Climate Change. London, Arnold/New York, Oxford University Press, 2000.
• Flannery, Tim. The Weather Makers: The History and Future Impact of Climate Change. Allen Lane, 2006.
• Hayes, Peter and Kirk Smith (eds). The Global Greenhouse Regime: Who Pays? London: Earthscan/UN University Press, 1993.
• Harvey, Danny. Global Warming: The Hard Science. Harlow/New York: Prentice Hall, 2000.
• Jepma, Catrinus and Mohan Munasinghe. Climate change policy: facts, issues, and analysis. New York/Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998.
• Leggett, Jeremy (ed). Global warming: the Greenpeace Handbook. New York/Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990. Dated but still good.
• Linden, Eugene. The Winds of Change: Climate, Weather, and the Destruction of Civilizations. New York/London: Simon & Schuster, 2006.
• Mendlesohn, Robert. The Impact of Climate Change on the United States. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1999.
• O´Riordan, T. and Jäger, J. Politics of Climate Change: a European Perspective. London: Routledge, 1996.
• Read, Peter. Responding to Global Warming. London/New Jersey: Zed Books, 1994.
• Tickell, Crispin,Climatic Change and World Affairs Full text is now online at Sir Crispin's website.

Articles not on the web

• Global Climate Protection Policy: The Limits of Scientific Advice, Sonja Boehmer-Christiansen , Global Environmental Change, Vol 4 No 2, 1994, pp. 140-159.
• The new cold war: stalking climate change by sub, Glenn Hodges, National Geographic, March 2000, p. 30.
• Global climate change, R. Houghton and G. Woodwell, Scientific American, April 1989, p. 18.
• The human impact on climate, Thomas Karl and Kevin Trenberth, Scientific American, December 1999, p. 62.
• Global warming trends, Philip Jones and Tom Wigley, Scientific American, August 1990, p. 66.
• The Coming Climate, Stephen H. Schneider, Scientific American, September 1989, p. 38.
• Climate Modeling. Stephen H. Schneider, Scientific American. May 1987, p. 72.
• The great climate debate, Robert M. White, Scientific American, July 1990, p. 18.