People Don’t Fear Climate Change Enough

Aug. 27 (Bloomberg) -- With respect to the science ofclimate change, many experts regard the Intergovernmental Panelon Climate Change as the world’s authoritative institution. Adraft summary of its forthcoming report was leaked last week. Itdescribes the panel’s growing confidence that climate change isreal, that it is a result of human action, and that if the worldcontinues on its current course, it will face exceedinglyserious losses and threats (including a significant rise in sealevels by century’s end).

While the draft report states these conclusions withunprecedented conviction, they are broadly consistent with thepanel’s judgments from the past two decades, which raises anobvious question: Why have so many nations (including China andthe U.S., the world’s leading greenhouse-gas emitters) not donemore in response?