Governments need to do more to avert the prospect of "worrying and significant consequences" for the world climate by pushing for immediate carbon emissions reductions, according to a new report.
A study by the Met Office's Hadley Centre for climate change research, partly funded by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, has said that it is important for carbon emissions to drop by three per cent a year.
Failure to do so could lead to global temperatures rising by two degrees centigrade – a figure which is claimed to represent a tipping point for irreversible and dramatic changes to the climate.
Vicky Pope, of the Met Office, advises the government and has called for "large and early cuts".
She said: "Even with large and early cuts in emissions, these projections indicate that temperatures are likely to rise to around 2C above pre-industrial levels by the end of the century. If action is delayed or is slow, then there is a significant risk of much larger increases in temperature."
A recent report pointed out that one way of reducing carbon emissions by 50 per cent by 2050 would be for half of all electricity to be generated from renewable sources.
E.ON is bringing the UK's first wind farm back online and has completed two phases of the world's biggest wind farm.
