Six Degrees: Our Future on a Hotter Planet

An eye-opening and vital account of the future of our earth | and our civilisation | if current rates of global warming persist | by the highly acclaimed author of ‘High Tide’.Picture yourself a few decades from now | in a world in which average temperatures are three degrees higher than they are now. On the edge of Greenland | rivers ten times the size of the Amazon are gushing off the ice sheet into the north Atlantic. Displaced victims of North Africa's drought establish a new colony on Greenland's southern tip | one of the few inhabitable areas not already crowded with environmental refugees. Vast pumping systems keep the water out of most of Holland | but the residents of Bangladesh and the Nile Delta enjoy no such protection. Meanwhile | in New York | a Category 5-plus superstorm pushes through the narrows between Staten Island and Brooklyn | devastating waterside areas from Long Island to Manhattan. Pakistan | crippled by drought brought on by disappearing Himalayan glaciers | sees 27 million farmers flee to refugee camps in neighbouring India. Its desperate government prepares a last-ditch attempt to increase the flow of the Indus river by bombing half-constructed Indian dams in Kashmir. The Pakistani president authorises the use of nuclear weapons in the case of an Indian military counter-strike. But the biggest story of all comes from South America | where a conflagration of truly epic proportions has begun to consume the Amazon…Alien as it all sounds | Mark Lynas's incredible new book is not science-fiction; nor is it sensationalist. The title | ‘Six Degrees’ | refers to the terrifying possibility that average temperatures will rise by up to six degrees within the next hundred years. This is the first time we have had a reliable picture of how the collapse of our civilisation will unfold unless urgent action is taken.Most vitally | Lynas's book serves to highlight the fact that the world of 2100 doesn't have to be one of horror and chaos. With a little foresight | some intelligent strategic planning | and a reasonable dose of good luck | we can at least halt the catastrophic trend into which we have fallen – but the time to act is now.