Jeff Goodell Quotes

The signs of climate change are visible across the nation, from the drought-stricken fields of Central California to the flooded streets of Michigan. Extreme weather is turning people's lives upside down and costing communities millions of dollars in damaged infrastructure and added health care costs.

The increasing frequency of extreme weather events, droughts and floods is in line with what climate scientists have been predicting for decades - and evidence is mounting that what's happening is more severe than predicted, and will get far worse still if we fail to act.

For millions of Americans, climate change is no longer just a chart or a graph. It's the smoke on our tongues from massive wildfires. It's the floodwater invading our homes and record-breaking hurricanes and heat waves.

In particular, Australia, because of its ancient geography, soil profile and distinctive weather patterns, is more adversely affected by climate variability than some other continents.

One thing most people would agree is that climate change would add further uncertainties to our already quite tight water supply situation in China.

Extreme weather threatens our energy and electric grid, federal buildings, transportation infrastructure, access to natural resources, public health, our relationships across the globe, and many other aspects of life.

Droughts come and go, but this one is so extreme that it will doubtless affect the discussion of climate change.

From floods in Iowa and Nebraska to fires in California to hurricanes in Houston and Puerto Rico, we can no longer escape the fact that climate change is not happening in some far-off, distant future.

When I left school, I never wondered whether my apartment in New York was vulnerable to storm surges, but my three daughters have to consider the realities of extreme weather and how it may destabilize communities around the globe.

Is it 10 years, 20, 50 before we reach that tipping point where climate change becomes irreversible? Nobody can know. There's clearly a probability distribution. We need to ensure this planet, and we need to do it quickly.

Climate is always evolving, and natural disaster have always existed.

Climate change is a global problem. The planet is warming because of the growing level of greenhouse gas emissions from human activity. If this trend continues, truly catastrophic consequences are likely to ensue from rising sea levels, to reduced water availability, to more heat waves and fires.

Opening up Atlantic and Arctic waters to drilling would lock the next generation into burning oil and gas in a way that only makes climate change that much worse, fueling ever rising seas, widening deserts, withering drought, blistering heat, raging storms, wildfires, floods and other hallmarks of climate chaos.

Climate change is real.

Global climate change has a profound impact on the survival and development of mankind. It is a major challenge facing all countries.

People are seeing the impact of climate change around them in extraordinary patterns of floods and droughts, wildfires, heatwaves and powerful storms.

You could engineer a human to survive the greenhouse effect because you think that's what's going to happen, and then all of a sudden the glaciers are creeping down on you.

Human-caused climate change threatens almost every aspect of human existence.

Global warming is real. It is happening today. It is being charted by our satellites. It is being charted by our scientists. It is being charted by those of us in this body, and I think the real key is if we are ready to admit that fact and take the action to make the necessary conversion.

Climate change is also clearly a matter of huge interest and concern for the scientific community.

Australia has suffered a decade of drought, epic floods, a Category 5 cyclone, and a plague of locusts. But just because Aussies have the biggest carbon footprint in the world, it doesn't mean they're stupid.

The effects of climate change are real and must be acted on.

We must start to treat climate change as what it is - a threat to United States security. And we must not delay.

Climate change is a really abstract thing in most of the world.

I think the Caribbean countries face rising oceans and they face increase in the severity of hurricanes. This is something that is very, very scary to all of us. The island states in the world represent - I remember this number - one-half of 1 percent of the carbon emissions in the world. And they will - some of them will disappear.