Four scary new things about global warming we've just learned

Report after report, study after study confirms, the planet is in serious trouble. Within 50 to 150 years, and within the lifetime of children born today, the world will experience catastrophic weather changes. Carbon dioxide, and methane emissions have spiked and temperatures are following.

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LOS ANGELES, CA (California Network) - There are four points worth nothing today:

-Carbon dioxide levels are rising at a faster rate than at any time in the past 66 million years.

-Methane emissions are also much higher than anticipated.

-Global warming is coming faster, in correlation with spikes in methane and CO2.

-The impacts will be more severe than originally thought and will occur within the next human lifetime.

Humans are releasing CO2 into the atmosphere at a higher rate than at any time in the past 66 million years. That includes the last one million years before the dinosaurs were wiped out. And it's not just by a little, but by ten times the highest rate previously calculated.

It must be understood that it's not the warming itself that is the problem, or even the CO2, but rather the rate of warming. When temperatures shift, so too do weather patterns, which causes habitats to move or even disappear. Plants and animals need to adapt to these changes, but adaptation by natural selection and evolution takes at least hundreds, if not thousands of years. No organism can adapt in mere decades to changes that are supposed to happen over centuries. Habitat loss and mass extinctions, like we actually see today, are to be expected.

Methane emissions are also much higher than anticipated. Methane matters because it is 86 times more powerful than CO2 as a retainer of heat. Recent years have seen a spike in methane emissions, but scientists have been curious why. Now, an answer seems to be emerging --fracking.

A startling new report suggests fracking, which has long been considered environmentally safe, is behind a recent spike in global methane, which has increased 30 percent more than expected in the USA in the past decade. However, the final verdict is out. The study made the conclusions because the methane levels correlate with the fracking boom. However, correlation does not equal causation and more research is needed.

The impacts of global warming will arrive sooner than anticipated. At most, scientists suggested the worst would be experienced by people who were not even born yet, perhaps inspiring hope that this future generation would be less shocked by the changes. However, scientists now predict some of the more severe effects will be seen within the next 50 years. This is easily within the lifetimes of children who live today.

As glacial ice melts, cities will be inundated. States like Florida will lose their legendary beaches and much of their land. Billions of people will be displaced, creating a global refugee crisis.

Imagine severe droughts, punctuated with lashing super storms.

Such claims would have been relegated to science fiction nightmare scenarios, but scientists are warning that too little too late has resulted in the nightmare coming true.

Whatever does come to pass, we can rest assured it will lead to suffering and death for a great many people. We cannot so swiftly change the climate of the planet without some consequence.

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