His view was that the planet was blocked from the sun not by clouds but by dust and was descending into the next ice age. Apart from one nation, all countries in the world have signed the Paris Agreement on climate change, committing to limit emissions of climate-warming greenhouse gases. The world's average temperature is at least 1degC warmer since observation records began in the 19th century, and New Zealand's average temperature 1.2degC warmer. And in the northern hemisphere, the extreme weather, linked to climate change, has been more serious still. Otherwise, if the global average temperature rises by 2degC above pre-industrial values, then about 400,000 of the species that we know could go extinct.

Source: Otago Daily Times October 15, 2018 01:41 UTC