According to Bennington, “Millions will migrate into, rather than away from, areas of environmental vulnerability … An even bigger policy challenge will be the millions who are trapped in dangerous conditions and unable to move to safety.”

According to the report Migration and Global Environmental Change, between 114 million and 192 million people will have moved to urban areas of Asia and Africa by 2060. Despite the environmental changes the earth is going through, scientists explain that there isn’t reason to panic just yet. “Migration can be a good option. It is a way of adapting to climate change,” explains Neil Adger, who works as a professor of environmental economics. “We should be planning for migration pro-actively, to ensure that the necessary infrastructure is in place for people.”

The scientists in the Foresight Group have also said that developing countries should be helped now, while there is still time to support them before more drastic changes start taking place in the environment.

In related news, the Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature study was recently released, which found that global warming is real. This study is somewhat different from others because it was independently conducted, non-profit (in fact, it had been funded by many skeptics), and open source. Also, the report includes a great amount of data and information results and records concerning the earth’s temperature that were compiled from more than 39,000 weather stations around the world.

The Berkeley study’s findings corroborated with what other studies had previously found and showed: the earth’s temperatures are indeed getting warmer and warmer each year. Yet despite all of the statistics and facts, a number of people still insist that global warming is a myth, that information has been distorted and tampered with, and that all of this is part of an elaborate hoax.

Hopefully as the earth continues to increase in temperature and the environmental repercussions like the melting of the polar ice caps continue to make themselves evident, skeptics will realize that global warming is indeed real and that green living is one way to combat it on an individual level. Then again, some people will likely still be in denial, even when Alaska is hotter than a garage door in Guam.

What are your thoughts on the Berkeley and Foresight Group studies? Be sure to let us know, in the comments below!

During the conference the Geological Society in London warned in a statement that in the absence of mitigation measures it could take Earth 100,000 years or more to recover:

“The geological evidence from the 55 million year event and from earlier warming episodes suggests that such an addition [a massive increase in greenhouse gases caused by the activities of mankind] is likely to raise average global temperatures by at least 5 to 6C, and possibly more, and that recovery of the Earth’s climate in the absence of mitigation measures could take 100,000 years or more. Numerical models of the climate system support such an interpretation. In the light of the evidence presented here it is reasonable to conclude that emitting further large amounts of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere over time is likely to be unwise, uncomfortable though that fact may be.”

Professor Jim Zachos, from the University of California, said that if we humans continue to pump out greenhouse gases into the atmosphere we could cause “mass extinction of species”:

“Prof Zachos said that if the world continues to pump out greenhouse gases at the current rate, around 5,000 gigatons of greenhouse gases will be released into the atmosphere over a few hundred years.

He said this will cause a more rapid temperature rise that at any other time in history and could cause “mass extinction of species”.

“The impacts will be pretty severe compared to 55 million years ago in terms of evolution of this planet,” he said.”

Read more about this story over at the Telegraph. Also check out this Green Blog post: NOAA study shows climate change “largely irreversible for 1000 years”

This past week the non-profit film HOME was released in every format, including in movie theaters, on television, DVD/Blu-ray Disc and the internet, on the same day in over 50 countries in an effort to spread its message to the widest audience possible.

“We are living in exceptional times. Scientists tell us that we have 10 years to change the way we live, avert the depletion of natural resources and the catastrophic evolution of the Earth’s climate”, Yann Arthus-Bertrand, director and photographer of the film, said.

“The stakes are high for us and our children. Everyone should take part in the effort, and HOME has been conceived to take a message of mobilization out to every human being.”

HOME is directed by the internationally renowned French photographer Yann Arthus-Bertrand, produced the famous director Luc Besson and narrated by five-time Academy Award nominee Glenn Close (Dangerous Liaisons).

The film is shot in high definition in 54 countries and 120 locations over 217 days and will use a “first-time ever all-aerial filming style” highlighting “the Earth’s wonders as well as its wounds and provides a necessary perspective to approach the changing environment”.

Home will be available on DVD for $19.98. But you can watch it for free in high definition over at YouTube.

It’s an amazingly beautiful and yet scary documentary about our home. It sort of reminds me about the Swedish documentary “The Planet” but with fewer facts. Watch it!

Also watch: The Age of Stupid

“Other evangelicals are concerned the Green Bible will mislead Christians because it does not interpret Scripture literally, said James Taylor, a founding elder at Living Water Christian Fellowship in Palmetto, Fla.

“These groups don’t have a religious focus; they have a desire to spread their environmental message,” Taylor said of the essayists who contributed to the Green Bible, which contains a foreword from Anglican Archbishop Desmond Tutu.”

Yes, these religious fundamentalists are worried that the “Green Bible” won’t follow the Bible literally. You know, they are worried that the “Green Bible” won’t say that it is alright to own a slave or sacrifice animals as well as humans as it is “pleasing to the Lord”. Or that it is alright to murder and rape people in the name of a fairy-tale God. It makes my mind boggle that people still in the 21st century believes in religious dogma and superstition. Will we ever be able to leave the Dark Age?

As of September 23 we humans have used all the resources our earth can produce this year. That means we are borrowing resources from 2009 and that we are literally consuming our children’s resources.

And as each year passes Earth Overshoot Day happens earlier and earlier. Last year Earth Overshoot Day happened on October 6. Then we consumed 30% more natural resources than what the earth can reproduce under a whole year. Now in 2008 that number has increased with 10% as the Global Footprint Network expects us to use 140% of the Earths resources.

“Globally, we now require the equivalent of 1.4 planets to support our lifestyles. But of course, we only have one Earth. The result is that our supply of natural resources — like trees and fish — continues to shrink, while our waste, primarily carbon dioxide, accumulates.”

Some countries contribute more to these numbers than others do. If everyone lived like a resident of the following countries we would need this many earths:

• United States 5.4 Earths
• Canada 4.2 Earths
• United Kingdom 3.1 Earths
• Germany 2.5 Earths
• Italy 2.2 Earths
• South Africa 1.4 Earths
• Argentina 1.2 Earths
• Costa Rica 1.1 Earths
• India 0.4 Earths

What do you think? How can we manage to overcome our increasing consumption rate and overpopulation? And how can one personally contribute to ending the Overshoot Day?

The number of six billion human lives would never have been reached if it wasn’t for fossil fuels. The energy sent by the sun and received by the Earth every day could ever sustain more than two billion people. Fossil fuels combine a sort of energy saved below the surface of the planet, now extracted by humans to use this energy and cover their needs. And with all needs easily covered, humanity was and is able to rise in population.

But there is a great difference of four billion people between the number of humans the planet can sustain and the number of humans existing, a fact that has a bad impact on the Earth. Using fossil fuels releases huge amounts of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. And since there are so many people on Earth, there are more and more gas emissions. All this leads to global warming, climate change and pollution in general.

Even if overpopulation didn’t cause environmental problems of that kind, there are other consequences to be taken into account. And that’s because all these people need accommodation, private space, public areas and services, fields and farms to produce food. All this space needed is taken from ecosystems, mostly by deforestrating large areas. This act alone is enough to reduce the amount of oxygen produced by plants, and the space that natural habitats used to cover.