What is Climate Change
Understand what climate change is.
Last updated 9 July 2026
Climate change refers to significant variations in global weather patterns that persist over an extended period of time.
Many places in the world are experiencing higher temperatures due to global warming.
Over the past 100 years, global temperatures have been increasing faster than ever before. As the Earth gets warmer, rain patterns are changing, sea levels are rising, and year after year, snow and ice are melting sooner each spring. The impact of climate change on the environment is becoming increasingly apparent as climate conditions continue to change and intensify.
The consensus among the scientific community is that climate change is the result of a complex combination of natural and man-made activity. The findings of the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) (opens in new tab), an internationally accepted authority on climate change that provides comprehensive scientific assessments on climate change, indicate that human activities are indeed speeding up climate change.