Places on Earth will become uninhabitable if ‘ Hothouse Earth ’ becomes a reality ,” said Johan Rockström , of the Stockholm Resilience Centre .
Losing balance And a co-author , Hans Joachim Schellnhuber , who directs the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research , said : “ We show how industrial age greenhouse gas emissions force our climate , and ultimately the Earth system , out of balance .
“ In particular , we address tipping elements in the planetary machinery that might , once a certain level has been passed , one by one change fundamentally rapidly , and perhaps irreversibly . The cascade of events may tip the entire Earth system into a new mode of operation .”
The message , although alarming , is a restatement of previous findings and a reconsideration of existing evidence , enhanced by lessons from the more recent geological past , in which rocks and the fossils buried with them tell a story of dramatic changes in temperature and sea level .
Other researchers have raised the hazard of “ tipping points ” that could send the climate into a state of irreversible change . Professor Steffen three years ago warned that of the nine safe “ planetary boundaries ” that kept
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