Climate change is accelerating at a faster rate than world experts predicted and will cause global devastation unless immediate action is taken, a new report claims.

And 'extreme weather events' like the hot summer of 2003, which caused 35,000 deaths across Europe due to heat stress and bad air quality, will happen more frequently, it says.

The report found the Arctic Ocean is losing sea ice 30 or more years ahead of the projections put forward by the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in 2007.

If the trend continues all summer sea ice could disappear within five years - a state not seen on the planet for more than a million years.

This would be the first 'tipping point' paving the way to 'rapid and abrupt climate change' rather than gradual changes, according to the bleak WWF study.

The WWF report 'Climate Change: Faster, stronger, sooner' also predicts global crop failure, with more frequent flooding in northern Europe and long-term droughts in the Mediterranean region. The number and intensity of extreme cyclones over the UK and North Sea are also expected to increase.

The WWF, formerly the World Wildlife Fund, issued their report to coincide with a meeting of EU environment ministers to discuss new laws to tackle climate change.

They called on the EU to work towards zero net emissions by 2050 to try to stop global temperature rising more than 2C. The first step would be to reduce emissions to 30 per cent below 1990 levels by 2020.

However, at present Britain is the only country that has committed to an 80 per cent cut in emissions by 2050. The Government claims this can be achieved through renewable energy and a new generation of power stations.

Other European countries including Poland and Italy have rejected

一份新的研究報告聲稱,全球氣候正在劇烈變化,該變化的速度超過了之前專家們的估計,如果不采取直接有效的行動，將會造成巨大災難.

它還指出,類似于2003年那樣酷熱夏天的極端氣候現象將更頻繁的出現,那年夏天,整個歐洲共有35000人死于熱應力和不良空氣質量.

該研究發現,早在IPCC2007指出該問題之前的30年或者更早,北冰洋就開始逐漸失去海冰了。

如果這種趨勢持續發展,所有的夏季海冰將在五年內消失----一百多萬年后,這個星球上將會有一個大陸消失.

根據WWF的研究顯示,這將是鋪就"氣候驟變"之路的首個"驚爆點".

WWF報告氣候的變化:"更快,更強,",同時它還預測,由于歐洲北部頻繁的水災和地中海地區長期的干旱,全球糧食產量將會減產.發生在英國和北海地區颶風的數量和強度也將會增加.

WWF,其前身是世界野生動物基金會,發布他們的報告與歐共體環境部長會議相符談論新的法律應付氣候變化.

他們呼吁歐共體在2050年實現0凈排放的目標,努力將全球氣溫升高控制在兩度以內.第一步將減少排放量,到2020年,將排放量減少到低于1990年水平的30%.

可是,目前只有英國致力于實現到2050年減少80%排放量的目標.政府聲稱,通過可再生能源和使用新一代的電站可以實現上述目標.

其他的歐洲國家，包括波蘭和意大利,持反對意見.