HELSINKI - Former US Vice President Al Gore said on Tuesday that reducing drastically the amount of greenhouse gas emissions was vital for the future of the planet.
"Unless we stop dumping 70 million tonnes of global warming pollution into the atmosphere every 24 hours, which we are doing right now ... the continued acceleration of this pollution would destroy the future of human civilisation," Gore said in a news conference in Finland's capital Helsinki.
It is possible to reverse global warming, he said, adding that politics can seem to change very slowly, but it can also cross a tipping point and adapt a new pattern and change rapidly.
Gore said he was worried that adaptation to climate change could serve as an excuse for not reducing the global warming pollution and solving the climate crisis.
"We have to solve it (global warming) and there are some people who urge adaptation instead of prevention, and that formulation must be rejected."
Since there is damage done already, Gore said it is only morally responsible to have an appropriate amount of attention paid to helping poor nations to cope with the changes already taking place.
REUTERS NEWS SERVICE
