The Met Office study shows time is running out to avoid the worst consequences of climate change.
Britain’s meteorological agency warned that the world must take drastic action to reduce greenhouse gas pollution within the next two years or face the worst effects of climate change.
The Meteorological Office’s usually conservative Hadley Center said that only by cutting emissions by 3 percent a year beginning in 2010 can the world prevent global temperatures from rising by more than 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit (2 degrees Celsius) this century.
That increase is widely recognized as the point at which the worst impacts of sea level rise, climate change and subsequent wide-scale extinctions would begin.
The Hadley Center warning came only two months before world leaders will meet in Poland to discuss a new treaty on cutting global emissions.
Many feel the nearly immediate 3 percent cut being recommended for 2010 would be almost impossible to achieve.