Climate change is one of the most serious environmental challenges to face our planet. Urgent action is needed if we are to avert the threat it poses to many species and habitats, and to people's livelihoods.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) agrees that the average rise in global temperature must stay below a 2°C increase above pre-industrial levels.

At WWF-UK, our focus is on the following:

• ensuring that the UK makes a fair contribution towards the international effort to stay below 2ºC warming. It is vital that the draft UK Climate Change Bill is improved and commits to delivering a reduction in carbon dioxide emissions of at least 80% by 2050. This equates to at least a 3% cut each year;
• ensuring the UK government continues to play a leading role on the global stage by driving forward an effective international climate change agreement to follow the first phase of the Kyoto Protocol, which ends in 2012;
• ensuring that the review of the European Emissions Trading Scheme (which puts a cap on emissions from industry) will guarantee that the scheme delivers substantial emissions reductions within Europe after 2012;
• working with the major UK power companies and UK government to promote a shift in the business model towards renewables and energy services;
• promoting energy efficiency and renewable energy in new housing developments;
• developing and documenting an increased understanding of the range of climate change impacts supported through our work on the climate witness programme;
• support for developing and disseminating community based adaptation planning;
• ensuring that developed nations begin to pay there fair share of the costs of Climate change by supporting the development of institutional architecture and financing for adaptation funding;
• supporting WWF programmes to adapt to the impacts of climate change and building the resilience of ecosystems and local communities to better withstand climate change impacts;
• we work with a diversity of partners including local communities, governments, civil society, the media, academia and other international agencies especially on the relationship between environmental wellbeing and eliminating poverty.

More about the work of the WWF UK Climate Change team

Key to achieving some of these goals is our campaign work; through the Stop Climate Chaos (SCC) coalition and our One Planet Living (OPL) campaign.

One Planet Living (OPL) - a joint initiative with BioRegional

WWF-UK encourages every individual to take responsibility for reducing their carbon emissions and protecting our one planet.

To help save the environment from the worst effects of climate change, we need to look at the big picture of the UK's unsustainable lifestyle; it is about societal change; it's about individuals changing how they live, and in doing so, changing the UK.

Join the One Planet Living campaign to find out what you can do to live within your fair share of the Earth's resources. We recognise that you can only do so much. That's why we're also calling on you to join us in campaigning for government and business to play their part in making One Planet Living a reality.

It is still possible to save the planet from a climate change catastrophe. However, we are running out of time. We have just five years to make sure we have changed our unsustainable lifestyle. But we need to make the first changes today. More

Stop Climate Chaos Coalition (SCC) /Icount Campaign

WWF is a founding member and board member of the UK Non Governmental Organisation, Stop Climate Chaos (SCC). The key campaign of the SCC is called ICount which was launched in October 2006 to inspire thousands of people to help stop climate change. SCC were a UK partner for the Live Earth concerts in July 2007. More

Looking after our supporters

We also encourage the public to donate to WWF to enable us to continue our work to conserve endangered species, protect their habitats and address global threats such as climate change. We also have a great membership scheme and you can make a difference by adopting one of our sponsored animals. More