The Earth continues to experience record-breaking temperatures caused by increased concentrations of carbon dioxide (CO2) and other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. This buildup is the result of human activities, especially our use of fossil fuels in, for example, automobiles and power plants. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the world's leading scientific body assessing climate change, recently raised its estimate of warming in this century to a possible 10.8° F. The impacts of this unprecedented warming-increased floods and drought, rising sea levels, spread of deadly diseases such as malaria and dengue fever, increasing numbers of violent storms-threaten to be more severe and imminent than previously believed.

Impacts are already being felt in the Arctic, where the average annual temperature has increased approximately four times as much as average annual temperatures around the rest of the globe. Caribou are falling through once solid sea ice, and thawing permafrost is causing damage to houses, roads, airports and pipelines as well as accelerating erosion. Up to 100 feet of land per year are being lost to erosion in some locations along the coasts of the Siberian, Alaskan and Canadian Arctic. Rising temperatures have caused outbreaks of insect pests such as the spruce bark beetle, which is reproducing at twice its normal rate in today's warmer climate. A sustained outbreak of the beetles on Alaska's subarctic Kenai Peninsula caused over 2.3 million acres of tree mortality, the largest loss from a single insect outbreak recorded in North America. As a result of global warming, Inuit communities in the Arctic are in danger of losing their homes and livelihoods, and now face mass resettlement choices and global warming-related destruction of culturally and historically significant lands and buildings.

An urgent, global response is essential. To strengthen the global response, CIEL's Climate Change Program focuses on impacts to people and ecosystems of the Arctic and Subarctic. The Program works to protect the Earth's climate system through promotion of human rights, forest conservation, and biodiversity protection. CIEL advises key participants in the international policy arena on how to work towards a sustainable, enforceable emissions reduction framework. CIEL is widely recognized as a leading legal research institute, earning respect for our objective analysis and strong commitment to the environment. A key part of CIEL's strategy is to provide legal support and advice to other environmental organizations and representatives of indigenous and other local communities, helping build their capacity to advocate for a just and effective climate regime.

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• CIEL is collecting case studies on the impacts of climate change on vulnerable communities.