A review of some of my usual journals, 'Construction Manager', 'Construction Information Quarterly', 'New Civil Engineer' showed that recently they all carried articles on green technology, life-cycle carbon footprints and research reports for 'Energy Analyst'. It is clear that responding to climate change, greenhouse gases, global warming and the reduction of carbon emissions are now firmly on the agenda of the construction industry as the United Nations Conference on Climate Change in Copenhagen gets underway.

Whilst the balance of scientific opinion seems agreed off centre to the main discussion on how to reduce carbon emissions there are voices challenging the veracity of the man-made climate change claims. arguing that the economic impact of responding is too great or not well enough thought through. However the need to respond now seems clear, this is the defensive and careful position. The risky position would be not to believe the climate change scientists, not to respond to their warnings, do nothing and perhaps in fifty years say 'Oops sorry we were wrong perhaps we should have taken some action, but it wasn't clear, we didn't understand'!'.

So it seems important that as construction professionals we understand both the issues that we are facing and the decisions that need to be taken. Pittock's second edition 'Climate Change' has the sub-title 'The science, impacts and solutions' and offers an excellent briefing document for those that want to get up top speed on the issues confronting us and to understand the background science and the solutions available.

The book is balanced and both sides of the so called argument are presented. Drawing on the latest analyses and the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report and work from CSIRO the book presents the data in a readable and understandable way.

The role of renewable energy sources as part of the solution to global warming is reviewed from the large scale schemes of California to much smaller scale schemes.

The twelve chapters take us through the story. First the argument is that Climate Change matters, I would have hoped that we had moved on from the need for such an introduction but perhaps not. The next two chapters deal with historical evidence and projecting the future and leads to the nub of the differences in the discussion which is all about uncertainty and risk and the likely outcomes.

The impacts of climate change, the adaptations that could be made and the mitigations to limit the effects are dealt with in the following three chapters.

The balance of the argument is set out in the chapters 'Climate change in context' and 'The politics of greenhouse'.

The international dimension and the tension with national interests is set out in the penultimate chapter and the finale is 'Accepting the challenge'.

This is a super briefing document and is an excellent reference to those who are becoming engaged in the responses to climate change. I believe that this is now all of us. The book should appeal to students and practioners, policy makers and company strategists considering how to position their company for the challenges and hence opportunities to come.

Ronald McCaffer

December 2009