This week global leaders are trying to thrash a series of agreements on how to reverse global warming, save the rainforests and reduce our carbon emissions.
But like many things in life, solving these issues is far from simple.

Rich and poor nations have very different needs, and some cranks don’t believe that climate change is happening at all.

Amidst all this we also have mass protest, police brutality and key environmentalists being barred from the talks.

In all this confusion it’s difficult to figure out exactly what’s going on. Even leading experts are having a hard time of it. So here’s our lowdown on the Copenhagen Climate Change meeting 2009.

Part one: What’s the problem?
Two words. Climate change. We’re used to the weather changing with the four seasons. We’re even used to seasonal shifts in weather – this is normal. What isn’t normal is the Greenhouse Effect.

Since the Industrial Revolution humans have been belching massive amounts of chemicals into the atmosphere. The main culprits are fossil fuels, but other big baddies included Chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) that are now hardly used in the West.

CFCs, found mainly in products like deodorant and hairspray, literally eat the Ozone Layer, which keeps harmful rays from the sun at bay. Thanks to our obsession with sweat denial and having firm big hair, we now have huge patchy holes in the Ozone Layer that will take thousands of years to repair.

These holes have caused a massive spike in the cases of skin cancer, and have contributed towards global warming.

Now to fossil fuels, which when burnt release carbon dioxide (and a whole host of other ugly chemicals). Carbon dioxide, AKA CO2, loves energy, it makes it feel like dancing. When sunlight hits the CO2 molecules they start to vibrate and give off their groovy energy into the atmosphere in the form of hot hot heat.

Why is this a problem? Well, whilst CO2 molecules are pulling their atomic moves in what is possibly the best atmospheric disco of all time, the heat goes back into the earth’s atmosphere rather than bouncing into space – like it would have done originally if the Ozone Layer hadn’t been ripped to pieces.

Needless to say, the more carbon dioxide in the air, the hotter things are going to get. And this isn’t good for life on earth. Not that we want to spoil the party or anything.

Life became cheap
But things don’t end here. Oh no. You see, life on earth is based around delicate balances that evolved over billions of years. Living creatures breathe out CO2, and trees, plants and algae (plankton in the sea) convert CO2 into water and oxygen. It’s a give-take scenario that’s worked for everyone for a very long time.

But not now, because us humans decided that trees, and in particular the rainforests, don’t matter and we’d just get rid of them.

The thing is, they don’t call the Rainforests the ‘Lungs of the Earth’ for nothing. They produce most of our oxygen. You know, the stuff that keeps us alive. Unless you’re a deep sea free diver or a Yogic guru, the average human can only survive a few minutes without the stuff.

Why did we decide to trash our rainforests? Commercial logging supplies timber for our cheap furniture, and pulp for paper – here’s a scary fact, for every ciggie ever smoked, around three trees were burned simply to dry the paper. All so we can inhale an expensive cloud of carcinogens that make you look old and give you cancer.

Of course, it’s not just timber. The land is then used by large corporations to farm cattle to make cheap burgers. Plus cows have a massive carbon footprint. They fart methane, which is another greenhouse gas.

Huston, we have a problem…
So as the sun heats the earth, the ozone layer can’t protect us from harmful rays anymore. The huge amounts of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases we’re churning into the air can’t be mopped up by our rainforests because we’ve converted them into a gigantic pile of cheap plywood furniture and cigarette paper.

The warmer temperatures are also causing the Polar Ice Caps to melt, which will cause the sea levels to rise massively. This will drown many coastal towns and cities, islands will disappear underwater, and the face of the earth will change forever.

Also expect radical changes in the weather – more violent storms, floods, forest fires, resulting in drought, famine, disease – in short, more death and destruction. And sadly the poorest nations will bear the brunt of these man-made natural disasters.

This isn’t a biblical apocalypse we’ve just made up for your entertainment. This is happening now. If aliens were watching us, they’d either think we were self-harming on a global scale or were intent on suicide.