Climate change is already affecting our lives and the places we live, and has the potential to dramatically impact the lives of future generations.

The Nature Conservancy is joining with policy makers, community members, businesses, scientists, industry leaders and others to slow the pace of climate change.

We work to reduce the accumulation of heat-trapping gases in the atmosphere and help natural areas adjust to the impacts of climate change.

If we don't act now, we will leave a much larger problem to our children.

The good news is that, if we all join in to stop climate change, we can reduce its impact on our lives, on our environment and on future generations.

Climate change is caused by the emission of heat-trapping gases - mostly carbon dioxide (CO₂) - from vehicles, industry, power plants and deforestation.

As these gases build up, they act like a thick blanket, overheating the planet, changing our climate, and threatening our health, economy and natural environment.

The terms global warming and climate change are often used interchangeably, but the two phenomena are different. Global warming is the rise in global temperatures due to an increase of heat-trapping carbon emissions in the atmosphere.

Climate change, on the other hand, is a more general term that refers to changes in many climatic factors (such as temperature and precipitation) around the world. These changes are happening at different rates and in different ways.

For example, the United States has become wetter over the 20th century, while the Sahel region of central Africa has become drier.