The rejection by the US President Mr George W Bush of the Kyoto agreement on global warming last week is continuing to cause a storm in the US.
In an open letter published today in Timemagazine to the American leader, former US president Mr Jimmy Carter, scientist Stephen Hawking, actor Harrison Ford and ex-Soviet leader Mr Mikhail Gorbachev warned him it was "time for action".
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"No challenge we face is more momentous than the threat of global climate change," the letter said. "The current provisions of the Kyoto Protocol are a matter of legitimate debate.
"But the situation is becoming urgent and it is time for consensus and action."
European environment ministers have pledged to push ahead with implementing the treaty with or without the American government.
The Kyoto accord would have committed the US to cutting emissions but the country is struggling with an energy shortage which has seen blackouts in California and warnings other states may also suffer this summer.
The letter, which was also signed by astronaut John Glenn, financier Mr George Soros and primate scientist Ms Jane Goodall, told Mr Bush he should see clean technology as "an opportunity, not a peril".
"We urge you to develop a plan to reduce US production of greenhouse gases," they wrote.
"The future of our children - and their children - depends on the resolve you and other world leaders show."
The letter came as an opinion poll showed 75 per cent of Americans thought global warming was "a serious problem" and signals an increase in pressure on Mr Bush, who said he was putting the interests of the faltering American economy first by refusing to ratify the Kyoto treaty.
And it comes as a delegation of European Union officials arrived in Washington to lobby the Bush administration over global warming.
The group is also set to seek support for cutting emissions in Russia, China, Iran and Japan, where the treaty was signed in 1997.
PA
