Discovery Channel visits global warming tipping points across the globe, talks to the world’s leading experts and examines the latest evidence to determine the facts about global warming in Global Warming: What You Need To Know. Hosted by award-winning journalist Tom Brokaw, the two-hour special presents the facts and leaves it up to the viewers to determine their own truth about global warming.

“Global Warming: What You Need To Know” will decode the buzzwords and arm viewers with an arsenal of clear definitions and visual depictions to explain the greenhouse effect, carbon dioxide emissions, CFCs, effects on weather and rising sea levels. Visceral CGI and cutting edge climate computer models will help viewers see into the future at a world significantly changed by unchecked global warming.

The special will take viewers to global warming hot spots where the planet is most affected by climate change - into rushing sub-surface rivers deep in Patagonian glaciers; into the drought-stricken Amazon; on coral reefs ravaged by rising ocean temperatures; into a massive Chinese coal mine, and many more.

The international team of experts, including NASA’s top climate scientist Dr. James Hansen, and Princeton University professors Michael Oppenheimer and Stephen Pacala, will discuss the current realities of global warming and predict the future of the planet. Many of the experts will address natural warming and cooling cycles going back 600,000 years, and discuss if the present warming trend is unnatural.

The special will demonstrate how much carbon dioxide the average American family produces and present a graphical timeline of global warming throughout history. Finally, the special will look at technical solutions, both great and small, from giant gas injection rigs in the ocean, to more efficient architecture in cities, to what the average American family can do to slow global warming.

The special airs tonight, 9-11 PM.