"Climate change activists are pushing for a fossil fuel nonproliferation treaty, using strategies taken from global efforts to stop the spread of nuclear weapons." “They’re framing climate change as sort of a slow moving weapon of mass destruction. That kind of reframing can be very powerful,” says Charli Carpenter, a professor of political science at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst. “We sort of think of climate change as an environmental issue, but it’s really more like a slow motion asteroid headed towards the planet.” Scientists have warned the world that greenhouse gases need to be virtually eliminated by around 2050 to prevent the most catastrophic effects of climate change.