Environmental News Network: Climate change is affecting the Tibetan plateau, threatening regional water supplies and altering atmospheric circulation for half the planet. The plateau is the world’s third largest store of ice. But its temperature has risen by up to 0.3 degrees Celsius every ten years over the last fifty years – approximately three times the global warming rate. As a result, 82 per cent of the plateau’s glaciers have retreated while ten per cent of its permafrost has degraded. Among the …