The message two noted climate scientists - Peter Webster and Judith Curry of Georgia Tech - shared with Gov. Jeb Bush and gubernatorial candidate and attorney general Charlie Crist last week was simple: Global warming poses a threat to Florida more than to any other state and most nations.

Mr. Webster and Ms. Curry study hurricanes, particularly the occurrence of intense hurricanes, and they found a correlation between the rise in surface-water temperatures and the increase in the number of Category 4 and 5 storms.

"The risk is greater than people are aware of. Already, it's worse than the 1950s," Ms. Curry said, referring to the last big natural cycle of hurricanes. "And it's going to get worse."

Our coasts, Lake Okeechobee and surge-prone areas such as Tampa are in the cross-hairs.

We have maybe a 10-year window to make major policy changes before the climate reaches a tipping point. The debate about the validity of global warming is over; now's the time for public policy changes that will help us avoid crisis management later on.

Florida can take some unilateral actions, beginning this week if the political will was there. We can build levees and further strengthen and enforce building codes. That alone could save billions of dollars in a Katrina-like disaster.

We can plan ahead with land-use decisions and build desalination plants in places where fresh water may be contaminated by rising sea levels.

But let's think big. Let's think globally.

It's unusual for a state to take the lead on a worldwide issue such as global warming. But inaction at the federal level, combined with the fact that Florida will take the brunt of major climate change, make it imperative that our state act.

"A state is a laboratory for good ideas and bad ideas," said Jerry Karnas, regional outreach coordinator of the National Wildlife Federation. Inaction is a bad idea.

Florida can be a leader in conservation and alternative energy sources (does that blazing sun outside or our sea breezes give you any ideas?).

Our state must come up with a comprehensive climate plan, not just an energy bill with a climate component, which is the bloodless approach we have in place now.

Call in the academics

Our state must be careful to not let international politics or lingering denial of global warming affect funding for our universities or researchers. Knowledge and global warming know no borders. Georgia Tech is seeking as many international partnerships as it can, Ms. Curry noted. And Mr. Webster pointed out that a simple weather forecast for Bangladesh - right up there with Florida as an endangered area - can involve satellites in space and scientists on three continents.

Our state can become a leader in finding technology to ease global warming through reduction of greenhouse gas, the chief villain.

"We're talking about selling clean technology to a billion Chinese, not the other way around," Mr. Karnas said.

And we can find solutions.

Cleaner power plants have driven acid rain out of the headlines, for example. Changes in the use of certain chemicals have started to repair the hole in the ozone layer. International cooperation (and U.S. technology) promise to greatly reduce the emission of the potent greenhouse gas methane.

Gov. Bush and Mr. Crist are to be commended for opening their doors to the scientists and to representatives of the National Wildlife Federation and Florida Wildlife Federation.

Listening and understanding are a start.