Feb. 9 (Bloomberg) -- Former U.S. Vice President Al Gore and British billionaire Richard Branson announced a $25 million prize for scientists who can devise a way to reduce greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and help combat global warming.

Branson, founder of Virgin Group Ltd., will award the Virgin Earth Challenge prize money to anyone who develops technology capable of removing carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases at the rate of one billion tons a year. Gore will be a member of a panel of judges that makes the award. The two made the announcement at a press conference in London.

The initiative comes a week after the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) said global warming is more than 90 percent likely to have been caused by humans, and predicted temperatures are likely to rise by 1.1 to 6.4 degrees Celsius by the end of this century, with sea levels increasing by 18 to 59 centimeters (7 to 23 inches).

``Governments, businesses and individual members of the public need to take that warning very seriously,'' Branson said of the IPCC report in an interview after today's announcement. ``If I write this check for $25 million, it will be the best check I've ever written.''

Gore told reporters that the planet has a ``fever'' and that the prize was ``an initiative to stimulate society to do what no- one knows how to do now.''

`Inconvenient Truth'

``We face the challenge of transforming the way in which we produce energy, the way we transport ourselves and goods, the way we build structures -- everything we do,'' Gore said. ``Is there some way that some of the extra CO2 can be scavenged efficiently out of the atmosphere?''

Gore, 58, has long called for stronger action on climate change, a stance that has earned him a nomination for the Nobel Peace Prize. ``An Inconvenient Truth,'' a film featuring Gore and based on his lecture about climate change, has been nominated for a best documentary Oscar.

The panel of six judges also includes James Hansen, who heads the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, and U.K. scientist James Lovelock, who devised the ``GAIA'' theory that likens the Earth's natural systems to those of a living organism.

Branson, 56, said he drew inspiration for the prize from an 18th-century U.K. government award for an invention that could accurately register longitude, which produced a winner six decades later.

`The Earth Cannot Wait'

``The Earth cannot wait 60 years,'' Branson said. ``We need every brilliant scientist to put their minds to it together.''

Following the IPCC report's publication, environmental groups including WWF International, Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth said that governments need to reduce emissions of gases such as carbon dioxide and methane in order to avoid the worst ravages of global warming.

Branson warned that his prize doesn't guarantee success, and that as well as working towards extracting already-emitted gases from the atmosphere, companies should cut emissions.

``Every single business must set themselves an individual target: they must all try to reduce their own CO2 emissions by at least 25 percent,'' said Branson, whose Virgin Group comprises about 200 businesses ranging from airlines and trains to music and financial services. ``I believe that's possible.''

`Planetary Emergency'

Branson said airlines such as his own can reduce emissions by using newer planes and technologies, beginning descents to airports earlier rather than circling, and lobbying airports to tow planes to the runway rather than leave the engines running.

``Every industry will find that there are areas like that where they can reduce their output of CO2.''

In September, Branson pledged to contribute $3 billion over 10 years to combat global warming. The money will be used to reduce Virgin's own reliance on fossil fuels, as well as supporting research on bio-fuels, he said. The prize he announced today will not come from that fund.

``The winner must be able to demonstrate a commercially viable design which will result in the net removal of anthropogenic, atmospheric, greenhouse gases each year for at least ten years without countervailing harmful effects,'' the written rules of the prize say.

As well as Branson, Gore, Hansen and Lovelock, the panel of judges will include Crispin Tickell, a former British diplomat, and Tim Flannery, an Australian author and conservationist. The panel will be helped in their deliberations by Steve Howard, Chief Executive Officer of the Climate Group, an organization that works with governments and companies to help mitigate climate change.

The U.K. Treasury said in an Oct. 30 report that global warming may cost the world as much as 20 percent of global gross domestic product by the next century because of the effects of famine, rising sea levels, storms and other environmental damage.

``We're not used to thinking of a planetary emergency,'' Gore said. ``It's a challenge to the moral imagination of humankind to actually accept the reality of the situation we are now facing.''

To contact the reporter on this story: Alex Morales in London at amorales2@bloomberg.net. Elliott Gotkine in London at egotkin@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: February 9, 2007 08:21 EST