Washington, Sep 23 : Republican presidential candidate John McCain and his running mate Sarah Palin disagree on the question of climate change, as the Alaska Governor has focused on how to adapt to global warming rather than how to combat it.

Palin has publicly questioned scientists’ near-consensus that human activity plays a role in the rising temperatures, the Washington Post reported.

She fought the administration’s listing of polar bears as threatened with extinction because of shrinking sea ice.

Palin sued to overturn the decision on the grounds that it will “have a significant adverse impact on Alaska because additional regulation of the species and its habitat . . . will deter activities such as commercial fisheries, oil and gas exploration and development, transportation and tourism within and off-shore of Alaska.”

In his campaigning, McCain has regularly said that humans are driving global warming and declared that his efforts to cap greenhouse gas emissions demonstrate his ability to work with Democrats.

But in selecting Palin and deciding to place her in charge of energy affairs should they win the White House, he has a running mate who has resisted this key tenet of his candidacy.

Rick Steiner, a University of Alaska marine conservation professor who pressed Palin''s administration to hand over documents related to its position on the polar bear listing, said the governor has not enacted policies that would help reverse climate change even as it transforms the state''s landscape.

“She has said some of the right things in the last two years, but she''s done absolutely nothing,” Steiner said.

Different regions of the United States are responding in varying ways to climate change, with drought in the Southwest and changing blooming patterns in the Northeast, but Alaska is feeling the effects the most.

Palin has not voiced an opinion on whether the federal government should cap carbon emissions, a cause McCain has championed for years. But she did resist the federal government''s move to list polar bears under the Endangered Species Act. (ANI)