IPCC plays safe, turns to govts
After a number of gaffes, the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has asked governments around the world to nominate scientists to the panel that will review and finalise its fifth climate assessment report.
After a number of gaffes, the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has asked governments around the world to nominate scientists to the panel that will review and finalise its fifth climate assessment report.
This move will ensure that the report’s accuracy and reliability is not the IPCC’s alone. The report will be released in 2014.
The IPCC recently expressed regret for its erroneous claim that most Himalayan glaciers will disappear by 2035. It apologized again for saying that 55 per cent of the Netherlands lies below sea level. In fact, it is only 26 per cent.
The IPCC intends to form three working groups. The first group will examine the scientific aspects of climate system and the change. The second group will study scientific, social and economic aspects of vulnerability to climate change and its impact on ecological systems and health impact. The third will study the mitigation possibilities to meet the challenge of climate change.
“The fifth assessment report will put greater emphasis on assessing the socio-economic aspects of climate change and its implications for sustainable development,” the letter written in mid-January to governments around the worlds, said.
The IPCC has asked governments to nominate scientists by March 12.
The IPCC has also clarified it will not do any research on its own but will use assess scientific, technical and socio-economic information, which is peer-reviewed.
The IPCC, in its fourth report, had been accused of using non-peer reviewed data to sensationalise the impact of climate change.