In March 2014, a technical support unit (TSU) of ten, headquartered at Global Ecology, had successfully completed a herculean management effort for the 2000-page assessment Climate Change 2014: Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability, including two summaries. They were issued by the United Nations (UN) Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), Working Group II co-chaired by Chris Field, Global Ecology director, with science co-directors Katie Mach and Mike Mastrandrea managing the input of over 190 governments and nearly 2,000 experts from around the world.

The IPCC, established in 1988, assesses information about climate change and its impacts. In September 2008, Field was appointed co-chair of Working Group II. The process, managed by the TSU, was prescribed by the IPCC to ensure that the report is comprehensive; to incorporate government and scientists’ reviews; to be policy relevant and neutral; and to conduct a line-by-line approval of the 32-page policymaker summary. Image courtesy IPCC

 

Government representatives began by itemizing the topics to address, which were used to produce the outline in July 2009. The report expanded from the fourth assessment with 10 new chapters, including a broader ocean assessment and material on poverty, human security, livelihood, and urban and rural areas.

From January to June 2010, governments and organizations nominated 1,200 experts. Some 242 lead authors and 66 review editors were elected five months later. In all 1,774 experts were enlisted and the outline was refined.

Experts reviewed thousands of sources; over 12, 000 references were cited.  The report went through two extensive rounds of review, one in the summer of 2012, and the other in the spring of 2013.  Over 50,000 comments were addressed.

Mach and Mastrandrea worked with the co-chairs to produce the summaries—a 100-page technical summary and the high-profile 32-page policymaker summary. Their perspective allowed them to see the patterns, similarities, and overlap among the different topics to highlight the most important findings. The policymaker summary was sent for government review in October 2013, with Mach and Mastrandrea coordinating the comment response process.

As a last step, the policymaker summary went through a line-by-line approval process at a March 2014 meeting in Japan. Government representatives, scientists, and others gathered in an auditorium for a 5-day, virtually non-stop review co-chaired by Field and Vicente Barros. Every line was scrutinized aloud. In the end, all IPCC governments and scientists were in full consensus of the content.

 

 

Scientific Area: 
Global Ecology
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