IPCC Announces Postponement Of Synthetic Report Release

Posted by Eric Ojo Latest Headlines, U.S./Canada Saturday, September 10th, 2022

(AFRICAN EXAMINER) – The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has rescheduled the approval session for the Synthesis Report (SYR), which will integrate the findings of the Working Groups and Special Reports.

The assessment reports which were initially scheduled to be released from 13 to 17 of March 2023, hosted by Switzerland, has been shifted to 20 March 2023.

The IPCC is the United Nations (UN) body for assessing the science related to climate change. It was established by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) in 1988 to provide political leaders with periodic scientific assessments concerning climate change, its implications and risks, as well as to put forward adaptation and mitigation strategies. In the same year the UN General Assembly endorsed the action by the WMO and UNEP in jointly establishing the IPCC. It has 195 member states.

Thousands of people from all over the world contribute to the work of the IPCC. For the assessment reports, experts volunteer their time as IPCC authors to assess the thousands of scientific papers published each year to provide a comprehensive summary of what is known about the drivers of climate change, its impacts and future risks, and how adaptation and mitigation can reduce those risks.

The Panel also rescheduled the review of the Final Government Distribution to take place from 21 November to 15 January 2023 after extensive consultations with the SYR section facilitators, the SYR Scientific Steering Committee, and the IPCC Bureau.

The Synthesis Report follows the release of three major IPCC reports over the past 12 months – the three Working Group contributions to the Sixth Assessment Report – despite the challenges to the work programme posed by the Covid-19 pandemic.

The report of the Sixth Assessment Report will integrate the findings of the three Working Group contributions and the three Special Reports released in 2018 and 2019. It will provide policymakers with a high-level, up-to-date understanding of climate change, its impacts and future risks, and options for addressing it.

Comprehensive scientific assessment reports are published every 6 to 7 years; the latest, the Fifth Assessment Report, was completed in 2014 and provided the main scientific input to the Paris Agreement.

At its 41st Session in February 2015, the IPCC decided to produce a Sixth Assessment Report (AR6). At its 42nd Session in October 2015 it elected a new Bureau that would oversee the work on this report and Special Reports to be produced in the assessment cycle. At its 43rd Session in April 2016, it decided to produce three Special Reports, a Methodology Report and AR6.

The Working Group I contribution to the Sixth Assessment Report Climate Change 2021: the Physical Science Basis was released on 9 August 2021. The Working Group II contribution, Climate Change 2022: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability, was released on 28 February 2022. The Working Group III contribution, Climate Change 2022: Mitigation of Climate Change, was released on 4 April 2022.

The IPCC is currently working on the final installment to the Sixth Assessment Report, the Synthesis Report, which will integrate the findings of the three Working Group assessments as well as the three Special Reports released in 2018 and 2019.

Global Warming of 1.5°C, an IPCC special report on the impacts of global warming of 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels and related global greenhouse gas emission pathways, in the context of strengthening the global response to the threat of climate change, sustainable development, and efforts to eradicate poverty was launched in October 2018.

Climate Change and Land, an IPCC special report on climate change, desertification, land degradation, sustainable land management, food security, and greenhouse gas fluxes in terrestrial ecosystems was launched in August 2019.