IPCC: cherish it, tweak it or scrap it?Nature,
February 2010Abstract As calls for reform intensify following recent furores about e-mails, conflicts of interest, glaciers and extreme weather, five climatologists propose ways forward for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Their suggestions range from reaffirming the panel' governing principles to increasing the number and speed of its publications to replacing the volunteer organization with a permanently staffed structure.
Split into three panels Mike Hulme Coordinating lead author, lead author, review editor (AR3), University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK Much has changed since the late 1980s when the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was designed, notably the nature of scientific practice and its relationship with society. How the world's knowledge communities are mobilized to enlighten policy deliberations also needs to be different. The assessments published by the IPCC have firmly elevated anthropogenic climate change to one of the major international political issues of our time. But they have made this impact by drawing in an ever-widening subset of the social, technological, environmental and ethical dimensions of climate change - well beyond the physical sciences. The IPCC is no longer fit for purpose. It is not feasible for one panel under sole ownership - that of the world's governments, but operating under the delegated management of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) - to deliver an exhaustive 'integrated' assessment of all relevant climate-change knowledge. As I remarked three years ago in these pages, "The IPCC needs a complete overhaul. The structure and process are past their sell-by dates." My suggestion for radical reform is to dissolve the IPCC after the Fifth Assessment Report (AR5) in 2014. The work would be split into three types of assessment and evaluation, each rather different to the three existing IPCC working groups. The first would be a Global Science Panel (GSP). An IPCC-like assessment process should continue to operate for the physical sciences that observe and predict the Earth system. Rather than comprehensive reports every six years, this panel would commission, on a rolling basis, a larger number of smaller, sharply focused syntheses of knowledge on fast-moving topics that have great scientific or policy salience. Perhaps two or three would be in production at any one time and each would be no more than 50 pages in length. These would need to be globally coordinated and could be governed either through an intergovernmental process as now, or devolved to a governing council of representative national academies of science. The second group would be made up of Regional Evaluation Panels (REPs). The cultural, social, economic and development dimensions of climate change are essentially regional in nature. Each region - five to ten continental or sub-continental regions in all - should conduct its own evaluation of relevant knowledge. This should use the work of the GSP, but also draw in a much more diverse set of expertise, knowledge and scholarship. As well as being structured according to the concerns of each region, the ownership and governance patterns of these REPs would vary regionally, but should ideally involve a consortium of national governments, civil-society organizations and businesses. The third group would be the Policy Analysis Panel (PAP) - a standing panel of expertise, global in reach, with interdisciplinary skills and a diverse analytical capacity. Perhaps 50-100 strong, this panel would undertake focused and rapid (6-12 months) analyses of specific proposed policy options and measures that have global significance. These could be subjects such as environmental effectiveness of controlling black carbon, economic implications of carbon border tariffs or new financing options for reducing emissions from deforestation. The policy options to be analysed can be brought forward by UN bodies, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), businesses and groupings of national governments. The PAP could be governed by a council of women and men of international stature and strong cultural significance to represent the breadth of civil society around the world. Such high quality and transparent policy evaluation would broaden the options available for national and international deliberations. This restructuring would allow clearer distinctions to be made in areas that have been troublesome for the IPCC: assessments of published knowledge versus policy analysis and evaluation; the globalized physical sciences versus more geographically and culturally nuanced knowledge; a one-size, top-down model of ownership and governance versus more inclusive, representative and regionally varying forms of governance. It would better serve the world, and its peoples, in understanding and responding to anthropogenic climate change.
Independent agency needed
Eduardo Zorita Contributing author (AR4), GKSS Research Center in Geesthacht, Germany
Like the financial sector last year, the IPCC is currently experiencing a failure of trust that reveals flaws in its structure. This presents the climate-change community with the opportunity to address these faults. The IPCC currently performs as a diffuse community of government-nominated academic volunteers occupying a blurred space between science and politics, issuing self-reviewed reports under great stresses and unmanageable deadlines. Its undefined structure puts it at the mercy of pressure from advocates. The IPCC should be made stronger and independent. We do not need to reinvent the wheel; there are excellent examples of agencies that society has set up when credibility is of the utmost importance. The European Central Bank, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the International Energy Agency and the US Congressional Budget Office all independently navigate their way through strong political pressures, delivering valuable assessments, advice, reports and forecasts, tapping academic research when necessary. These agencies are accountable and respected. An international climate agency (ICA) along such lines would have a staff of around 200 full-time scientists who would be independent of government, industry and academia. Such an agency should be resourced and empowered to do the following: issue streamlined biennial state-of-the-climate reports; be a repository and quality-controller of observational climate data; advise governments on regional assessments of climate impacts; and coordinate the suite of future-climate simulations by research institutes. An ICA could be built, for instance, on the IAEA template, encompassing many more countries than the IAEA but with a smaller staff. ICA reports should be independently reviewed in a transparent process, draw only on established, peer-reviewed literature, and highlight research gaps. External reviews would then be incorporated into the reports to form white papers to include possible opposing views in a transparent way. The process of moving towards such an ICA could start now, alongside the preparation of the next IPCC assessment report, and culminate after its completion. Those climate researchers in the IPCC Bureau who have widely recognized credibility could initiate this transformation, supported by lead authors and review editors more numerous and with a bigger say than presently. These review editors should be elected not by governments but directly by scientific unions, for instance the American Geophysical Union, the European Geosciences Union and similar associations from Asia. As with finance, climate assessment is too important to be left in the hands of advocates.
Apply best practice rules Thomas F. Stocker Co-chair IPCC Working Group I (AR5), coordinating lead author (AR3, AR4), University of Bern, Switzerland
The basis of the IPCC is the voluntary contributions of thousands of dedicated scientists from all over the world. The Principles Governing IPCC Work (IPCC, 1998) provide a clear framework for an open, transparent and robust process. This bottom-up endeavour is a unique model of providing scientific information, mainly from the peer-reviewed scientific literature, for decision-making on a challenging problem. It has worked extremely successfully for the past 21 years. Recent controversies have demonstrated both the value and the limitations of these procedures. The team structure of the chapter authors, the multiple reviews by peers and governments, and the full and public documentation of this process largely eliminate personal views or biases in the science assessment. But procedures are only as strong as their enforcement at all levels of the assessment process. When I served as a coordinating lead author of Working Group I in the Third and Fourth Assessment Reports (AR3 and AR4), I was deeply impressed by the strict adherence to these principles by the co-chairs who ensured that these standards were applied at all levels. The combination of the best scientists and clear procedures constitute the authority of the IPCC. Calls for reform of the IPCC have been made before. Changes were discussed after the completion of the Fourth Assessment Report in 2007. One possibility mooted was the production of more frequent assessments, more limited in scope. Fast-track assessments in support of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change process were also considered. However, the panel concluded that the production of comprehensive reports roughly every six years is preferable because it ensures the robustness required for a thorough and rigorous assessment. Faster turnover would jeopardize the multi-stage review and thus compromise authority and comprehensiveness. In asking scientists to produce reports and assessments every year, say, we could lose their support rather quickly. The IPCC has served as an honest broker in the past and will do so, hopefully, in the future. Now that the problem of climate change is on the radar screen of the world, there are many NGOs and other groups, even groups of scientists and institutions, that provide climate-change information in various forms and quality, often lacking comprehensiveness and proper recognition of uncertainties. There is a strong pressure to provide 'just-in-time' scientific updates for policy-makers and stakeholders, as was the case in the preparations for the 2009 climate-change conference in Copenhagen. The IPCC must not yield to this pressure. In this field of different and divergent forces, confusion may arise. An honest broker therefore is an asset. From my perspective, the IPCC has fulfilled this role with remarkable rigour and integrity. This role is now at risk, as the stakes are higher than ever before. The requirement that assessments are policy relevant but never policy prescriptive, as formulated in the Principles Governing IPCC Work, is of paramount importance. Our task is to inform the policy-makers and the public strictly in a 'what if' mode. Any other approach must be left to NGOs, negotiators or individuals. Only with strict adherence to procedures and to scientific rigour at all stages will the IPCC continue to provide the best and most robust information that is needed so much.
Produce more reports faster Jeff Price Lead author (AR3, AR4), director, climate-change adaptation, WWF United States
The IPCC is accepting nominations (until 12 March 2010) from governments and participating organizations for authors for its Fifth Assessment Report. One recommendation for the IPCC that could be implemented immediately is in how its coordinating lead authors and review editors are selected.
A new class of short, rapidly prepared, peer-reviewed reports is needed. Currently, authors are selected to represent "a range of views, expertise, gender and geographical representation". However, given the importance placed on these assessments, the most senior positions should be filled by the nominees most expert in their field, regardless of balance. These authors should be the most knowledgeable nominee about the range of topics in their chapter, best able to cooperatively work with a team of international scholars. Preferably, they should have previously been involved in an IPCC assessment and be familiar with IPCC standards and methodologies. Geographic and gender balance should then be used in selection of lead authors. The level of work required in preparing an assessment is large. Increasing the number of lead authors would provide better balance and give more scientists the ability to participate in the process. A new class of short, rapidly prepared, peer-reviewed reports is also needed. At present, publication options include supplemental material (no peer review required), technical papers (based on existing assessments) or assessments and special reports that undergo two reviews (expert and government/expert, usually taking more than two years to complete) (fig. 1). For topics of emerging importance or uncertainty, we need reports based on expert meetings and literature synthesis that undergo only a single round of extensive peer review with review-editor oversight before publication. The IPCC should also expand the number of specialist task forces, task groups and hold more expert meetings to provide additional scientific review and oversight for the broadening array of models (including model comparisons and validation) and methodologies used in emissions reporting, estimating and monitoring impacts, and in developing assessments and adaptation plans. Finally, the current period between assessments is too long. One option would be for the IPCC, or another body, to produce an annual review, assessment and synthesis of the literature for policy-makers (for example, three annual review volumes with a synthesis chapter in each volume) prepared by experts in the field. Although the editors of the volumes should ideally be drawn from past IPCC authors and editors, the review articles could be submitted by any author, as they would for a journal, with appropriate peer review and assessment for publication.
Open debate: Wikipedia-style
John R. Christy Lead author (AR3), University of Alabama in Huntsville, USA
Since 1992 I have served as an IPCC contributor and in 2001, as a lead author. My experience has left me of the firm conviction that the IPCC should be removed from UN oversight. The IPCC selects lead authors from the pool of those nominated by individual governments. Over time, many governments nominated only authors who were aligned with stated policy. Indeed, the selections for the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report represented a disturbing homogeneity of thought regarding humans and climate. Selected lead authors have the last word in the review cycle and so control the message, often ignoring or marginalizing dissenting comments. 'Consensus' and manufactured-confidence ensued. The recent leaking of e-mails from the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia in Norwich, UK, put on display the unsavoury cycle of marginalizing different viewpoints. Now several errors of overstatement, such as that of the melting rate of the Himalayan glaciers, have been exposed. Unfortunately, prestigious media, including Nature, became cheerleaders for these official reports, followed then by governments trying to enact policies that drastically reduced emissions to 'stop global warming' while increasing energy costs. I recommended last year that the next IPCC report invites published authors to write about the evidence for low climate sensitivity and other issues. The IPCC then would be a true reflection of the heterogeneity of scientific views, an 'honest broker', rather than an echo chamber. My recommendation assumed a business-as-usual IPCC process. However, voluminous printed reports, issued every six years by government-nominated authors, cannot accommodate the rapid and chaotic development of scientific information today. An idea we pitched a few years ago that is now worth reviving was to establish a living, 'Wikipedia-IPCC'. Groups of four to eight lead authors, chosen by learned societies, would serve in rotating, overlapping three-year terms to manage sections organized by science and policy questions (similar to the Fourth Assessment Report). The authors would strike a balance between the free-for-all of true science and the need for summary statements. Controversies would be refereed by the lead authors, but with input from all sides in the text, with links to original documents and data. The result would be more useful than occasional big books and would be a more honest representation of what our fledgling science can offer. Defining and following rules for this idea would be agonizing, but would provide greater openness. The truth, and this is frustrating for policy-makers, is that scientists' ignorance of the climate system is enormous. There is still much messy, contentious, snail-paced and now, hopefully, transparent work to do.
See also Perspectives, page 747. Have your say on the future of the IPCC
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analysisTop Science Journal Calls for Climate Science Reform AP A steady drip of errors in the top report on global warming -- and the erosion they are causing in public confidence of the science behind it -- have some scientists calling for drastic changes in how future United Nations climate reports are done. WASHINGTON -- A steady drip of errors in the top report on global warming -- and the erosion they are causing in public confidence of the science behind it -- have some scientists calling for drastic changes in how future United Nations climate reports are done. A push for reform being published in Thursday's issue of the prestigious scientific journal Nature comes on top of a growing clamor for the resignation of the chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The work of the climate change panel, or IPCC, is often portrayed as one massive tome. But it really is four separate reports on different aspects of global warming, written months apart by distinct groups of scientists. No errors have surfaced in the first and most well-known of the reports, which said the physics of a warming atmosphere and rising seas is man-made and incontrovertible. So far, four mistakes have been discovered in the second report, which attempts to translate what global warming might mean to daily lives around the world. "A lot of stuff in there was just not very good," said Kevin Trenberth, head of climate analysis at the National Center for Atmospheric Research and a lead author of the first report. "A chronic problem is that on the whole area of impacts, getting into the realm of social science, it is a softer science. The facts are not as good." It's been a dismal winter for climate scientists after the high point of winning the 2007 Nobel, along with former Vice President Al Gore, for championing efforts to curb global warming and documenting its effects. --In November, stolen private e-mails from a British university climate center embarrassed a number of scientists for their efforts to stonewall climate skeptics. The researchers were found to have violated Britain's Freedom of Information laws. --In December, the much anticipated climate summit of world leaders in Copenhagen failed to produce a meaningful mandatory agreement to curb greenhouse gases. --Climate legislation in the United States, considered key to any significant progress in slowing global warming, is stalled. --Some Republican U.S. senators, climate skeptics and British newspapers have called for Rajendra Pachauri, chairman of the IPCC, to resign. They contend he has financial conflicts of interest involving his role with the climate panel and a green-energy foundation he set up. He has vigorously denied any conflicts. --And in recent weeks, a batch of mistakes have been uncovered in the second of the four climate research reports produced in 2007. That second report -- which examines current effects of global warming and forecasts future ones on people, plants, animals and society -- at times relied on government reports or even advocacy group reports instead of peer-reviewed research. Scientists say that's because there is less hard data on global warming's effects. Nine different experts told The Associated Press that the second report -- because of the nature of what it examines -- doesn't rely on standards as high or literature as deep as the more quoted first report. And they say communication problems between lead authors of different reports make it harder to spot errors. The end result is that the document on the effects of climate change promotes the worst of nightmares and engages in purposeful hyping, said longtime skeptic John Christy of the University of Alabama, Huntsville. David King, Britain's former chief scientific adviser who once lectured at the University of East Anglia, home to the climate center where scientist e-mails were hacked, said that scandal laid bare the weaknesses in the IPCC. In a telephone interview, he said those who challenged the IPCC's assessment "are seen to be rocking the boat, and this in my view is extremely unfortunate." Scientists -- including top U.S. government officials -- argue that the bulk of the reports are sound. "The vast majority of conclusions in the IPCC are credible, have been through a very rigorous process and are absolutely state of the science, state of the art about what we know of the climate system," said National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration chief Jane Lubchenco, who runs the agency that oversees much of the U.S. government's climate research. The problems found in the IPCC 2007 reports so far are mostly embarrassing: --In the Asian chapter, five errors in a single entry on glaciers in Himalayas say those glaciers would disappear by 2035 -- hundreds of years earlier than other information suggests -- with no research backing it up. It used an advocacy group as a source. It also erroneously said the Himalayan glaciers were melting faster than other glaciers. --A sentence in the chapter on Europe says 55 percent of the Netherlands is below sea level, when it's really about half that amount. --A section in the Africa chapter that talks about northern African agriculture says climate change and normal variability could reduce crop yields. But it gets oversimplified in later summaries so that lower projected crop yields are blamed solely on climate change. --There's been a longstanding dispute about weather extremes and economics. The second report says that there are more weather disasters than before because of climate change and that it is costing more. The debate continues over whether it is fair to say increased disaster costs are due to global warming or other societal factors such as increased development in hurricane prone areas. Scientists say the nature of the science and the demands of governments for a localized tally of climate change effects and projections of future ones make the second report a bit more prone to mistakes than the first report. Regional research is more often done by governments or environmental groups; using that work is allowed by IPCC rules even if it is seen as less rigorous than traditional peer-reviewed research, said Martin Parry, chairman in charge of the report on climate effects. The second report includes chapters on each region, which governments want to be mostly written by local experts, some of whom may not have the science credentials of other report authors. That's where at least three of the errors were found. In Thursday's issue of the journal Nature, four IPCC authors call for reform, including Christy, who suggests the outright dumping of the panel itself in favor of an effort modeled after Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia. A fifth author, writing in Nature, argues the IPCC rules are fine but need to be better enforced. In response, Chris Field of Stanford University, the new head of the second report team, said that he welcomes the scrutiny and vows stricter enforcement of rules to check sources to eliminate errors in future reports; those are to be produced by the IPCC starting in 2013. Many IPCC scientists say it's impressive that so far only four errors have been found in 986 pages of the second report, with the overwhelming majority of the findings correct and well-supported. However, former IPCC Chairman Bob Watson said, "We cannot take that attitude. Any mistakes do allow skeptics to have a field day and to use it to undermine public confidence, private sector confidence, government confidence in the IPCC."
