The latest climate report on impacts, vulnerabilities and adaptation
In the last two weeks of February, the 55th session of The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC-55) brought together government representatives and scientists to review and approve the summary of a report of 3675 pages. Focussing on climate impacts and on vulnerabilities and adaptation to climate change, the report was compiled by 270 scientists from 67 countries over the last three years. As the impacts of human-caused climate change become increasingly substantial with each passing year, the role of the IPCC is more important than ever. But what do they do exactly?
Unlocking the IPCC
One might think of the IPCC as a giant science hive mind. Several hundred experts from across multiple areas of research together delve into the subject of climate change and all things related. Their job involves reviewing and assessing the latest evidence from around the world contained in thousands upon thousands of scientific articles and government reports. Once that knowledge is synthesized, those experts—also known as lead authors—put together all the different sources into one unified understanding of our planet’s changing climate, the IPCC Assessment Report.
The task is gargantuan. Fortunately, lead authors have the shared goal of science to help them build consensus in the face of such dizzying complexity. Assembling such a detailed portrait of what is known about climate impacts and risks is useful because it provides governments (and all of us!) with the planet’s most definitive knowledge base on the world’s most pressing challenges. The objective, however, is not to tell governments what to do. Rather, IPCC reports provide reliable and rigorous science to inform government policies and programs as well as describe actions that all of us can advocate for or do. As such, the knowledge contained in IPCC reports represent one of humanity’s best hopes to support collective climate action.
One report among many: WGII on Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability
Scientific knowledge needs to be constantly re-evaluated in the face of new data, so new assessments have to be done every six or seven years. Currently, the IPCC is wrapping up the Sixth Assessment Report (AR6) that began in 2015 and will end later this year. Because of the complexity of the topic, the IPCC’s work is divided amongst a few different groups. This year’s IPCC-55 considered the contribution of Working Group II (WGII) to the IPCC. In contrast to Working Group I, whose final report on the physical science of climate change was released last year, WGII’s report deals with how society and nature are vulnerable to and impacted by climate change and what are the solutions for adapting to it. Furthermore, there is more local and regional information in the report than previous assessment cycles, as well as a strengthening of the scientific links between biodiversity loss and climate change.
Reading about experts meeting in international conferences, we can sometimes forget the human side of the enterprise. Elisabeth Gilmore, Senior Scientific Advisor to the Assistant Deputy Minister of the Science and Technology Branch at ECCC and who was nominated to be a lead author in Working Group II in 2018, said about the experience: “It’s tough at times, we’re talking science, but also about real impacts on ecosystems and people. Each issue gets discussed at length and these scientists really care and want it to be as accurate and complete as possible. Yet throughout it all, there’s a tremendous amount of collegiality… [even with] the 20-hour days during the approval plenary!”
What’s next?
From the scientists putting together the knowledge to the people who are most impacted, and everyone in between, climate change affects the entire planet. In that light, the WGII’s contribution to the IPCC Assessment report helps governments better understand where to concentrate their efforts and focus spending so as to deal with the worst climate impacts in the present and future.
In the early spring, we can look forward to the 56th session of the IPCC. After that, Working Group III’s report will be released, examining how to reduce greenhouse gas emissions that are impacting our climate. By the end of this year, a Synthesis Report will be available which ties together all the contributing reports to the 6th Assessment Cycle. As IPCC Chair Hoesung Lee said at the opening of IPCC-55, “The need for this report has never been greater because the stakes have never been higher.”
The evidence is clear: climate change affects us all significantly. Thanks to the hardworking efforts of the IPCC and our own Canadian scientists, we can learn what to do about it. Equipped with the knowledge from all the reports of the 6th IPCC Assessment cycle, we will be able to tackle head-on these challenges and make sound science and policy-based decisions.