Posted on July, 26 2021
(26 July 2021) - The UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) today opened its first ever virtual meeting to approve its next report - Climate Change 2021: The Physical Science.
The reports are used by governments at all levels to inform their climate policies. The report of Working Group I is the first of four contributions to the Sixth Assessment Report (AR6). It will provide the most up-to-date physical understanding of the climate system and climate change, bringing together the latest advances in climate science and multiple lines of evidence. There will be a greater focus on regional information that can be used for climate risk assessments, according to the IPCC.
The report runs to several thousand pages. So, subject to the decisions of the Panel, a summary of the report will be approved line by line during the meeting, and be released on 9 August at 10am CEST. The remaining three parts of the AR6 report will be finalized in 2022.
The latest IPCC report will show us what lies ahead if we don’t take urgent action on runaway climate change, said WWF’s Stephen Cornelius. “To limit climate change risks, we must rapidly and drastically reduce greenhouse gas emissions, get out of coal, oil and gas, and protect and restore natural carbon sinks. While the previous IPCC Assessment Reports sounded the alarm on climate change, the warnings from this report will hopefully be a megaphone that amplifies the alarm even louder.”
WWF expects decision-makers at G20 and COP 26 can make use of the information and take stronger action to reverse climate impacts.
Notes to Editors:
- Read WWF’s blog setting the scene for the IPCC Working Group I report here.
- Comprehensive scientific assessment reports are published every 6 to 7 years; the latest, the Fifth Assessment Report, was completed in 2013-2014 and provided the main scientific input to the Paris Agreement. The last (synthesis) report of the Six Assessment Report will be published in late 2022.
- The first-order draft of the IPCC Working Group I report received 23,462 review comments from 750 expert reviewers’ the second-order draft received 51,387 review comments from governments and 1,279 experts; and the final government distribution of the Summary for Policymakers that ended on 20 June received over 3,000 comments from 47 governments. Over 14,000 scientific papers are referenced in the Working Group I report.
