Earth Institute Center for Research on Environmental Decisions Columbia University
 

CRED Co-Director Elke Weber and CRED PI Howard Kunreuther selected as authors of the upcoming IPCC report


June 2010-CRED co-director Elke Weber, selected from a pool of over 3,000 nominations, to be a Lead Author to the 5th Assessment Report (AR5), Working Group III (WG3), for the volume entitled, Climate Change 2014: Mitigation of Climate Change. Weber will be Lead Author of the second chapter in that volume entitled, Integrated Risk and Uncertainty Assessment of Climate Change Response Policies, and will focus on framing issues. CRED PI Howard Kunreuther has been selected to be a Coordinating Lead Author for the same chapter on Integrated Risk and Uncertainty Assessment of Climate Change Response Policies.

The scheduled completion dates for the 5th assessment report are as follows:

Working Group I- Mid September 2013
Working Group II- Mid March 2014
Working Group III- Early April 2014
Synthesis Report- September 2014

Other Columbia scientists and professors selected to contribute to this upcoming report include:

Geoffrey Heal- Paul Garrett Professor of Public Policy and Business Responsibility, Professor of Finance & Economics, Columbia Business School ; Marc Levy- Deputy Director CIESEN, Adjunct Professor of International and Public Affairs, Columbia School of International and Public Affairs ; Patrick Kinney- Associate Professor of Environmental Health Sciences, Mailman School of Public Health ; Drew Shindell- NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, Lecturer in the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences

To learn more about the 5th Assessment Report (AR5), click here

AR5 will provide an update on the following climate change related topics: (From the IPCC AR5 leaflet)

  • Socio-economic aspects of climate change and its implications for sustainable development
  • More detailed regional information
  • More precise considerations of risk, economics and ethics
  • Stabilization of greenhouse gas concentrations

Press releases:
IPCC:
June 23, 2010- http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/press-releases/pr-23june2010.pdf

June 23, 2010- http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/press-releases/ipcc-wg3-ar5-authors.pdf

CIESIN:
June 25, 2010- http://www.ciesin.org/news.html

About the IPCC (Source:IPCC)
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is the leading body for the assessment of climate change, established by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) to provide the world with a clear scientific view on the current state of climate change and its potential environmental and socio-economic consequences.

The IPCC is a scientific body. It reviews and assesses the most recent scientific, technical and socio-economic information produced worldwide relevant to the understanding of climate change. It does not conduct any research nor does it monitor climate related data or parameters. Thousands of scientists from all over the world contribute to the work of the IPCC on a voluntary basis. Review is an essential part of the IPCC process, to ensure an objective and complete assessment of current information. Differing viewpoints existing within the scientific community are reflected in the IPCC reports.

The IPCC is an intergovernmental body, and it is open to all member countries of UN and WMO. Governments are involved in the IPCC work as they can participate in the review process and in the IPCC plenary sessions, where main decisions about the IPCC work programme are taken and reports are accepted, adopted and approved. The IPCC Bureau and Chairperson are also elected in the plenary sessions.

Because of its scientific and intergovernmental nature, the IPCC embodies a unique opportunity to provide rigorous and balanced scientific information to decision makers. By endorsing the IPCC reports, governments acknowledge the authority of their scientific content. The work of the organization is therefore policy-relevant and yet policy-neutral, never policy-prescriptive.