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Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)

The IPCC Fourth Assessment Report: Climate Change 2007 is available on the IPCC website alongside other reports on special topics relating to climate change. The IPCC Fifth Assessment Report is due to be published in 2014.

The IPCC’s findings show that human activity has caused most of the global warming over the last 50 years, and that human-induced climate change is a real threat to our future.

The IPCC is an intergovernmental body, and it is open to all member countries of the United Nations and the World Meteorological Organisation. Governments 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 role of the IPCC is to review and assess what we know about the climate system, the impacts of climate change and possible ways forward. It does not carry out research nor does it monitor climate-related data or other relevant parameters.

The IPCC brings the world’s leading experts together to assess the current state of knowledge across the international scientific literature. Thousands of scientists from all over the world contribute to the work of the IPCC. Its reports involve a multiple review process to ensure they are balanced, cover all relevant viewpoints and are not captured by special interests. These reports are peer-reviewed in an open and international process.

Because of its scientific and intergovernmental nature, the IPCC represents a unique opportunity to provide rigorous and balanced scientific information to decision-makers. The IPCC does not make recommendations for actions to address climate change – it only describes the current state of knowledge on climate change so that governments have a sound basis for decision-making.

In March 2010 the United Nations and the IPCC jointly requested the InterAcademy Council (IAC) to conduct an independent review of the processes and procedures of the IPCC. The purpose of the Review was to make recommendations on how these might be improved in order to enhance the quality and authority of future assessments. The findings of the Review were broadly supportive of the IPCC’s processes and procedures, but also identified some issues for future consideration. The IPCC Panel have discussed the findings and are currently looking at ways to implement the report’s recommendations. The Review was delivered in August 2010 and is available on the IAC website.

The IPCC has three Working Groups and a Task Force:

  • Working Group I assesses the scientific aspects of the climate system and climate change
  • Working Group II assesses the vulnerability of socio-economic and natural systems to climate change negative and positive consequences of climate change, and options for adapting to it
  • Working Group III assesses options for limiting greenhouse gas emissions and otherwise mitigating climate change.
  • The Task Force on National Greenhouse Gas Inventories is responsible for the IPCC National Greenhouse Gas Inventories Programme.

For more information visit the IPCC website.

For more information on the international response to climate change see:

Last updated: November 2010