What’s the IPCC?

When speaking with someone that vehemently proclaims that climate change is not caused by humans (or happening at all), ask them “what’s the IPCC?”  If they can’t answer, this person has taken the bait (as described below).

I’ll let the IPCC explain who they are: “The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is the international body for assessing the science related to climate change. The IPCC was set up in 1988 by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) and United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) to provide policymakers with regular assessments of the scientific basis of climate change, its impacts and future risks, and options for adaptation and mitigation. IPCC assessments provide a scientific basis for governments at all levels to develop climate related policies….. but they do not tell policymakers what actions to take.”

That’s a long explanation but worth understanding.  Hundreds of scientists from around the world contribute to the IPCC and all member countries must approve the reports.  This is “peer reviewed” science – which means you can’t make claims without backing them up because your peers will call you out on it.  Big carbon emitters like China, India, and the US have approved the publications – which makes the report a very conservative assessment.  This is where climate science is aggregated into one report for world leaders to read.  The IPCC does a good job of taking something very complex and making it understandable in the Summary for Policymakers (here).  You will see they qualify statements with “very high confidence” or “medium confidence” etc. to allow member countries to agree to approve the report.

The IPCC assessments come out every three years.  While they have been criticized for understating the problem (due to the conservative nature mentioned above), they are a good resource to help readers see what scientists are saying.  Reading newspapers or online articles is not a good way glean information on climate science because, as Havard’s Dr. Oreskes explains here, this is where the confusion is created.  Those who don’t want carbon regulation publish articles that make it seem as if scientists are still arguing about it.  These articles are usually debunked by climate scientists at realclimate.org (and other places) but the general public won’t see this.  Even if they do, they think “ah ha, still arguing about it.  I’ll check back later when they finally agree.”  And voila – public interest goes away and regulations are postponed.  Same strategy was used with tobacco, acid rain emission, and CFCs (ozone layer).  They provide those that don’t want to believe a resource in which to base their opinion.