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© ®The Nobel Foundation
Oslo, 10 December 2007
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change and Albert Arnold (Al) Gore Jr.were awarded of the Nobel Peace Prize "for their efforts to build up
and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change, and to lay the foundations for the measures that
are needed to counteract such change".
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The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was created in 1988. It was set
up by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) and the United Nations
Environment Program (UNEP) as an effort by the United Nations to provide the
governments of the world with a clear scientific view of what is happening to
the world's climate. The initial task for the IPCC as outlined in the UN General
Assembly Resolution 43/53 of 6 December 1988 was to prepare a comprehensive
review and recommendations with respect to the state of knowledge of the science
of climate change; social and economic impact of climate change, possible
response strategies and elements for inclusion in a possible future international
convention on climate. Today the IPCC's role is also, as defined in
Principles Governing IPCC Work,
"...to assess on a comprehensive, objective, open and transparent basis the
scientific, technical and socio-economic information relevant to understanding the
scientific basis of risk of human-induced climate change, its potential impacts and
options for adaptation and mitigation. IPCC reports should be neutral with respect
to policy, although they may need to deal objectively with scientific, technical
and socio-economic factors relevant to the application of particular policies."
The scientific evidence brought up by the first IPCC Assessment Report of 1990
unveiled the importance of climate change as a topic deserving a political
platform among countries to tackle its consequences. It therefore played a
decisive role in leading to the creation of the United Nations Framework
Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), the key international treaty to reduce
global warming and cope with the consequences of climate change.
Since then the IPCC has delivered on a regular basis the most comprehensive
scientific reports about climate change produced worldwide, the Assessment
Reports. It also continued to respond to the need of the UNFCCC for information on
scientific technical matters through Special Reports, Technical Papers and
Methodology Reports. Methodologies and guidelines were prepared to help Parties
under the UNFCCC in preparing their national greenhouse gas inventories.
The IPCC Second Assessment Report of 1995 provided key input in the way to the
adoption of the Kyoto Protocol in 1997. The Third Assessment Report came out in
2001 and the Fourth in the course of 2007. "Climate Change 2007", clearly brought
to the attention of the world the scientific understanding of the present changes
in our climate and led the organization to be honored with the Nobel Peace
Prize at the end of that same year.
Along with Comprehensive Assessment Reports, the IPCC has produced several
Special Reports on various topics of growing interest, and many other papers
and contributions to the advancements of the climate change science.
The participation of the scientific community in the work of the IPCC has been
growing greatly, both in terms of authors and contributors involved in the
writing and the reviewing of the reports and of geographic distribution and
topics covered by the reports.
Below the following document provides more information on the foundation of the IPCC,
the evolution of the organization, its work over time with respect to the Climate
Convention and reviews the evolution of the state of knowledge on various aspects of
climate change from 1990 (First Assessment Report) until 2007 (Fourth Assessment Report).
Brochure
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