Seventh Assessment Report

The IPCC is currently in its seventh assessment cycle which formally began in July 2023 with elections of the new Chair and new IPCC and TFI Bureaus.

The IPCC is currently in its seventh assessment cycle which formally began in July 2023 with elections of the new Chair and new IPCC and TFI Bureaus.

At its inaugural Plenary Session for the new cycle (IPCC-60), held in Istanbul in January 2024, the Panel decided on the programme of IPCC´s scientific work for the entire cycle.

Member governments agreed that the IPCC will produce the three Working Group contributions to the Seventh Assessment Report, namely the Working Group I report on the Physical Science Basis, the Working Group II report on Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability and the Working Group III report on Mitigation of Climate Change. The Synthesis Report of the Seventh Assessment Report will be produced after the completion of the Working Group reports and released by late 2029.

During the previous cycle the Panel already decided to produce a Special Report on Climate Change and Cities and a Methodology Report which is scheduled for publication in early 2027. The Report on Short-lived Climate Forcers and the Methodology Report on Carbon Dioxide Removal Technologies, Carbon Capture Utilization and Storage are both also planned for release in 2027.

In addition, a revision of the 1994 IPCC Technical Guidelines on impacts and adaptation as well as adaptation indicators, metrics and guidelines, will be developed in conjunction with the Working Group II report and published as a separate product.

 

Scoping

A Scoping Meeting to prepare the draft outline of the Working Group contributions to the Seventh Assessment Report is scheduled from 9 to 13 December 2024 in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The meeting will also work on the details of how the Working Group contributions will be prepared and their proposed timelines. These will be considered by the Panel during its Sixty second Session in the first half of 2025.

A letter soliciting nominations of experts to attend the meeting was sent to governments and observer organizations on 3 May 2024.

As stated in Appendix A of the Principles of Governing IPCC Work, the respective Bureaus of each Working Group selected participants based on the following:

  • Scientific, technical and socio-economic expertise, including the range of views; Geographical representation;
  • A mixture of experts with and without previous experience in IPCC;
  • Gender balance;
  • Experts with a background from relevant stakeholder and user groups, including governments.

The list of invited experts and Bureau Members is here.

The Scoping Meeting participants will collectively have expertise in the following areas:

Working Group I 

  • Observation, monitoring of climate variables, reanalyses (ocean, atmosphere, cryosphere, land, freshwater, coasts), process understanding (water cycle, short-lived climate forcers and air quality, other climate system processes).
  • Climate modeling (global, Earth System Models, regional, coupled, ocean, atmosphere, cryosphere, land, hydrology, chemistry and biogeochemistry) and model evaluation.
  • Statistical climatology (trends, extremes, attribution, downscaling and bias correction, observation constraints, AI, …), recent global and regional trends.
  • Near-term and long-term ensemble projections, storylines, emulators, uncertainties, carbon budget.
  • Climate services and decision-support tools (experience working with stakeholders).
  • High-impact climate outcomes and abrupt changes including tipping points, compounding and cascading events.
  • Physical aspects of renewable resources (Energy, Water, …).

 Working Group II 

  • Impacts, losses and damages on, and vulnerability and risk for natural (g. land, freshwater, biodiversity and oceans), human (e.g. human safety, mobility and migration, health, economic sectors, poverty, livelihoods, and cultural heritage), and managed human-natural systems with implications for climate resilient development.
  • Evaluating climate change adaptation: Methods for monitoring, setting indicators, metrics and targets, measuring observed and projected policy effectiveness at multiple temporal and spatial scales.
  • Scenarios and assessments of integrated adaptation, mitigation and development policies at multiple governance levels (local to multi-national) accounting for gender, equity, justice and/or Indigenous Knowledge, and local knowledges.
  • Aggregation of information on impacts, vulnerability, adaptation and risks to settlements (rural, urban, cities, small islands), and infrastructure and systems (g. sanitation and hygiene, water, food, nutrition, economic and energy security, industry, health and well-being, mobility).
  • Adaptation needs, options, opportunities, constraints, limits, enabling conditions, policy impacts and influencing factors including contributions from governance, finance, law, psychology and sociology.
  • Global dimension of adaptation responses: financial incentivization, responding to losses and damages, equity, justice, finance and governance, etc.
  • Socio-cultural, psychological, political and legal drivers of making and implementing decisions.

Working Group III 

  •  Mitigation responses in energy, industry, transport, buildings, agriculture, forestry, land use and waste; Energy systems planning (including energy storage, demand side management, energy supply technologies, etc.).
  • Cross-sectoral mitigation options covering land, coastal and ocean systems, including sector coupling, Carbon Dioxide Removal, Carbon Capture and Storage, Carbon Capture and Utilization, etc.
  • Emission trends (consumption patterns, human behavior and emissions trends, including economic, sociological and cultural aspects).
  • Scenarios and transitions at the global, national, regional and local scales.
  • Governance (policies, institutions, agreements and instruments) at the international, national and subnational levels, including just transitions of sectors and systems.
  • Mitigation and sustainable development (capacity building; technology innovation, transfer and adoption; related enabling conditions; international cooperation).
  • Economic and financial aspects of mitigation options.

 Cross-cutting areas of expertise 

  • Integration of different forms of climate-related knowledge and data, including Indigenous Knowledge, local knowledge, and practice-based knowledge.
  • Regional (including terrestrial, ocean, and coastal) and sectoral climate information.
  • Carbon Dioxide Removal, Solar Radiation Modification and associated Earth System impacts/feedbacks.
  • Scenarios and pathways, including physical climate, impacts and adaptation, mitigation, development, feasibility and socio-cultural considerations (equity, ethics, finance).
  • Co-benefits, avoided impacts, risks and co-costs of mitigation and adaptation, including: interactions and trade-offs, technological and financial challenges, options and implementation and low regret options.
  • Ethics and equity dimensions of climate change, sustainable development, gender, poverty eradication, livelihoods, health, and food security.
  • Societal responses to spatial and temporal dimensions of risks and benefits of climate change, including sociological, financial, cultural and communication aspects.

 Regional Expertise 

  • Africa
  • Europe
  • Asia
  • Australasia
  • North America
  • Central and South America
  • Polar regions
  • Small Islands
  • Oceania