Posted March 11, 2010

The U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the organization responsible for much of the scientific data used by the U.S. EPA in its proposed GHG emissions regulation rule, has requested the InterAcademy Council to conduct an independent review of its processes and procedures. UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and IPCC chairman Rajendra Pachauri formally invited the IAC to conduct the review on March 10, following a Feb. 27 announcement that the IPCC planned for an independent committee of experts to evaluate the panel's procedures.

The IPCC's policies and procedures came under fire last November, when e-mails and documents that had been hacked from researchers who had contributed to the panel's Fourth Assessment Report on climate change called into question the validity of some data used in the report as well as the conduct of several of the researchers. The scandal, dubbed "Climategate," has been used by industry groups to battle looming U.S. GHG emissions regulations by citing flawed IPCC data as reason to overrule the agency's proposed regulations. The minority staff of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works recently released a report exploring Climategate and concluded that, in light of the erroneous information used in the IPCC report, the EPA should rescind its endangerment finding on GHGs and start over. (Read "Senators release Climategate report.")

Pachauri continues to defend the panel's research and stated that the IAC review won't include reconsideration of any data put forth in the IPCC's Fourth Assessment Report. "The IPCC stands firmly behind the rigor and reliability of its Fourth Assessment Report from 2007, but we recognize that we can improve," he said. "We have listened and learned from our critics, and we intend to take every action we can to ensure that our reports are as robust as possible."

In a letter to IAC co-chairs Robbert Dijkgraaf and Lu Yongxiang requesting the IAC's participation in the review, Pachauri and Ki-moon stated that a "very small number of errors have been brought to light" regarding the panel's Fourth Assessment Report. "However, the bedrock scientific consensus on climate change as described in the Fourth Assessment Report remains unchanged," they continued. "Given the gravity of the global threat posed by climate change, it is vitally important to ensure full confidence in the scientific process underpinning the assessments of the IPCC."

The 18-member IAC board includes presidents of 15 academies of science and equivalent organizations. The review, which will examine how IPCC reports are prepared, management functions and the panel's procedures for communicating with the public, will be led by the council's co-chairs and will be conducted according to its independent study procedures. The review is expected to be complete by September, which will allow the IPCC time to submit the results for decision at its 32nd annual session in October. The panel expects to implement any recommended changes in time for the release of its Fifth Assessment Report on climate change, due to be published by 2014.

Originally posted at Industrial GHG Solutions