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Understanding the IPCC: An Important Follow-Up

A week ago, I wrote at this blog about my recent frustrations with the government approval process of one part of the Summary for Policymakers (SPM) of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Fifth Assessment Report (AR5) Working Group III (WG3) report, namely the section in the Summary for Policymakers (SPM.5.2) on “International Cooperation,” for which I had major responsibility.

In that post, I described how the government approval process, which took place in Berlin in early April, had led to the deletion of a significant fraction of the text of SPM.5.2, not because governments questioned its scientific validity, but because they found various passages to be inconsistent with their respective positions and national interests within the ongoing international climate change negotiations under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). (That post took the form of a letter to the co-chairs of WG3 – Ottmar Edenhofer, Ramon Pichs-Madruga, and Youba Sokona. They have since sent a thoughtful response and agreed for me to provide a link to their letter here.)

Why a Follow-Up Post?

My first post has been widely reported in the press. Some of this coverage was accurate and reasonable. Pilita Clark of the Financial Times, in particular, wrote an excellent article that accurately presented my views and conveyed some additional useful insights. Other press coverage, however, inaccurately stated or suggested that my critique of the IPCC process was much broader than it was. This was despite my very careful caveats in the first blog post, in which I tried hard to communicate clearly the limited focus of my critique, namely the effects of the government approval process on one section (SPM.5.2) of the Summary for Policymakers.

Some in the more fringe elements of the press and blogosphere quickly capitalized on the situation by distorting the message of my original post to meet their own objectives – by stating or implying that I found fault with the overall IPCC process and reports themselves, that I have positioned myself as an opponent of the important work of the IPCC, and/or that I am a skeptic of the science of climate change! Because of these over-the-top distortions, I am writing this second post to place my original critique in the context of the overall IPCC process and of the IPCC’s recent Fifth Assessment Report.

Understanding the IPCC Process and Reports

The central purpose of the IPCC Assessment Reports is to survey and synthesize the best published research on climate change, including its causes, consequences, and potential mitigation. Each of the last several reports has therefore consisted of three volumes, prepared by separate scientific working groups, which address respectively: (1) research from the natural sciences on climate change itself — whether, how, and to what extent it is happening; (2) the impacts of climate change on natural systems and on human society — and how society might adapt to climate change; and (3) approaches to the mitigation of climate change, including, importantly, policy options for reducing greenhouse-gas emissions. The chapter of which I was a Co-Coordinating Lead Author, “International Cooperation: Agreements and Instruments,” fell into this third volume. (See my previous post for further details.)

Hundreds of the world’s leading scientists conducting research on the various topics addressed by the IPCC’s Assessment Reports spend countless un-compensated hours over several years preparing the reports, motivated only by a commitment to scientific rigor and the desire to better understand climate change and its implications. A core principle of the IPCC process is that the reports should be “policy-relevant but not policy-prescriptive” and should synthesize the peer-reviewed literature as objectively as possible.

The IPCC’s three-volume reports — including the recent Fifth Assessment Report — largely succeed in accurately and objectively synthesizing the best scientific research. The reports are, as a result, absolutely essential resources for both understanding climate change and formulating responses to it.

In addition to being divided into three volumes along substantive lines, the recent Fifth Assessment Report is presented in three different “packages”: (1) the full volumes, each of which consist of multiple chapters totaling about 2,000 pages; (2) the Technical Summaries (TS), which condense the full volumes into documents of less than 100 pages each; and (3) the Summary for Policymakers (SPM), which at one-third the length of the TS, was the focus of my previous blog post.

I emphasized in that post that none of the deletions and revisions I described regarding the section on international cooperation in the 33-page SPM had any effects whatsoever on the key, foundational products of five years of work on AR5 WG3: the Technical Summary (three times the length of the Summary for Policymakers, but no more “technical” than the SPM), and – most important – the 2,000 pages of the 15 underlying chapters, including Chapter 13, “International Cooperation: Agreements and Instruments” (with 79 pages of text, and 57 pages of references). Only the SPM is subject to the (line-by-line) government approval process.

Furthermore, even the severe cuts to the section on international cooperation in the SPM – the focus of my concerns – should be understood in context. The governments never added text to the section; rather they deleted text, because in the line-by-line approval process they could not agree among each other. As I explained in my previous post, the government representatives were doing their job – looking out for the interests of their respective countries. Any text that was considered inconsistent with their countries’ interests and positions in multilateral negotiations was treated as unacceptable.

Overall, my serious concerns about the effects of the government approval process on one section of the SPM should be considered in the much larger context of what is an exceptionally valuable scientific resource for those concerned with climate change.

A Word on the Government Approval Process

Notwithstanding the problems and challenges of the government approval process, which I highlighted in my previous post, it is important to note the merits of the process, as well, because there are some distinct advantages of the IPCC being an intergovernmental organization and having some aspect of the Assessment Reports requiring government approval (namely, the SPM).

First, as I emphasized in my previous post, government approval has brought political credibility to the IPCC that it would probably not otherwise enjoy. Second, this process forces member governments to pay attention to the reports, and agree that a substantial body of research on climate change is valid (which would not be the case with a non-governmental organization). It is hardly trivial that the world’s governments have formally (and unanimously) agreed — through the IPCC process — that climate change is real, caused by human activity, and poses significant threats.

My Bottom Line

In the short term, I am continuing to work within the IPCC, as I currently serve as a lead author of the AR5 Synthesis Report, which brings together the essence of the reports of Working Groups 1, 2, and 3. That work will be completed in October of this year.

In addition, I hope to work constructively with my colleagues within the IPCC, its member governments, and others to address our shared concerns about the SPM approval process — particularly with regard to policy-relevant material in the third (Working Group III) volume of the assessment reports, and most especially in regard to text on international cooperation, which is so intimately connected with the UN climate negotiations in which those same governments are deeply involved.

I conclude this post with the final paragraph of my previous one, which featured my letter to the IPCC WG3 leadership: “The mission of the IPCC is important, and the scientific work carried out by the hundreds of lead authors of AR5 Working Group 3 was solid and important, as validated by the Technical Summary and the underlying chapters. I hope this letter can be constructive and helpful for the future work of the IPCC.”

Is the IPCC Government Approval Process Broken?

Over the past 5 years, I have dedicated an immense amount of time and effort to serving as the Co-Coordinating Lead Author (CLA) of Chapter 13, “International Cooperation: Agreements and Instruments,” of Working Group III (Mitigation) of the Fifth Assessment Report (AR5) of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). It has been an intense and exceptionally time-consuming process, which recently culminated in a grueling week spent in Berlin, Germany, April 5-13, 2014, at the government approval sessions, in which some 195 country delegations discussed, revised, and ultimately approved (line-by-line) the “Summary for Policymakers” (SPM), which condenses more than 2,000 pages of text from 15 chapters into an SPM document of 33 pages. Several of the CLAs present with me in Berlin commented that given the nature and outcome of the week, the resulting document should probably be called the Summary by Policymakers, rather than the Summary for Policymakers.

Before returning to the topic of today’s blog entry — the SPM process and outcome — I want to emphasize that the IPCC’s Working Group III “Technical Summary” and the underlying Working Group III report of 15 chapters were completely untouched by the government approval process of the Summary for Policymakers. So, the crucial IPCC products – the Technical Summary and the 15 chapters of WG 3 – retain their full scientific integrity, and they merit serious public attention. Now, back to the SPM process and outcome …

The process of the government approval sessions was exceptionally frustrating, and the outcome of that process – the final SPM – was in some regards disappointing. Two weeks ago, immediately after returning from Berlin, I sent a letter to the Co-Chairs of Working Group III — Ottmar Edenhofer, Ramon Pichs-Madruga, and Youba Sokona — expressing my disappointment with the government approval process and its outcome in regard to the part of the assessment for which I had primary responsibility, SPM.5.2, International Cooperation. At the time, I did not release my letter publically, because I did not want to get in the way of the important messages that remained in the SPM and were receiving public attention through the Working Group III release.

With two weeks having passed, it is now unlikely that the broader release of my letter will obscure the news surrounding the Working Group III release, and – importantly — it could be constructive to the process going forward, as the IPCC leadership and others think about the path ahead for future climate assessments. Rather than summarizing or annotating my letter, I believe it makes most sense simply to reproduce it, and let it stand – or fall – as originally written. It follows below.

==================================================================

From: Stavins, Robert
Sent: Thursday, April 17, 2014 4:06 PM

TO: Ottmar Edenhofer, Co-Chair, Working Group III, AR5, IPCC

Ramon Pichs-Madruga, Co-Chair, Working Group III, AR5, IPCC

Youba Sokona, Co-Chair, Working Group III, AR5, IPCC

CC: Rajendra Pachauri, Chairman, IPCC

Jan Minx, Head of Technical Support Unit, Working Group III

FROM: Robert Stavins

SUBJECT: Thoughts on the Government Approval Process for SPM.5.2 (International Cooperation) of the Summary for Policymakers of Working Group 3, Fifth Assessment Report, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change

Dear Ottmar, Ramon, and Youba:

I am writing to you today to express my disappointment and frustration with the process and outcome of the government approval meetings in Berlin this past week, at which the assembled representatives from the world’s governments, considered and, in effect, fundamentally revised or rejected parts of the Summary for Policymakers (SPM) of IPCC Working Group 3 over a period of five long days (and nights). My focus in this letter is exclusively on one section of the SPM, namely SPM.5.2, International Cooperation. I am not representing nor referring to any other parts of the SPM.

Also, none of what I have to say should be taken as reflecting negatively on you (the Co-Chairs of Working Group 3), the WG 3 Technical Support Unit (TSU), nor the overall leadership of the IPCC. On the contrary, I thought that all of you did a remarkable job over the five years of work on AR5, as well as during the week in Berlin. The problems about which I’m writing arose despite, not because of your excellent leadership and support.

More broadly, the problems I identify in this letter are not a consequence of personal failings of any of the individuals involved. My intent is not to criticize the country representatives, the IPCC leadership, the TSU, the Lead Authors, or the Coordinating Lead Authors. The problems I seek to identify are structural, not personal.

Further, as Co-Coordinating Lead Author (CLA) of Chapter 13 (International Cooperation: Agreements and Instruments) of the underlying report, I had primary responsibility – together with my Co-Coordinating Lead Author, Dr. Zou Ji – for drafting the text for Section SPM.5.2 (International Cooperation) of the SPM, and nothing in this letter should implicate Zou Ji, for whom I have great respect and with whom I have enjoyed working. He may or may not share any of the views I express below.

Another caveat is that none of the problems I describe in this letter apply to either the Technical Summary nor the underlying Chapter 13. Indeed, because of the problems with Section SPM.5.2 on international cooperation in the SPM, it is important that interested parties refer instead to the Technical Summary, or better yet, the original Chapter 13.

In this letter, I will not comment on the government review and revision process that affected other parts of the SPM, other than to note that as the week progressed, I was surprised by the degree to which governments felt free to recommend and sometimes insist on detailed changes to the SPM text on purely political, as opposed to scientific bases.

The general motivations for government revisions – from most (but not all) participating delegations – appeared to be quite clear in the plenary sessions. These motivations were made explicit in the “contact groups,” which met behind closed doors in small groups with the lead authors on particularly challenging sections of the SPM. In these contact groups, government representatives worked to suppress text that might jeopardize their negotiating stances in international negotiations under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).

I fully understand that the government representatives were seeking to meet their own responsibilities toward their respective governments by upholding their countries’ interests, but in some cases this turned out to be problematic for the scientific integrity of the IPCC Summary for Policymakers. Such involvement — and sometimes interference — with the scientific process of the IPCC was particularly severe in section SPM.5.2 on international cooperation. It is to that section of the SPM that I now turn.

In the early morning of Monday, April 7, 2014, a draft of SPM.5.2 was completed and approved by the assembled team of CLAs in Berlin. The draft, a copy of which is attached as Item A, had been extensively revised over the preceding months in response to comments received from governments around the world (to whom multiple drafts had been sent as part of the normal IPCC process). The draft in Item A was sent to governments on April 7^th through the IPCC’s PaperSmart system.

The plenary session of government representatives turned their attention to SPM.5.2 at approximately 10:00 pm on Friday, April 11^th. When it became clear that the country delegates were unwilling to move forward with the consideration of the text in plenary, you established a contact group to work on acceptable text. You gave the group 2 hours to come up with acceptable text. That group began its work at approximately 11:00 pm (and continued past 1:00 am on Saturday, April 12^th).

The contact group included representatives from of a diverse set of countries, ranging from small to large, and from poor to rich. Hence, I do not believe that the responsibility for the problems that arose are attributable to any specific country or even set of countries. On the contrary, nearly all delegates in the meeting demonstrated the same perspective and approach, namely that any text that was considered inconsistent with their interests and positions in multilateral negotiations was treated as unacceptable. In fact, several (perhaps the majority) of the country representatives in the SPM.5.2 contact group identified themselves as negotiators in the UNFCCC negotiations. To ask these experienced UNFCCC negotiators to approve text that critically assessed the scholarly literature on which they themselves are the interested parties, created an irreconcilable conflict of interest. Thus, the country representatives were placed in an awkward and problematic position by the nature of the process.

Over the course of the two hours of the contact group deliberations, it became clear that the only way the assembled government representatives would approve text for SPM.5.2 was essentially to remove all “controversial” text (that is, text that was uncomfortable for any one individual government), which meant deleting almost 75% of the text, including nearly all explications and examples under the bolded headings. In more than one instance, specific examples or sentences were removed at the will of only one or two countries, because under IPCC rules, the dissent of one country is sufficient to grind the entire approval process to a halt unless and until that country can be appeased.

I understand that country representatives were only doing their job, so I do not implicate them personally; however, the process the IPCC followed resulted in a process that built political credibility by sacrificing scientific integrity. The final version of SPM.5.2, as agreed to by the contact group, and subsequently approved in plenary (at approximately 3:00 am, April 12^th), is attached to this letter as Item B.

No institution can be all things for all people, and this includes the IPCC. In particular, in the case of the IPCC’s review of research findings on international cooperation, there may be an inescapable conflict between scientific integrity and political credibility. If the IPCC is to continue to survey scholarship on international cooperation in future assessment reports, it should not put country representatives in the uncomfortable and fundamentally untenable position of reviewing text in order to give it their unanimous approval. Likewise, the IPCC should not ask lead authors to volunteer enormous amounts of their time over multi-year periods to carry out work that will inevitably be rejected by governments in the Summary for Policymakers.

I hope I have made it clear that my purpose is not to condemn the country representatives, the IPCC leadership, the TSU, the Lead Authors, or the Coordinating Lead Authors. The problem is structural, not personal. In my view, with the current structure and norms, it will be exceptionally difficult, if not impossible, to produce a scientifically sound and complete version of text for the SPM on international cooperation that can survive the country approval process.

More broadly, I urge the IPCC to direct public attention to the documents produced by the lead authors that were subject to government (and expert) comment, but not subject to government approval. I believe that tremendous public good would arise from publicizing the key findings of the Technical Summary and the individual chapter Executive Summaries, instead of the Summary for Policymakers. I know that as the leaders of the IPCC, you see it to be your responsibility to convey to the public (and policy makers) the results of the hard scientific work that the hundreds of lead authors put into the report over the past five years, and not simply the constrained version of the Summary for Policymakers produced over the past week.

The mission of the IPCC is important, and the scientific work carried out by the hundreds of lead authors of AR5 Working Group 3 was solid and important, as validated by the Technical Summary and the underlying chapters. I hope this letter can be constructive and helpful for the future work of the IPCC.

Best wishes,

Rob

Robert N. Stavins, Albert Pratt Professor of Business & Government, John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University
Director, Harvard Environmental Economics Program
Director of Graduate Studies, Ph.D. Programs in Public Policy and Political Economy & Government
Co-Chair, Harvard Business School-Kennedy School Joint Degree Programs
Director, Harvard Project on Climate Agreements
Blog: An Economic View of the Environment SSRN Paper Downloads
Mail: John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, 79 JFK St., Room L-306, Box 11, Cambridge, MA 02138
Phone: 617-495-1820 E-Mail: robert_stavins@harvard.edu
University Fellow, Resources for the Future Research Associate, National Bureau of Economic Research

Can There Be a Positive Prognosis for Climate Negotiations?

I’m writing this brief essay on board my flight to the USA from Europe (where I participated in a workshop at the Center for European Economic Research (ZEW) in Mannheim, Germany). It was an interesting event, the substance of which (the “energy-efficiency paradox”) I will write about in the future, but today’s post is stimulated by a news article I read on board my flight, titled, “U.S. and China May Find Agreements Outside Stymied Climate Talks.”

Bad News from Bonn

In Bonn this past week, international negotiations continued under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). The two most important countries in terms of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions – China and the United States – apparently engaged in a war of words on the fundamental question of who should do what. In particular, these two giants – and their respective allies in the developed and developing worlds – bickered over their very different interpretations of the Durban Platform for Enhanced Action’s call for an agreement to be reached in Paris in 2015 that is “applicable to all Parties” (countries).

The United States and other industrialized countries have insisted that this calls for an agreement with emissions reduction pledges by all countries (in particular, by the industrialized countries plus the large emerging economies of China, India, Brazil, Korea, Mexico, and South Africa). But China, India, and most countries in the developing world have maintained that because the Durban Platform was adopted under the auspices of the UNFCCC, it calls only for emission reduction commitments by the industrialized countries. In previous essays at this blog, I’ve written about the potential promise that the Durban Platform can offer for a departure from the paralysis that has characterized the past 15 years under the Kyoto Protocol with its dichotomous distinction between emissions-reductions commitments for industrialized (Annex I) countries and no such commitments for other nations. But it is difficult to claim that the rhetoric in Bonn has been encouraging in that regard.

Better News from Beijing and Washington

At the same time, U.S. government officials back in Washington were quoted in the news article I read on board my flight as saying that bilateral negotiations with China – possibly outside of the UNFCCC – are where real progress is most likely to be made. This caught my eye, because it may be the major – and perhaps only — cause for (cautious) optimism regarding the path ahead. I wrote about this reality shortly after the UNFCCC negotiations concluded in Warsaw, Poland, in November, 2013, and recent developments merit returning to it today. My premise is what I perceive to be the potential emerging convergence of interests between these two most important countries in the world when it comes to climate change and international policy to address it – China and the United States. Five factors stand out: emissions, historical responsibility, fuel sources, policy approaches, and geopolitics.

Emissions

First, the annual carbon dioxide (CO₂) and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions of these two countries have already converged. Whereas U.S. CO₂ emissions in 1990 were almost twice the level of Chinese emissions, by 2006 China had overtaken the United States. We are the world’s two largest emitters.

Historical Responsibility

Second, cumulative emissions are particularly important, because it is the accumulated stock of GHGs in the atmosphere that cause climate change. Any discussion of distributional equity in the climate realm therefore inevitably turns to considerations of historic responsibility. Looking at the period 1850-2010, the United States led the pack, accounting for nearly 19% of cumulative global emissions of GHGs, with the European Union in second place with 17%, and China third, accounting for about 12% of global cumulative emissions. But that picture is rapidly changing, because emissions are flat to declining throughout the industrialized world, but increasingly rapidly in the large emerging economies, in particular, China. Depending upon the relative rates of economic growth of China and the United States, as well as other factors, China may top all countries in cumulative emissions within 10 to 20 years.

Fuel Sources

Third, China and the United States both have historically high reliance on coal for generating electricity. At a time at which U.S. dependence on coal is decreasing (due to increased supplies of unconventional natural gas and hence lower gas prices ), China continues to rely on coal, but is very concerned about this, partly because of localized health impacts of particulates and other pollutants. Importantly, both countries have very large shale gas reserves. U.S. output (and use for electricity generation) has been increasing rapidly, bringing down CO₂ emissions, whereas Chinese exploitation and output have been constrained by available infrastructure (that is, lack of pipelines, but that will change).

Policy Approaches

Fourth, in both countries, sub-national market-based climate policies – in particular, cap-and-trade systems – are moving forward. In the case of the China, seven pilot CO₂ cap-and-trade regimes at the local level are under development, while in the United States, California’s ambitious AB-32 cap-and-trade system continues to make progress, and in the northeast, the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) is witnessing higher allowance auction prices due to the more severe targets the RGGI states recently adopted.

Geopolitics

Fifth and finally, there is the reality of global geopolitics. If the twentieth century was the American Century, then many observers, including leaders in China, anticipate (or at least hope) that the twenty-first century will be the Chinese Century. In this regard, I’m reminded that I was quoted by David Jolly in the New York Times, as saying, “If it’s your century, you don’t obstruct, you lead.”