The Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change (IPCC) is calling on its member governments and observer organizations to nominate experts who will draft the outline of the Working Group contributions to the Seventh Assessment Report (AR7). The MRI encourages its community to actively engage in this process to ensure mountains remain part of the assessment scope. Nominations should be submitted by midnight CEST on 12 June 2024. 

The IPCC has decided to prepare a Seventh Assessment Report during its 60^th Session in January 2024. The Seventh Assessment report (AR7) comprises three Working Group contributions and a Synthesis Report. The Working Group I contribution is on the physical science basis of climate change, Working Group II deals with impacts, adaptation, and vulnerabilities, and Working Group III looks at the mitigation of climate change.  

For the upcoming scoping meeting for AR7, the IPCC is seeking participants with a broad understanding of climate change and related issues to help draft the outline of these reports. The subsequently approved outlines help guide Lead Authors on the key topics and scope to be covered in their assessment.  

In the previous sixth assessment cycle (AR6), and thanks to the collective efforts, engagement, and advocacy from various mountain stakeholders from science, practice, policy and Panel members alike, mountains were specifically covered in dedicated report chapters, with accompanying summary factsheets: 

• IPCC Special Report on the Ocean and Cryosphere in a Changing Climate (SROCC) – Chapter 2: High Mountain Areas  and Supplementary Material. 
• IPCC AR6 Working Group II – Cross-Chapter Paper ‘Mountains’ and Supplementary Material. 
• IPCC AR6 Summary Factsheets: 
  • Working Group I Mountains Regional Factsheet. 
  • Working Group II Cross-Chapter Paper Mountains Factsheet. 

Mountains as a topic were also covered and integrated across AR6, including as part of the corresponding technical and summaries for policymakers. This broad coverage underscores the importance of synthesising and making accessible various formats of assessment-relevant content on mountains, including in diverse regions and sectors. 

The IPCC is now seeking 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 (e.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 (e.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 behaviour 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  

• 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 
• Ocean 

The meeting to discuss the draft outline is tentatively scheduled for December 2024. The draft outline will be submitted to the panel for approval before author teams can be selected to work on the report, a process that is expected to begin in 2025.  

More information on the preparation of IPCC reports, including the scoping process is available from the IPCC Principles and Procedures. 

Those interested in being nominated as an expert for participation in the scoping meeting should contact the relevant Focal Point in their country. A list of Focal Points for IPCC member governments and observer organizations is available here. 

Nominations are submitted through a dedicated online nomination tool by Focal Points only.  Nominations should be submitted by midnight CEST on 12 June 2024. 

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This news was adapted from a press release first published by the IPCC. You can find the original news article on the website.

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Cover image by: Ed van duijn