Highlights and images for 17 January 2024

Delegates convene in a huddle before the morning plenary.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) continued working in a closed session on Wednesday to consider its plans for the seventh assessment cycle. Delegates exchanged views on options for this cycle, including the duration of the cycle and possible outputs.

The Panel is considering three main options, all of which are intended to support the IPCC’s ambition to have “more integrated, concise, and policy relevant reports” while keeping the workload within acceptable limits (IPCC-LX/Doc. 4, Rev. 1). The options include:

a “light” option with fewer products and a shorter timeline than the Sixth Assessment Report;
a “classical” option with up to two Special Reports and two Task Force on National Greenhouse Gas Inventories Methodology Reports;
a “Special Report gallery” option that delivers no Working Group assessment reports, and instead delivers a larger collection of topic-specific Special Reports.

IPCC Chair Jim Skea, Emira Fida, IPCC Secretariat, and IPCC Secretary Abdalah Mokssit

IPCC Secretary Abdalah Mokssit, IPCC Chair Jim Skea and IPCC Deputy Secretary Emira Fida

These options were prepared by an Informal Group on the Programme of Work for the seventh assessment cycle with the aim of guiding discussions during the current meeting. In putting together these options, the Informal Group was instructed to consider a compilation of lessons learned during the sixth assessment cycle and a synthesis of IPCC Member Countries’ views on the products for the seventh assessment cycle, among other resources.

This agenda item is expected to dominate the Panel’s work this week. Deliberations will continue on Thursday.

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All ENB photos are free to use with attribution. For the 60th Session of the IPCC (IPCC-60), please use: Photo by IISD/ENB | Anastasia Rodopoulou