The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has opened a meeting in hybrid format to consider essential business as work on the Sixth Assessment Report advances amid the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Representatives of the IPCC’s 195 Member countries, meeting in the 53rd Session of the Panel, will convene for the first time in a format combining exchanges in writing and online discussions, as a face-to-face meeting remains impossible.
The main business of the 53rd Session will be to agree the IPCC budget for the coming year. This Session of the Panel will reconvene in early 2021 to consider other urgent business matters.
The Panel is meeting as members of the IPCC Bureau and authors continue their work on AR6. The pandemic has led to delays of 3-4 months in some of the milestones for the preparation of AR6 this year, and the release dates of the report remain under review.
In a letter to delegates opening the Session, IPCC Chair Hoesung Lee thanked the Secretariat for finding a way to hold a meeting that was consistent with the IPCC Principles and Procedures and did not disadvantage any delegates on the basis of connectivity or time zones.
“Their determination to keep the business of the IPCC flowing smoothly parallels the huge efforts and creativity of the Working Groups and their authors and Technical Support Units to advance work on the Sixth Assessment Report despite the pandemic,” he said.
The IPCC meeting runs from December 7 to 14, 2020.
