• Rocky Mountain Research Station
• 240 West Prospect
• Fort Collins, CO 80526
• (970) 498-1100

Climate Change Links

US Global Change Research Program

Our Changing Planet. A report on the US Climate Change Science Program. 2008.

International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and its recently released three Summary for Policymaker reports:

• Working Group I contribution to the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report describes progress in understanding of the human and natural drivers of climate change, observed climate change, climate processes and attribution, and estimates of projected future climate change. It builds upon past IPCC assessments and incorporates new findings from the past six years of research. Scientific progress since the Third Assessment Report (TAR) is based upon large amounts of new and more comprehensive data, more sophisticated analyses of data, improvements in understanding of processes and their simulation in models and more extensive exploration of uncertainty ranges.
• Working Group II contribution to the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report describes the current scientific understanding of impacts of climate change on natural ecosystems, managed ecosystems and human systems, the capacity of these systems to adapt and their vulnerability. It builds upon past IPCC assessments and incorporates new knowledge gained since the Third Assessment.
• Working Group III contribution to the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report focuses on new literature on the scientific, technological, environmental, economic and social spects of mitigation of climate change, published since the IPCC Third Assessment Report (TAR) and the Special Reports on COB2B Capture and Storage (SRCCS) and on Safeguarding the Ozone Layer and the Global Climate System (SROC). The following summary is organised into six sections after this introduction: Greenhouse gas (GHG) emission trends, Mitigation in the short and medium term, across different economic sectors (until 2030), Mitigation in the long-term (beyond 2030), Policies, measures and instruments to mitigate climate change, Sustainable development and climate change mitigation, and Gaps in knowledge.