Over a year in the making, I have helped co-lead a group of 26 prominent international climate scientists research and write a report called ‘The Copenhagen Diagnosis’: a worldwide update on the latest indicators and observations relating to climate change. It has been a large effort on behalf of everyone involved and while being challenging it has been immensely rewarding at the same time.
Download the summary of the report in 11 different languages here and download the full report and figures here.
The goal of ‘The Copenhagen Diagnosis’ was to provide a robust and objective update of the latest climate science for policy-makers worldwide, particularly emphasising on the major developments from the observations over the past three years since the scientific input into the IPCC 2007 report. This synthesis is unfiltered from government, industry or NGO’s and is directly from climate scientists in the field.
The report is not opinion, but based on published peer-reviewed scientific research and different to the IPCC 2007 report in style, with a focus on writing it in plain a language as possible. Also, there are several ‘misconception’ boxes which have simple explanations of questions like ‘Has global warming slowed down or paused?’ and ‘Isn’t climate always changing?’
Main conclusion: We find some calming news on some fronts (tipping points and lower land clearing) but mostly unexpectedly bad news, particularly with respect to ice melt around the world from the warming (Antarctic, Greenland, Arctic and Glaciers). More about these details later.
I will be blogging about various aspects of the outcomes and process over the coming weeks, but in science there is the diagnosis and the cure. The main outcome from the climate diagnosis is that the world needs to heavily move towards resourcing the cure - enabling and committing to the rapid upscale in low carbon technologies and a new Clean Industrial Revolution. I urge you all to at least read our summary of the main points.
Another point: None of the authors were paid or profited to undertake this work - it was a public service they felt necessary.
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