This week, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released the Physical Science Basis report from Working Group 1, a major part of their sixth Assessment Report, which provides the most up-to-date understanding and best scientific evidence of the ways in which the climate is changing. The sobering report finds that climate change is already affecting nearly every part of the planet with rapidly intensifying impacts, and human activities are unequivocally the cause.
Three CPO-funded scientists were among the world’s top climate researchers who contributed to the report. The scientists include:
- Russell Vose (NOAA/NCEI), Chapter 2 “Changing state of the climate system” author, funded by CPO’s Climate Observations and Monitoring (COM) program in Fiscal Year 2019 (FY19) and FY20;
- Mathew Barlow (University of Massachusetts Lowell), Chapter 8 “Water cycle changes” author, funded by CPO’s Modeling, Analysis, Predictions, and Projections (MAPP) program in FY20; and
- Baylor Fox-Kemper (Brown University), Chapter 9 “Ocean, cryosphere, and sea level change” author, funded by CPO’s Climate Variability and Predictability (CVP) program in FY19.
The report states that there is no going back for some changes to our climate system but there is still time to slow, stop, or even reverse others by limiting warming. However, only significant and immediate action can alleviate worse-case future scenarios.