Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
that the scientific message from Villach was sufficiently definitive to garner
support even from relatively conservative administrations in the United
States and United Kingdom. Indeed, immediately following the confer-
ence Tolba appealed to Secretary of State George Shultz, who represented
the largest producer of greenhouse gases and the most important player in
any potential climate talks, urging the United States to take “appropriate”
policy actions in preparation for a new convention.
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Few national governments were ready to accept the 1985 Villach con-
ference as the definitive word on climate, however, least of all the United
States. Domestic government agencies continued to disagree over the
nature and magnitude of the problem, and the Reagan administration
had no reason to support bold action. Perhaps more important, neither
the DOE nor the EPA— the two main agencies responsible for climate
change policy— had a place at the table in Villach, and the State Depart-
ment would not accept an international scientific consensus that did not
involve U.S. government scientists who could speak for the interests of
the administration.
Not wishing to lose momentum for an international agreement, the
policy board of the National Climate Program (NCP)— an “outpost in
enemy territory” within the Reagan administration, as one scientist called
it— came up with an alternative.
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The NCP recommended a new inter-
governmental body to oversee yet another comprehensive assessment of
climate science, this one led by official government representatives rather
than by independent scientists.
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UNEP and the WMO soon parlayed this
proposal into a permanent mechanism for building consensus on climate
change: the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. These organiza-
tions charged the IPCC with the express mission of creating a scientific
consensus that could serve as the foundation for the U.N. Framework Con-
vention on Climate Change.
Officially commissioned in 1988 and chaired by Bert Bolin, the IPCC
rehashed much of the material discussed at Villach in 1985, but under a
slightly different and more transparent— but also overtly political— assess-
ment structure. Peopled primarily by scientists from government agen-
cies and by midlevel diplomats, the IPCC consisted of three main working
groups: Working Group 1 dealt exclusively with the state of the physical
science of climate change; Working Group 2 discussed the potential
economic, social, and environmental impacts of the phenomenon; and