Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
environmentalists continued to believe that in the right political forum,
good science would inevitably lead to political change, as rational politi-
cal actors responded to the best information available. Successful efforts
to translate scientific consensus on acid rain and ozone depletion into
international policy action reinforced this optimistic notion. The high-
stakes energy and land-use issues associated with potential solutions to
climate change, however, exposed the political limitations of NGO and
U.N. efforts to use scientific consensus to promote international regula-
tions. Scientists realized that they needed strong political backing in order
to implement political change on global warming. To convince the state
officials and government agencies that could give their recommendations
real political clout, environmental advocates sought to involve these politi-
cal actors in the knowledge-making process. And to do this, they created
a new mechanism for building scientific consensus on climate change:
the IPCC.
Scientists and environmentalists alike lauded the completion of the
IPCC's first assessment report as a transformative moment in international
negotiations on climate change. It was an important feat. Just as UNEP and
the WMO had intended, scientists and politicians had created a rigorous,
transparent, and credible process for producing international scientific
consensus on climate change, bringing the issue to international atten-
tion.
76
The international community recognized the IPCC as the first step
in developing the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change, to
be introduced at the 1992 U.N. Conference on Environment and Devel-
opment in Rio de Janeiro. And late in 1990, the U.N. General Assembly
accepted the first assessment report and officially commissioned the Inter-
governmental Negotiating Committee to begin the process of translating
the IPCC's scientific consensus into international policy. The working-
group meetings, though technically not loci of new research, helped to
push new developments in atmospheric modeling. The conversations of
Working Group 1 in particular helped to expand discussions of greenhouse
gases beyond CO
2
to include noncarbon gases like methane and ozone,
in addition to other trace substances, that could affect the global climate
system. On the whole, it is difficult to judge the IPCC fairly without rec-
ognizing its remarkable success.
At the same time, incorporating national interests and government and
industry representatives into the international scientific consensus-making
