Public participation in environmental assessments: The

case for an open IPCC

Nils Simon, Dipl.-Pol., MA

Environmental Policy Research Centre, Freie Universität Berlin

German Institute for International and Security Affairs at the Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik, Berlin

Robustness of IPCC• Despite error of Himalayan glacier melt rate and other minor

mistakes, the IPCC reports are scientifically sound• However, as the public reaction towards “Climategate” and

the IPCC errors showed, climate science is currently not socially robust

• Main problem: Climate science serves as main legitimisation for far-ranging political decisions with impacts on virtually every socioeconomic sector

Contested science• Reliance on climate science

has made it easy for “rearguards of modernity” to question political action

• Dismissal of climate science organized by– Professional denialists (“doubt

is their product”)– Civic skeptics (e.g. bloggers)

• Opening up the IPCC might seem counterintuitive, yet offers an opportunity to get people involved who perceive climate science as not transparent

Why is climate science different?

• Higher standards are expected from climate science than from other disciplines

• This includes transparency of the process, availability of data and methods, frankness about uncertainties

• Task ahead: Realising “socially robust science” (Nowotny et al. 2002)

• Reforming the IPCC – From a science-policy-interface to a science-policy-society-interface?

IPCC reform big topic

Public participation

• US National Research Council report 2008 on “Public Participation in Environmental Assessment and Decision Making”

• “Conclusion 1: When done well, public participation improves the quality and legitimacy of a decision and builds the capacity of all involved to engage in the policy process. It can lead to better results in terms of environmental quality and other social objectives. It also can enhance trust and understanding among parties. Achieving these results depends on using practices that address difficulties that specific aspects of the context can present.”

How to open it up?

• Christy (2010) suggested a “Wikipedia-like climate panel”• Hardly feasible, but useful as most far-ranging model• Question: How could a more socially robust IPCC assessment

process based on enhanced public participation look like?

IPCC Climate Wiki?? ?Level of public engagement

Contribution Co-creationCollaboration

IPCC organizational structure

IPCC report process

(No) room for public participation?

IPCC and participation

• In reality, the IPCC is not quite as closed to participation as sometimes perceived

• For AR4, expert and government (and informal) reviewers sent in 90,000 comments – huge task to facilitate

• US government published first order draft of AR4 and invited comments from interested experts in early 2006; facilitated by US Climate Change Science Program

• Everyone who is really interested in contributing can find (informal) ways to either read drafts or send in comments

IPCC and participation

• Increasing public participation needs to take account of editors’ limited capacities; it seems only feasible in combination with a well-structured comment policy

• IAC review shows WGs already struggle with comments:• Recommendation: The IPCC should adopt a more targeted and effective

process for responding to reviewer comments. In such a process, Review Editors would prepare a written summary of the most significant issues raised by reviewers shortly after review comments have been received. Authors would be required to provide detailed written responses to the most significant review issues identified by the Review Editors, abbreviated responses to all non-editorial comments, and no written responses to editorial comments.

Other participation processes

1. US EPA published report on which GHG endangerment finding should be based upon; public comments required by law– Over 2 months, 380,000 comments were sent in by June 2009 (sorted,

summarized, replied to online) – reflecting US culture and potential consequences of endangerment finding

– EPA has organizational capacities to deal with this amount of input (staff size: 18,000)

– For comparison: IPCC secretariat has staff size about 14, TSUs have about 10 each

2. InterAcademy Council invited comments on its review of IPCC procedures– 400 comments were sent in and dealt with (not published)

Assessing engagement

• Conducting interviews/surveys with– Climate scientists– Governments– Environmental NGOs– Bloggers

• Open questions of – institutional capacities of IPCC secretariat, including TSUs, – capabilities and willingness of scientists, and – willingness of governments

to implement participation

Internet as tool for participation• Using the internet is the most

obvious channel through which to distribute drafts, post comments, and publish results

• It is also the channel through which dissent is most widely spread, and that’s already being used for intensive climate discussions

• Web community has developed a range of tools; applicability for Open IPCC needs to be assessed

Developing models• What models could be envisioned in between absent

participation (IPCC today) and a full-scale co-creation process (Climate Wiki)?

• Looking for examples in other domains (e.g. Impact Assessments, National Sustainable Development Strategies, ...)

• Applying technical solutions developed by web community

IPCC Climate Wiki

Contribution Co-creationCollaboration

Open IPCC Model I

Open IPCC Model II

Open IPCC Model III

Level of public engagement opportunities

SummaryA participatory process needs to be substantial

and transparent in order to be meaningful for public reviewers and to increase social robustness of the reports

SOCIETY

SCIENCEA participatory process needs to take

into account editors’ capabilities and must not overstretch their goodwill in order to guarantee scientific integrity

POLITICSA participatory process must ensure

governmental discretion over the review in order to remain useful for governments and to

Question: How could a more socially robust IPCC

assessment process based on enhanced public participation

look like?

Methods: Looking for models of participatory processes in

other domains; assessing willingness to participate;

develop range of models for Open IPCC

IPCC (ideal)

IPCC (real)

Climate Wiki

Open IPCC Model I

Open IPCC Model II

Open IPCC Model III