IPCC Report Card
BACKGROUND
United Nations countries belong to an organization called the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which publishes a report every six years. Often referred to as the "climate bible" these reports are relied on by governments around the world.
The latest was released in 2007. Sometimes called the AR4 (the Fourth Assessment Report), it contains 44 chapters and is nearly 3,000 pages long. Written by people organized into teams - Working Group 1, 2 and 3 - it consists of three smaller reports bundled into one.
The chairman of the IPCC has repeatedly said the report relies solely on peer-reviewed literature to support its findings. He has said research that hasn't appeared in peer-reviewed journals should be thrown "into the dustbin" (see the last line of this newspaper article). But our audit has discovered almost 5,600 non-peer-reviewed references in this report.
In elementary schools in the United States, students are assigned grades ranging from an A to an F, based on the mark they've achieved out of 100 (see Wikipedia's table here). Most parents would be alarmed if their child brought home a report card similar to the one received by the IPCC.
(click each chapter for the relevant section of the IPCC report)
2007 IPCC report (AR4) |
grade | % peer-reviewed | total number of references | % not peer-reviewed |
Working Group 3, Chapter 4 | F | 15 | 360 | 85 |
Working Group 3, Chapter 7 | F | 23 | 352 | 77 |
Working Group 3, Chapter 1 | F | 24 | 50 | 76 |
Working Group 3, Chapter 5 | F | 27 | 260 | 73 |
Working Group 3, Chapter 6 | F | 29 | 379 | 71 |
Working Group 3, Chapter 12 | F | 37 | 414 | 63 |
Working Group 2, Chapter 13 | F | 40 | 354 | 60 |
Working Group 2, Chapter 11 | F | 42 | 372 | 58 |
Working Group 3, Chapter 2 | F | 46 | 302 | 54 |
Working Group 2, Chapter 7 | F | 46 | 244 | 54 |
Working Group 3, Chapter 10 | F | 47 | 191 | 53 |
Working Group 3, Chapter 13 | F | 48 | 491 | 52 |
Working Group 2, Chapter 9 | F | 53 | 361 | 47 |
Working Group 2, Chapter 17 | F | 53 | 275 | 47 |
Working Group 2, Chapter 20 | F | 53 | 220 | 47 |
Working Group 2, Chapter 18 | F | 56 | 270 | 44 |
Working Group 3, Chapter 9 | F | 56 | 229 | 44 |
Working Group 2, Chapter 14 | F | 58 | 562 | 42 |
Working Group 2, Chapter 16 | F | 58 | 194 | 42 |
Working Group 3, Chapter 3 | F | 58 | 358 | 42 |
Working Group 2, Chapter 10 | F | 59 | 391 | 41 |
Working Group 3, Chapter 11 | D | 62 | 330 | 38 |
Working Group 2, Chapter 6 | D | 65 | 443 | 35 |
Working Group 2, Chapter 2 | D | 67 | 374 | 33 |
Working Group 2, Chapter 15 | D | 68 | 361 | 32 |
Working Group 2, Chapter 5 | C | 70 | 444 | 30 |
Working Group 2, Chapter 3 | C | 71 | 377 | 29 |
Working Group 2, Chapter 12 | C | 71 | 633 | 29 |
Working Group 2, Chapter 19 | C | 71 | 273 | 29 |
Working Group 2, Chapter 8 | C | 75 | 557 | 25 |
Working Group 3, Chapter 8 | C | 77 | 317 | 23 |
Working Group 1, Chapter 1 | B | 80 | 264 | 20 |
Working Group 2, Chapter 4 | B | 82 | 917 | 18 |
Working Group 1, Chapter 4 | B | 85 | 257 | 15 |
Working Group 2, Chapter 1 | B | 86 | 650 | 14 |
Working Group 1, Chapter 11 | B | 89 | 609 | 11 |
Working Group 1, Chapter 6 | A | 93 | 609 | 7 |
Working Group 1, Chapter 8 | A | 94 | 686 | 6 |
Working Group 1, Chapter 9 | A | 94 | 535 | 6 |
Working Group 1, Chapter 2 | A | 95 | 759 | 5 |
Working Group 1, Chapter 10 | A | 95 | 545 | 5 |
Working Group 1, Chapter 3 | A | 96 | 804 | 4 |
Working Group 1, Chapter 5 | A | 96 | 289 | 4 |
Working Group 1, Chapter 7 | A | 96 | 869 | 4 |
18,531 |
Of the 44 chapters in the IPCC report: |
|
21 received an F | - 59% or fewer references are peer-reviewed |
4 received a D | - 60-69% of references are peer-reviewed |
6 received a C | - 70-79% of references are peer-reviewed |
5 received a B | - 80-89% of references are peer-reviewed |
8 received an A | - 90-100% of references are peer-reviewed |
grade | chapters (out of 44) |
% of chapters receiving this grade |
F (59% & below) |
21 | 48 |
D (60-69%) |
4 | 9 |
C (70-79%) |
6 | 14 |
B (80-89%) |
5 | 11 |
A (90-100%) |
8 | 18 |