The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s forthcoming special report on climate change and cities has more women than men on its authorship team, for the first time in the organisation’s history, Carbon Brief analysis shows.
The IPCC released a list earlier this month of the 97 authors (pdf) who will write the cities report – which is scheduled for publication in March 2027.
With 46 men and 51 women, it is the first report in the IPCC’s 37-year history to have more women than men as authors.
Meanwhile, with 39 authors from institutions in the global south and 58 from the global north, this report has the fifth-highest representation of authors from the global south.
The report is one of the multiple documents, including special reports, working group reports and methodology reports, that will make up the IPCC’s seventh assessment cycle (AR7).
Last year, Carbon Brief published an in-depth analysis of the gender and country of affiliation of the authors of major IPCC reports, from the first assessment report in 1990 to the sixth assessment report in 2023.
The analysis has now been expanded to include all reports published since 1990 by the IPCC, including assessment reports, special reports and methodology reports.
It shows a steady increase in the proportion of women and scientists from global-south institutions contributing to the IPCC reports, but highlights that these groups are still underrepresented.
Gender balance
Carbon Brief has analysed the coordinating lead authors, lead authors and review editors who have worked together to produce dozens of IPCC reports.
The chart below shows the gender balance of the authors of all IPCC reports ever published.
Each IPCC assessment cycle is marked by the publication of three working-group reports, which are summarised in a synthesis report. Carbon Brief has grouped these four reports under the headline “assessment reports” for every assessment cycle.
The first, second and third assessment reports are indicated by the acronyms FAR, SAR and TAR. Subsequent assessment reports are indicated by AR, followed by the name of the assessment cycle.
Most assessment cycles also saw the publication of “special reports”, focusing on specific areas of climate change, and “methodology reports” – technical documents that focus on specific areas of the IPCC’s methodology. Acronyms for these reports are given as SR and MR, respectively, followed by the name of the assessment cycle.
For example, the special reports on 1.5C, the ocean and cryosphere and climate change and land – published over 2018-19 – are part of the sixth assessment cycle and are referred to collectively as SR6.
To assign each special and methodology report to an assessment cycle, Carbon Brief assumes that assessment reports are the last documents to be published in each assessment cycle. Carbon Brief has grouped the authors from special reports (“SR”) and methodology reports (“MR”) separately for each assessment cycle.
The analysis shows that when the IPCC’s first-ever assessment report was published in 1990, only 8% of authors were women. The representation of women in the IPCC has steadily risen over time and by the sixth assessment cycle (2018-22) more than one-third of authors were women.
The special report on climate change and cities is the only output from the seventh assessment cycle with a publicly available authorship list to date. With 46 men and 51 women, the IPCC cities report is the first in the organisation’s history to have more women than men on its author list.
The IPCC’s seventh assessment cycle – which will include the three main working group reports, one special report and two methodology reports – is likely to have hundreds of authors. The authorship teams for the other reports have not yet been selected.
The graphic below shows a more detailed view. Each dot represents one person – with women shown in orange and men in purple. Where one author contributed to multiple working group reports in the same assessment cycle, these repeats have been removed. Grey dots indicate that the gender of the author could not be determined.
For more information on why gender representation is important in climate science, read Carbon Brief’s 2021 analysis on the lack of diversity in climate science.
Global-south representation
Carbon Brief also analysed how the proportion of IPCC authors from institutions in the global south has changed.
Here, “global south” is defined as countries in Africa, Asia (excluding Japan), Latin America and Oceania (excluding Australia and New Zealand). “Global north” is defined as countries in North America and Europe, as well as Australia, New Zealand and Japan.
The chart below shows the percentage of authors from the global south in every IPCC report.
When the IPCC published its first assessment report, only 11% of authors were from institutions in the global south. This percentage has risen over the years, reaching 38% in the sixth assessment reports, the analysis shows.
With 58 authors from institutions in the global north and 39 from the global south, the IPCC’s cities report is the organisation’s fifth-most global south-dominated report.
(The highest-ranking report for global-south authorship, with 53 authors from the global north and 54 from the global south, was the special report on climate change and land. Published in 2019, this was part of the sixth assessment cycle.)
The graphic below shows a more detailed representation of IPCC authors from institutions in the global north and south. Each dot represents one person – with experts from global-south countries shown in dark blue and global-north countries in light blue. Where one author contributed to multiple working group reports in the same assessment cycle, these repeats have been removed.
The upcoming cities report includes authors from institutions in 54 different countries. The most highly represented countries are Japan, the Netherlands, the UK and the US, with six authors each.
The map below shows the number of authors from institutions in each country, across all IPCC reports included in this analysis. The map on the top shows countries in the global north while the map on the bottom shows those in the global south. Darker colours indicate more authors.
Every author in the cities report has two countries listed next to their name, labelled “country” and “citizenship”. Carbon Brief used the former – which indicates the country where the scientist works – for the analysis above, because citizenship data is not available in earlier reports.
However, IPCC scientists previously told Carbon Brief that, sometimes, experts from the global south find it easier to apply to join the IPCC via institutions in the global north.
An analysis of the citizenship of authors of the IPCC cities report finds that 51 are from global-south countries. However, only 39 are affiliated with institutions in the global south.
Methodology
Carbon Brief obtained data used in this analysis from a range of sources, including the IPCC website, the IPCC’s technical support unit and analysis by Carbon Brief staff.
(The “methodology” section of Carbon Brief’s 2023 analysis on IPCC authorship contains more details on how Carbon Brief collected authorship data from the main working group reports and recent special reports.)
Carbon Brief downloaded authorship data on the AR7 special report on climate change and cities from the IPCC website, which lists data on each author’s gender, citizenship and the country where their institution was based.
For authorship data on all the methodology reports and the special reports published before the fifth assessment cycle, Carbon Brief manually extracted information from the report pdfs, which were accessed on the IPCC archive.
In many early reports, only the initials were given for authors’ first names. In these instances, Carbon Brief used internet searches or a ChatGPT-based tool to find first names. If ChatGPT provided a name, Carbon Brief double-checked its accuracy with internet searches.
Similarly, Carbon Brief used internet searches and ChatGPT to suggest the most likely gender of the authors based on the information available. In some instances, it was not possible to find the authors’ first name or gender and so gender was recorded as “unknown” in the analysis.
Carbon Brief recognises that gender is not best categorised using a binary “male” or “female” label and appreciates that the methods used of determining author gender could result in inaccuracies. However, for the purpose of this analysis, this method was deemed suitable.
As many results were recorded manually, or with the use of artificial intelligence, Carbon Brief acknowledges the possibility of human error. Authorship data collected from earlier reports are more likely to contain these errors. However, the large sample size of more than 5,600 authors in total may mitigate the effect of any such inaccuracies on the overall trends identified.
The post IPCC’s special report on cities is its first with majority-women authorship team appeared first on Carbon Brief.
IPCC’s special report on cities is its first with majority-women authorship team
Climate Change
DeBriefed 15 August 2025: Raging wildfires; Xi’s priorities; Factchecking the Trump climate report
Welcome to Carbon Brief’s DeBriefed.
An essential guide to the week’s key developments relating to climate change.
This week
Blazing heat hits Europe
FANNING THE FLAMES: Wildfires “fanned by a heatwave and strong winds” caused havoc across southern Europe, Reuters reported. It added: “Fire has affected nearly 440,000 hectares (1,700 square miles) in the eurozone so far in 2025, double the average for the same period of the year since 2006.” Extreme heat is “breaking temperature records across Europe”, the Guardian said, with several countries reporting readings of around 40C.
HUMAN TOLL: At least three people have died in the wildfires erupting across Spain, Turkey and Albania, France24 said, adding that the fires have “displaced thousands in Greece and Albania”. Le Monde reported that a child in Italy “died of heatstroke”, while thousands were evacuated from Spain and firefighters “battled three large wildfires” in Portugal.
UK WILDFIRE RISK: The UK saw temperatures as high as 33.4C this week as England “entered its fourth heatwave”, BBC News said. The high heat is causing “nationally significant” water shortfalls, it added, “hitting farms, damaging wildlife and increasing wildfires”. The Daily Mirror noted that these conditions “could last until mid-autumn”. Scientists warn the UK faces possible “firewaves” due to climate change, BBC News also reported.
Around the world
- GRID PRESSURES: Iraq suffered a “near nationwide blackout” as elevated power demand – due to extreme temperatures of around 50C – triggered a transmission line failure, Bloomberg reported.
- ‘DIRE’ DOWN UNDER: The Australian government is keeping a climate risk assessment that contains “dire” implications for the continent “under wraps”, the Australian Financial Review said.
- EXTREME RAINFALL: Mexico City is “seeing one of its heaviest rainy seasons in years”, the Washington Post said. Downpours in the Japanese island of Kyushu “caused flooding and mudslides”, according to Politico. In Kashmir, flash floods killed 56 and left “scores missing”, the Associated Press said.
- SOUTH-SOUTH COOPERATION: China and Brazil agreed to “ensure the success” of COP30 in a recent phone call, Chinese state news agency Xinhua reported.
- PLASTIC ‘DEADLOCK’: Talks on a plastic pollution treaty have failed again at a summit in Geneva, according to the Guardian, with countries “deadlocked” on whether it should include “curbs on production and toxic chemicals”.
15
The number of times by which the most ethnically-diverse areas in England are more likely to experience extreme heat than its “least diverse” areas, according to new analysis by Carbon Brief.
Latest climate research
- As many as 13 minerals critical for low-carbon energy may face shortages under 2C pathways | Nature Climate Change
- A “scoping review” examined the impact of climate change on poor sexual and reproductive health and rights in sub-Saharan Africa | PLOS One
- A UK university cut the carbon footprint of its weekly canteen menu by 31% “without students noticing” | Nature Food
(For more, see Carbon Brief’s in-depth daily summaries of the top climate news stories on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.)
Captured
Factchecking Trump’s climate report
A report commissioned by the US government to justify rolling back climate regulations contains “at least 100 false or misleading statements”, according to a Carbon Brief factcheck involving dozens of leading climate scientists. The report, compiled in two months by five hand-picked researchers, inaccurately claims that “CO2-induced warming might be less damaging economically than commonly believed” and misleadingly states that “excessively aggressive [emissions] mitigation policies could prove more detrimental than beneficial”80
Spotlight
Does Xi Jinping care about climate change?
This week, Carbon Brief unpacks new research on Chinese president Xi Jinping’s policy priorities.
On this day in 2005, Xi Jinping, a local official in eastern China, made an unplanned speech when touring a small village – a rare occurrence in China’s highly-choreographed political culture.
In it, he observed that “lucid waters and lush mountains are mountains of silver and gold” – that is, the environment cannot be sacrificed for the sake of growth.
(The full text of the speech is not available, although Xi discussed the concept in a brief newspaper column – see below – a few days later.)
In a time where most government officials were laser-focused on delivering economic growth, this message was highly unusual.
Forward-thinking on environment
As a local official in the early 2000s, Xi endorsed the concept of “green GDP”, which integrates the value of natural resources and the environment into GDP calculations.
He also penned a regular newspaper column, 22 of which discussed environmental protection – although “climate change” was never mentioned.
This focus carried over to China’s national agenda when Xi became president.
New research from the Asia Society Policy Institute tracked policies in which Xi is reported by state media to have “personally” taken action.
It found that environmental protection is one of six topics in which he is often said to have directly steered policymaking.
Such policies include guidelines to build a “Beautiful China”, the creation of an environmental protection inspection team and the “three-north shelterbelt” afforestation programme.
“It’s important to know what Xi’s priorities are because the top leader wields outsized influence in the Chinese political system,” Neil Thomas, Asia Society Policy Institute fellow and report co-author, told Carbon Brief.
Local policymakers are “more likely” to invest resources in addressing policies they know have Xi’s attention, to increase their chances for promotion, he added.
What about climate and energy?
However, the research noted, climate and energy policies have not been publicised as bearing Xi’s personal touch.
“I think Xi prioritises environmental protection more than climate change because reducing pollution is an issue of social stability,” Thomas said, noting that “smoggy skies and polluted rivers” were more visible and more likely to trigger civil society pushback than gradual temperature increases.
The paper also said topics might not be linked to Xi personally when they are “too technical” or “politically sensitive”.
For example, Xi’s landmark decision for China to achieve carbon neutrality by 2060 is widely reported as having only been made after climate modelling – facilitated by former climate envoy Xie Zhenhua – showed that this goal was achievable.
Prior to this, Xi had never spoken publicly about carbon neutrality.
Prof Alex Wang, a University of California, Los Angeles professor of law not involved in the research, noted that emphasising Xi’s personal attention may signal “top” political priorities, but not necessarily Xi’s “personal interests”.
By not emphasising climate, he said, Xi may be trying to avoid “pushing the system to overprioritise climate to the exclusion of the other priorities”.
There are other ways to know where climate ranks on the policy agenda, Thomas noted:
“Climate watchers should look at what Xi says, what Xi does and what policies Xi authorises in the name of the ‘central committee’. Is Xi talking more about climate? Is Xi establishing institutions and convening meetings that focus on climate? Is climate becoming a more prominent theme in top-level documents?”
Watch, read, listen
TRUMP EFFECT: The Columbia Energy Exchange podcast examined how pressure from US tariffs could affect India’s clean energy transition.
NAMIBIAN ‘DESTRUCTION’: The National Observer investigated the failure to address “human rights abuses and environmental destruction” claims against a Canadian oil company in Namibia.
‘RED AI’: The Network for the Digital Economy and the Environment studied the state of current research on “Red AI”, or the “negative environmental implications of AI”.
Coming up
- 17 August: Bolivian general elections
- 18-29 August: Preparatory talks on the entry into force of the “High Seas Treaty”, New York
- 18-22 August: Y20 Summit, Johannesburg
- 21 August: Advancing the “Africa clean air programme” through Africa-Asia collaboration, Yokohama
Pick of the jobs
- Lancaster Environment Centre, senior research associate: JUST Centre | Salary: £39,355-£45,413. Location: Lancaster, UK
- Environmental Justice Foundation, communications and media officer, Francophone Africa | Salary: XOF600,000-XOF800,000. Location: Dakar, Senegal
- Politico, energy & climate editor | Salary: Unknown. Location: Brussels, Belgium
- EnviroCatalysts, meteorologist | Salary: Unknown. Location: New Delhi, India
DeBriefed is edited by Daisy Dunne. Please send any tips or feedback to debriefed@carbonbrief.org.
This is an online version of Carbon Brief’s weekly DeBriefed email newsletter. Subscribe for free here.
The post DeBriefed 15 August 2025: Raging wildfires; Xi’s priorities; Factchecking the Trump climate report appeared first on Carbon Brief.
DeBriefed 15 August 2025: Raging wildfires; Xi’s priorities; Factchecking the Trump climate report
Climate Change
New York Already Denied Permits to These Gas Pipelines. Under Trump, They Could Get Greenlit
The specter of a “gas-for-wind” compromise between the governor and the White House is drawing the ire of residents as a deadline looms.
Hundreds of New Yorkers rallied against new natural gas pipelines in their state as a deadline loomed for the public to comment on a revived proposal to expand the gas pipeline that supplies downstate New York.
New York Already Denied Permits to These Gas Pipelines. Under Trump, They Could Get Greenlit
A “critical assessment” report commissioned by the Trump administration to justify a rollback of US climate regulations contains at least 100 false or misleading statements, according to a Carbon Brief factcheck involving dozens of leading climate scientists.
The report – “A critical review of impacts of greenhouse gas emissions on the US climate” – was published by the US Department of Energy (DoE) on 23 July, just days before the government laid out plans to revoke a scientific finding used as the legal basis for emissions regulation.
The executive summary of the controversial report inaccurately claims that “CO2-induced warming might be less damaging economically than commonly believed”.
It also states misleadingly that “excessively aggressive [emissions] mitigation policies could prove more detrimental than beneficial”.
Compiled in just two months by five “independent” researchers hand-selected by the climate-sceptic US secretary of energy Chris Wright, the document has sparked fierce criticism from climate scientists, who have pointed to factual errors, misrepresentation of research, messy citations and the cherry-picking of data.
Experts have also noted the authors’ track record of promoting views at odds with the mainstream understanding of climate science.
Wright’s department claims the report – which is currently open to public comment as part of a 30-day review – underwent an “internal peer-review period amongst [the] DoE’s scientific research community”.
The report is designed to provide a scientific underpinning to one flank of the Trump administration’s plans to rescind a finding that serves as the legal prerequisite for federal emissions regulation. (The second flank is about legal authority to regulate emissions.)
The “endangerment finding” – enacted by the Obama administration in 2009 – states that six greenhouse gases are contributing to the net-negative impacts of climate change and, thus, put the public in danger.
In a press release on 29 July, the US Environmental Protection Agency said “updated studies and information” set out in the new report would “challenge the assumptions” of the 2009 finding.
Carbon Brief asked a wide range of climate scientists, including those cited in the “critical review” itself, to factcheck the report’s various claims and statements.
The post Factcheck: Trump’s climate report includes more than 100 false or misleading claims appeared first on Carbon Brief.
https://www.carbonbrief.org/factcheck-trumps-climate-report-includes-more-than-100-false-or-misleading-claims/
-
Climate Change2 years ago
Spanish-language misinformation on renewable energy spreads online, report shows
-
Climate Change Videos2 years ago
The toxic gas flares fuelling Nigeria’s climate change – BBC News
-
Greenhouse Gases1 year ago嘉宾来稿：满足中国增长的用电需求 光伏加储能“比新建煤电更实惠”
-
Climate Change1 year ago嘉宾来稿：满足中国增长的用电需求 光伏加储能“比新建煤电更实惠”
-
Carbon Footprint1 year agoUS SEC’s Climate Disclosure Rules Spur Renewed Interest in Carbon Credits
-
Climate Change2 years ago
Why airlines are perfect targets for anti-greenwashing legal action
-
Renewable Energy2 months ago
US Grid Strain, Possible Allete Sale
-
Climate Change2 years ago
Some firms unaware of England’s new single-use plastic ban