ipcc turns to secrecy to suppress information.

From: IPCC WGI TSU On Behalf Of Pauline Midgley
Sent: January-24-12 8:54 AM
To: Stephen McIntyre
Cc: ‘IPCC WGI TSU’
Subject: WGI AR5 FOD

Dear Mr McIntyre,

In a recent thread on the blog that you host, Climate Audit, you quote text and a figure directly from the WGI AR5 First Order Draft. We would remind you that each page of this document is clearly marked “Do not cite, quote or distribute”. Therefore, we kindly request you to remove this text and figure from your blog and refrain from such actions, which do not respect the terms of the IPCC review process.

Scientific comments and criticisms on the WGI AR5 FOD are encouraged and welcomed from experts in the topics being assessed. In order for the authors of the chapters to take into account, and respond to, these comments in drafting the Second Order Draft, they must be made through the appropriate channel. This requires registration as an expert reviewer and uploading the review comments on the WGI AR5 FOD before 10 February 2012.

Please refer to the WGI web site for more information about the WGI AR5 FOD review: https://fod.ipcc.unibe.ch/registration.

All review comments and the author responses will be published on an IPCC web site as soon as possible following the completion of the WGI AR5. For more information about the AR5 review in general, please see the IPCC web site: http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/ar5/review_of_wg_contributions.pdf.

As mentioned in our email to you of 16 December 2011, in order to have access to the Chapters and to submit review comments for consideration by the authors, all prospective expert reviewers of the WGI AR5 FOD are required to agree to the terms of the review, which specify that all materials provided for the review, including the chapter drafts, are considered confidential and shall not be cited, quoted or distributed. This is the standard IPCC practice in the preparation of its reports.

Thank you for your cooperation.

Yours sincerely,

IPCC WG1 TSU






Dear Ms Midgley,

This is to acknowledge your email of January 24, 2012 in which you “kindly requested” that I remove a discussion of IPCC from Climate Audit. In order for me to properly consider your request, I would appreciate it if you would clarify the legal basis, if any, of this request.

For many years, IPCC policies have stated that the review process should be “open” and “transparent” and my comments were very much in that spirit.

The recent review of IPCC policies and procedures by the InterAcademy Council did not contain any recommendations that the review process be less open or less transparent. I realize that Thomas Stocker, following suggestions of Phil Jones, sought changes to IPCC policies to authorize confidentiality, rather than openness, and that the minutes of the IPCC plenary session in Abu Dhabi state that the following language was approved:

IPCC considers its draft reports, prior to acceptance, to be pre-decisional, provided in confidence to reviewers, and not for public distribution, quotation or citation.

However, this change was deceptively included in a package described as “addressing” IAC recommendations, even though this language had nothing to do with IAC recommendations, but was designed to implement changes sought by Phil Jones and Thomas Stocker long before the IAC review. (See discussion at Climate Audit entitled Stocker’s Earmarks http://climateaudit.org/2012/01/12/stockers-earmarks/ .) Because IPCC officials seem to have misled the IPCC plenary session on the purpose of this language, it seems to me that you lack any moral authority to insist that reviewers comply with your request.

Nor am I aware of any legal authority or case law under Canadian or international law that entitles you to require me to remove the discussion at Climate Audit. Although I registered as a reviewer of the First Draft, I have not downloaded any documents from IPCC in that capacity and did not agree to any confidentiality terms in order to download documents. Nor do I intend to agree to any confidentiality terms as a condition of downloading.

Nor, as I understand matters, does IPCC’s adoption of the resolution saying that “IPCC considers its draft reports, prior to acceptance, to be pre-decisional, provided in confidence to reviewers, and not for public distribution, quotation or citation” create an obligation under Canadian or international law that requires me to comply with your request to remove discussion of IPCC drafts from Climate Audit.

It is my understanding that your email only asked politely that I remove the discussion and did not constitute a formal legal demand that I do so. Unless I am obligated under either Canadian or international law to remove the discussion from Climate Audit, I would prefer not to remove the discussion.

If I am incorrect in my interpretation of your email and it is your view that I am obligated under either Canadian or international law to comply with your request, I would appreciate it if you would explain the basis of your legal theory. I will promptly consider your explanation. Please do not consider this email as an unconditional refusal of your request, but an invitation to you to explain the legal basis of your request under Canadian or international law so that I can take the matter up with my own legal counsel.

While I understand that you are not obliged to take notice of articles posted at Climate Audit, I am very familiar with issues involved in proxy reconstructions. My hope is that the discussion at Climate Audit will contribute to a better understanding of proxy reconstructions, even by IPCC contributors. As I understand it, there are no IPCC rules that prohibit IPCC contributors from taking note of articles at Climate Audit nor any authority for you to discourage IPCC contributors from doing so, should they be so inclined.

Regards,
Stephen McIntyre






If you have the remaining ZOD files and will share them, or know where I can obtain them, please write me. Confidentiality guaranteed.

To learn more about IPCC's attempt to suppress publication of the ZODs after they were leaked, see Peter Morcombe's page at Galloping Camel and Steve McIntyre at Climate Audit. For background see Bishop Hill.

Note that the IPCC's "Principles Governing IPCC Work" says,

"2. The role of the IPCC is to assess on a comprehensive, objective, open and transparent basis the scientific, technical and socio-economic information relevant to understanding the scientific basis of risk of human-induced climate change, its potential impacts and options for adaptation and mitigation."

(emphasis mine). More here.

David Appell, independent science journalist


http://www.davidappell.com/ZODS/