Fear Over Diluted Climate Warnings

(BRUSSELS) — An authoritative international global warming conference, already past its deadline for finishing a comprehensive report, lapsed into an unprecedented showdown between scientists and diplomats over authors' concerns that governments were watering down their warnings.

Last-minute negotiations over language continued behind closed doors Friday, less than two hours before the scheduled release of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report in Brussels.

A dramatic dispute between the scientific authors of the report and its diplomatic editors erupted over a paragraph in the 21-page summary regarding how much confidence the scientists have in their findings. The report concerns the effects global warming is already having and will have on life on Earth. The disputed paragraph centers on what has already happened.

The paragraph originally said scientists had "very high confidence" — which means more than 90 percent chance of accuracy — in the statement that many natural systems around the globe "are being affected by regional climate changes, particularly temperature increases."

After days of intensive small group negotiations over this section, delegates from China and Saudi Arabia on Friday insisted that the confidence be reduced to "high confidence" which means more than 80 percent accuracy.

Three top scientists-authors formally objected to the change by the diplomats, including American scientist David Karoly of the University of Oklahoma. The scientists said it was an unprecedented weakening of the scientific confidence that was not raised when the report was circulated the past several months.

In the hurry to get the report finished before 4 a.m. EDT release and press conference, diplomats forced the last-minute removal and altering of parts of the iconic table, which shows the ill effects of warming with each 1.8 degree increase in temperature, scientists and other delegates tell The Associated Press.

A final draft of the report obtained by the AP — written by scientists before government officials edit it — said "roughly 20-30 percent of species are likely to be at high risk of irreversible extinction" if global average temperature rises by 2.7 to 4.5 degrees Fahrenheit.

That part has been "diluted," said retired scientist Ian Burton attending the session on behalf of the Stockholm Environment Institute. Another delegate said the amended version hedged on the sweep of the original text, inserting a reference to species "assessed so far."

Guy Midgley of the National Botanical Institute in South Africa, a lead author of the chapter on ecosystems that includes extinctions, said the changes will be "commensurate with the science."

Another prolonged tussle emerged over whether to include estimated costs of damage from climate change — calculated per ton of carbon dioxide emissions, said the delegates on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.

There is little dispute about the science, although some disagree about their confidence in the research. But the main issue at the Brussels conference is how the report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) will say what it has to say in the most effective possible way — that 120 nations' negotiators can accept.

The key is making it easily understandable, said Oyvind Christophersen, who heads the Norwegian delegation as a senior adviser for climate and energy. "The challenge is how to summarize a big, big report."

The entire final draft report, obtained last week by the AP, has 20 chapters, supplements, two summaries and totals 1,572 pages. This week's wrangling is just over the 21-page summary for policymakers.

It is the second of four reports from the IPCC this year; the first report in February laid out the scientific case for how global warming is happening. This second report is the "so what" report, explaining what the effects of global warming will be.

AP Correspondent Arthur Max contributed to this report.