IPCC Selects New Leader

The United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change elected Dr. Hoesung Lee as its new chairman at its meeting in Dubrovnik, Croatia, this week. Dr. Lee, who is currently one of the IPCC’s three vice chairmen, defeated five other candidates. Dr. Lee replaces two-term IPCC Chairman Rajendra K. Pachauri, who resigned in disgrace in February.

Dr. Lee is professor of the economics of climate change, energy, and sustainable development at Korea University. In an informative interview with the Carbon Brief, he said, “If you ask me to choose the most important work in climate change issues, then I'll choose carbon price. That's because it is the driver to put us into the right track.”

In his nomination papers, Dr. Lee wrote that his vision for the IPCC was to “enhance participation of developing country experts,” “increase policy relevance and neutrality,” and to “pay special attention to climate change issues associated with job creation, health, innovation and technology development, energy access and poverty alleviation.”

The IPCC also elected three vice chairs: Ko Barrett from the U.S., Thelma Krug from Brazil, and Youba Sokona from Mali. It also elected co-chairs and vice chairs for the three Working Groups for the sixth Assessment Report. Co-chairing WG I will be Valerie Masson-Delmotte from France and Panmao Zhai from China. Co-chairing WG II will be Hans-Otto Portner from Germany and Debra Roberts from South Africa. And co-chairing WG III will be Priyadarshi R. Shukla from India and Jim Skea from the U.K. A list of all officials elected by the IPCC can be found here

This piece was originally published in the Cooler Heads Digest. You may subscribe to the weekly digest at GlobalWarming.org