IOCCP lead the marine biogeochemistry element of the Report which includes all climate-relevant observing capabilities in all three domains globally.
This report (360 pages, 5.5 MB) entitled Status of the Global Observing System for Climate responds to an invitation by the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) at the thirty third session of the UNFCCC Subsidiary Body for Scientific and Technological Advice (SBSTA) in Cancún, Mexico, in 2010.
The report has been completed under the overall guidance of the Global Climate Observing System (GCOS) Steering Committee with contributions from several panel members and external experts including IOCCP SSG members and associated experts.
The Report assesses the progress made against the actions set out in the GCOS Implementation Plan for the Global Observing System for Climate in Support of the UNFCCC (IP 2010) and it has been submitted to the UNFCCC secretariat in October 2015 for consideration by the Parties at the 43rd session of SBSTA, to be held in conjunction with the 21st session of the Conference of the Parties, in Paris, France in December
2015.
This Status Report does not provide actions or plans to address gaps, deficiencies or additional requirements that have been identified: this is the role of the new GCOS Implementation Plan being developed for release and submission to the UNFCCC in 2016. IOCCP has a major role to play there as almost revolutionary progress was made in our observational capacity in terms of marine biogeochemistry and strategic utilization of these technological developments needs to be structured and aligned with the rest of global climate observing system.
One way to get involved in this process could be through active participation in conference Global Climate Observation: the Road to the Future which will be held from 2-4 March 2016 at the Royal Academy of Arts and Sciences, Amsterdam, Netherlands to allow producers and users of climate observations and other stakeholders the opportunity to discuss the current monitoring of the Essential Climate Variables (ECVs) and to highlight possible new areas for ECVs. These discussions will provide a key input into the new GCOS Implementation Plan .