Chapter_Zero_Climate_Change_2022_Impacts_Adaptation_and_Vulnerability
29 Mar 2023

What the IPCC report means for non-executive directors

The IPCC Sixth Assessment Report containing the latest scientific knowledge on climate change has been completed. Here are the key takeaways for NEDs.

The UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has completed its Sixth Assessment Report (AR6). With the IPCC's next report expected around 2030, this is likely to be its last assessment report published in this critical decade for climate action.

As part of AR6, four important reports containing the latest scientific knowledge on climate change have been released since August 2021, with the last in March 2023.

Here are the key takeaways are for NEDs:

Report

March 2023: Synthesis Report

Read the summary for NEDs
  1. Limiting global warming to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels is still achievable but requires immediate, rapid, and large-scale reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.
    • Board directors play an important role in ensuring the organisations they represent set, and deliver upon, ambitious climate targets and transition plans.
  2. The report provides unequivocal evidence of the link between human activity and global warming. It highlights the devastating risks and impacts for people and nature, including material risks for business.
    • Board directors should consider these risks and impacts for the businesses (and broader value chains) they oversee, disclose the findings, and put in place appropriate measures to address them.
  3. The cost of inaction is likely to be much higher than the cost of action to limit warming to 1.5°C in the medium to long-term.
    • Bold climate leadership today, both to reduce emissions and adapt to the impacts of climate change, will serve long-term business interest.

How choices made in the near term could affect future generations. Source: IPCC, 2023. Synthesis Report of the Sixth Assessment Report, Figure SPM.1, p.7Shape

Report

April 2022: Mitigation of Climate Change

This report focused on mitigating climate change by reducing greenhouse gas emissions – the central part of any organisation’s climate policy.

Read the summary for NEDs
Report

February 2022: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability

This report concluded that the impacts of climate change are severe, but that humanity can still avoid many of them if it seizes “a brief and rapidly closing window of opportunity”.

Read the summary for NEDs
Report

August 2021: The Physical Science Basis

This report showed that human activity is unequivocally driving changes to the climate at an unprecedented scale. The science indicates there is still time to limit temperature rises, but only if we act now, and with ambition.

Read the summary for NEDs

Related Content

Collaboration with Centre for Climate Engagement
Explainer | 17 Nov 2023

UK Climate Policy Briefing - November 2023

Our UK policy briefing aims to highlight the latest developments in UK climate policy directly relevant to NEDs. Since our last briefing. there have been significant developments in the climate policy landscape, most notably the Climate Change Committee’s 2023 Progress Report to Parliament and the recent government U-turn on a number of key net zero targets. Although this has generated much discussion among the business community, particularly around contributing to investment uncertainty, other key initiatives such as those on corporate disclosure and transition planning, continue at pace.

External Link
Blog | 27 Sep 2023

Understand the Requirements of this First Set of European Sustainability Reporting Standards

Mark Vaessen, KPMG Partner in The Netherlands, looks at key features of the final European Sustainability Reporting Standards and interoperability with international standard-settings initiatives. From FY24, companies will be required to provide granular sustainability information.

External Link
Blog | 20 Sep 2023

Nature Disclosures will 'Become the Norm'

The final TNFD recommendations were launched at New York Climate Week 2023. Toby Roxburgh, ICAEW’s Sustainability Manager, Nature and Biodiversity, explains what this means and why it matters.