No: 5009-09/ipcc/srex

To designated IPCC Focal Points and Ministries of Foreign Affairs Sir/Madam, I have the honour to invite you to nominate Co-ordinating Lead Authors, Lead Authors and Review Editors as well as any Expert Reviewers to contribute to the forthcoming “2013 Revised Supplementary Methods and Good Practice Guidance Arising from the Kyoto Protocol”. Following approval by the 35th Session of the IPCC, the IPCC’s Task Force on National Greenhouse Gas Inventories (TFI) will manage this work and aims to complete it by the end of October 2013. The UNFCCC Conference of the Parties serving as the meeting of the Parties to the Kyoto Protocol at its seventh session (CMP7), held in December 2011 in Durban, South Africa, invited the IPCC to review and, if necessary, update supplementary methodologies for estimating anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions by sources and removals by sinks resulting from land use, land-use change and forestry (LULUCF) activities under Article 3, paragraphs 3 and 4, of the Kyoto Protocol (KP), related to the annex to 2/CMP.7, on the basis of, inter alia, Chapter 4 of IPCC’s 2003 Good Practice Guidance for Land Use, Land-Use Change and Forestry (GPG-LULUCF) (decision 2/CMP7). Methodologies contained in Chapter 4 of the GPG-LULUCF provide the link between IPCC’s general greenhouse gas inventory guidance, and reporting requirements under the Kyoto Protocol. There are two main reasons to review and update Chapter 4 of the GPG-LULUCF. Firstly, the methodologies contained in Chapter 4 are based on the reporting requirements for LULUCF under the first commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol. CMP7 agreed rules for LULUCF for the second commitment period under the Kyoto Protocol which differ in some respects significantly from the rules agreed for the first commitment period, implying the need to update. Secondly, since Chapter 4 was intended to be used with the latest IPCC LULUCF guidance, updating is needed to take account of the decision of the CMP to use the 2006 IPCC Guidelines for the purposes of the second commitment period under the Kyoto Protocol. These new rules agreed by CMP7 on LULUCF contain, amongst other things, new provisions on forest management, emissions and removals associated with natural disturbances in forests, harvested wood products, and wetland drainage and rewetting, which are not covered in the existing Chapter 4. In response to this SBSTA invitation, and utilising the contingency funds in the 2012 budget which allowed for this possibility, the TFI held a scoping meeting, 1st – 4th May 2012 at the WMO in Geneva, Switzerland. This meeting produced a draft Terms of Reference (ToR), including a chapter outline and a Work Plan. However, during its 36th session in Bonn, 14th – 25th May 2012, the UNFCCC’s Subsidiary Body on Scientific and Technological Advice (SBSTA) re-considered the timeline in Decision 2/CMP.7 and noted with concern that the timeline would not allow for the methodological guidance to be adopted
in time for the inventory submissions by Parties by 15th April 2015. In view of this concern, SBSTA
invited the IPCC to consider the possibility of completing the work on the methodological guidance
within a revised timeframe, by October 2013, to allow for adoption of a decision on this matter by
the CMP 9 (Nov/Dec 2013).
To meet this new target date, a revised work plan was proposed by the Bureau of the TFI (the TFB),
aiming to finish the work by October 2013.
The IPCC at its 35th Session in Geneva, 6th – 9th June 2012 decided to produce the “2013 Revised
Supplementary Methods and Good Practice Guidance Arising from the Kyoto Protocol” by the
revised target date of October 2013. The panel also agreed to restrict the scope of the work by not
including the original section 4.3 of Chapter 4 of the GPG-LULUCF. The Terms of Reference,
Chapter Outline and Work Plan, as agreed by the IPCC-35, are attached to this letter (Annex 1).
Nominations (preferably electronically) should be made using the form (Annex 2). It is also
downloadable from asks for details of both the experts and
their areas of interest. In addition, please specify if they are willing to act as a Co-ordinating Lead
Author. The IPCC Trust Fund will support travel and subsistence for attendance at the four lead
author meetings and at the Panel, if needed, only for those nominated by developing countries and
countries with economies in transition. Please note that the IPCC cannot support other authors.
This work will require a mixture of knowledge and experience and so the Task Force Bureau will be
looking for authors who have experience on one or more of the following:
• Reporting of emissions and removals for the Kyoto Protocol, particularly under articles 3.3 • Preparation of national greenhouse gas inventories; and • Scientific and technical understanding of emissions and removals of greenhouse gases in the LULUCF/AFOLU sector, wetlands and harvested wood products. The roles and responsibilities of Co-ordinating Lead Authors, Lead Authors, Contributing Authors, Expert Reviewers and Review Editors are given in Appendix A to the IPCC Principles and Procedures (). The IPCC at its 33rd Session has agreed some revisions to these principles and procedures and Appendix A has been updated to reflect these changes. All Authors will be asked to abide by the IPCC procedures. The task of Co-ordinating Lead Authors and Lead Authors is a demanding one. The Co-ordinating Lead Authors and Lead Authors would attend 4 author meetings and selected authors will also attend the IPCC Plenary where the whole document is approved. They would also be expected to draft text and consider review comments on their own time – a significant effort. The role of Review Editors is being strengthened to ensure an unbiased approach and that all comments are considered. However, the time commitment of Review Editors is less than that for Co-ordinating Lead Authors or Lead Authors, but will include attendance at two Author meetings in 2013 to consider the comments from the reviews. Contributing Authors are normally not required to attend any of these meetings. Nominations are also being requested from inter-governmental and non-governmental organisations. Irrespective of such requests, your Government may wish to include experts from academia, industry, environmental organisations and other non-governmental organisations in your nomination(s). All nominations will be provided to the TFB which will select Co-ordinating Lead Authors, Lead Authors and Review Editors. The selection of Contributing Authors will be left to the Co-ordinating Lead Authors and Lead Authors. In the selection process the TFB will consider the nominee’s areas of knowledge and expertise, as described in the nomination form. They will aim for a list of authors that will, as far as possible, provide: • A range of scientific, technical and socio-economic views and expertise; • Geographical representation (ensuring appropriate representation of experts from developing and developed countries and countries with economies in transition); there should be at least one and normally two or more from developing countries (per chapter); A mixture of experts with and without previous experience in IPCC; and The TFB will inform the selected authors and their National Focal Points as soon as possible after selection. The first Lead Author Meeting is currently scheduled to be held late September 2012. All nominations should reach the following contact point no later than 15th July 2012 preferably by email Dr. Simon Eggleston, Head, Technical Support Unit IPCC Task Force on National Greenhouse Gas Inventories c/o Institute for Global Environmental Strategies 2108-11, Kamiyamaguchi, Hayama, Kanagawa, 240-0115 Japan Email: [email protected] Fax We would also like to use this opportunity to point out that, due the compressed time scale for this work, the expert review will last for four weeks and the government/expert review six weeks so the TFB will be preparing for the reviews well in advance. The schedule for these reviews is shown in Table 1 in Annex 1. The TFI will invite all those nominated as expert reviewers to review the first and second order drafts. The TFB will also directly invite experts to review the drafts. A copy of this letter is being sent to the Ministry for Foreign Affairs, the Permanent Representative with the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) Focal Point(s) of your country for information. Annex 1: Terms of Reference, Chapter Outline & Work Plan as approved by IPCC-35 Annex 2: Nomination Form

Source: http://www.cma.gov.cn/2011zwxx/2011ztzgg/201206/P020120621596118200207.pdf