Glossary C

Glossary of acronyms and specialised terms on the IPCC-DDC website.
The definitions shown here are from the IPCC Fifth Assessment Report (AR5) working group glossaries: WGI, WGII and WGIII. The source working group is indicated on each definition.

A | B | C | D | E | F-G | H-I | J-K | L-M | N-O | P-Q | R | S | T | U-V | W-Z

Capacity Building

The practice of enhancing the strengths and attributes of, and resources available to, an individual, community, society, or organisation to respond to change. WGII

Carbon dioxode (CO₂)

CO₂ is a naturally occurring gas, also a by-product of burning fossil fuels from fossil carbon deposits, such as oil, gas and coal, of burning biomass and of land use changes and of industrial processes (e.g., cement production). It is the principal anthropogenic greenhouse gas (GHG) that affects the Earth's radiative balance. It is the reference gas against which other greenhouse gases are measured and therefore has a Global Warming Potential of 1. WGIII

CGE

Consultative Group of Experts

CIESIN

Centre for International Earth Science Information Network

CISL

Computational Information Systems Laboratory

Climate

Climate in a narrow sense is usually defined as the average weather, or more rigorously, as the statistical description in terms of the mean and variability of relevant quantities over a period of time ranging from months to thousands or millions of years. The classical period for averaging these variables is 30 years, as defined by the World Meteorological Organization. The relevant quantities are most often surface variables such as temperature, precipitation and wind. Climate in a wider sense is the state, including a statistical description, of the climate system. WGIII

Climate Change

Climate change refers to a change in the state of the climate that can be identified (e.g., by using statistical tests) by changes in the mean and/or the variability of its properties, and that persists for an extended period, typically decades or longer. Climate change may be due to natural internal processes or external forcings such as modulations of the solar cycles, volcanic eruptions and persistent anthropogenic changes in the composition of the atmosphere or in land use. Note that the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), in its Article 1, defines climate change as: 'a change of climate which is attributed directly or indirectly to human activity that alters the composition of the global atmosphere and which is in addition to natural climate variability observed over comparable time periods'. The UNFCCC thus makes a distinction between climate change attributable to human activities altering the atmospheric composition, and climate variability attributable to natural causes. WGIII

Climate Change Commitment

Due to the thermal inertia of the ocean and slow processes in the cryosphere and land surfaces, the climate would continue to change even if the atmospheric composition were held fixed at today's values. Past change in atmospheric composition leads to a committed climate change, which continues for as long as a radiative imbalance persists and until all components of the climate system have adjusted to a new state. The further change in temperature after the composition of the atmosphere is held constant is referred to as the constant composition temperature commitment or simply committed warming or warming commitment. Climate change commitment includes other future changes, for example in the hydrological cycle, in extreme weather events, in extreme climate events, and in sea level change. The constant emission commitment is the committed climate change that would result from keeping anthropogenic emissions constant and the zero emission commitment is the climate change commitment when emissions are set to zero. WGIII

Climate Impact

See Impact Assessment

Climate Model (spectrum or hierarchy)

A numerical representation of the climate system based on the physical, chemical, and biological properties of its components, their interactions and feedback processes, and accounting for all or some of its known properties. The climate system can be represented by models of varying complexity, that is, for any one component or combination of components a spectrum or hierarchy of models can be identified, differing in such aspects as the number of spatial dimensions, the extent to which physical, chemical, or biological processes are explicitly represented, or the level at which empirical parameterisations are involved. Coupled Atmosphere-Ocean General Circulation Models (AOGCMs) provide a comprehensive representation of the climate system that is near or at the most comprehensive end of the spectrum currently available. There is an evolution towards more complex models with interactive chemistry and biology. Climate models are applied, as a research tool, to study and simulate the climate, and for operational purposes, including monthly, seasonal, and interannual climate predictions. WGIII

Climate Prediction

A climate prediction or climate forecast is the result of an attempt to produce (starting from a particular state of the climate system) an estimate of the actual evolution of the climate in the future, for example, at seasonal, interannual or long-term time scales. Because the future evolution of the climate system may be highly sensitive to initial conditions, such predictions are usually probabilistic in nature. WGIII

Climate Projection

A climate projection is the simulated response of the climate system to a scenario of future emission or concentration of greenhouse gases (GHGs) and aerosols, generally derived using climate models. Climate projections are distinguished from climate predictions in order to emphasize that climate projections depend upon the emission/concentration/radiative forcing scenario used, which are based on assumptions concerning, for example, future socioeconomic and technological developments that may or may not be realised. WGIII

Climate Scenario

A plausible and often simplified representation of the future climate, based on an internally consistent set of climatological relationships that has been constructed for explicit use in investigating the potential consequences of anthropogenic climate change, often serving as input to impact models. Climate projections often serve as the raw material for constructing climate scenarios, but climate scenarios usually require additional information such as about the observed current climate. WGIII

Climate System

The climate system is the highly complex system consisting of five major components: the atmosphere, the hydrosphere, the cryosphere, the lithosphere and the biosphere, and the interactions between them. The climate system evolves in time under the influence of its own internal dynamics and because of external forcings such as volcanic eruptions, solar variations and anthropogenic forcings such as the changing composition of the atmosphere and land use change. WGIII

Control Run

A model run carried out to provide a baseline for comparison with climate-change experiments. The control run uses constant values for the radiative forcing due to greenhouse gases and anthropogenic aerosols appropriate to pre-industrial conditions. WGI (AR4)

CORDEX

Coordinated Regional Climate Downscaling Experiment

CMIP

Coupled Model Intercomparison Project

CMIP5

Fifth Coupled Model Intercomparison Project

CRU

Climatic Research Unit

CSV

Comma Separated Values. CSV files store tabular data in plain-text form.