Paul Kovacs named lead author for IPCC climate change report

Paul Kovacs, executive director of the Institute for Catastrophic Loss Reduction (ICLR), has been chosen as a lead author of an Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report.
Specifically, Kovacs will serve as lead author of Chapter 26, North America, of the Working Group II contribution to the IPCC’s Fifth Assessment Report (AR5).
The appointment is the first step in a four-year drafting process, scheduled for completion in 2014.
More than 1,200 people were nominated for the 311 available coordinating lead author, lead author and review editor positions.
Candidates underwent a thorough review. IPCC sought input from observer organization representatives and senior leaders in climate science.
“Author teams were carefully constructed over a long series of teleconferences and in-person meetings, with attention to scientific qualifications, the needed range of institutional and disciplinary perspective, and adequate regional and gender balance, while also involving the next generation of climate scientists,” information from the IPCC says.
Kovacs has been involved with the IPCC for a number of years. He served as a lead author of Chapter 14 of the Fourth Assessment Report, published in 2007.