Introduction to the Report

Global Climate Change Impacts in the United States is unique among recent climate change assessments in many regards. For example, the author team worked very hard to make the report easily assessable to the general public by trying to keep it free of terms lay readers might not understand, even important terms such as statistically significant at the 5% level. Therefore, to better understand the following set of presentations, it is helpful to know the report's background. This presentation will not only describe the target audience and style used in the report, but also the process of creating it which included extensive public and peer review, what the report is, who called for it, who wrote it, who approved it, what its sources are, whether the report deals with options for responding to climate change, how the report deals with incomplete scientific understanding, who should be using the report, and lastly feedback the author team has received from people who are already using the report.