Battle Over IPCC Chair Renews Debate on U.S. Climate Policy

CLIMATE CHANGEWhen scientists from around the world meet next week in Geneva to elect a new chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, IPCC's decade-long success in forging a common position on the science of global warming will be sorely tested. The challenge comes from the U.S. government's decision to back an Indian engineer-economist rather than renominate an American atmospheric chemist. That action sets the stage for an international referendum on the Bush Administration's position on climate change.