A special report is a customized financial report that does not comply with GAAP and serves to provide specific information that is unique to certain users. Such reports are often prepared when a company or organization must comply with reporting provisions of another government regulatory agency (e.g., deferral income tax reporting) or when a company wants to provide different information than what is found in the standard financial statement format.
The role of special reports has evolved from earlier IPCC cycles as they have become more broadly framed not only as a direct channel for responding to requests from the UNFCCC but also to shape and catalyse political debate on specific timely issues deemed relevant to a diverse group of policymakers and social stakeholders. The cyclical nature of assessment processes and the timeliness of special reports entails that the scientific evidence contained in these documents is provisional, but at the same time, it may have lasting political impact, shaping the discourse on emerging policy topics in a particular direction (Section 3).
In some cases, however, this impact could be controversial. For example, when the IPCC commissioned SRREN in 2011, it was embroiled in controversy over allegations of conflicts of interest, with critics arguing that the report gave greater prominence to the most positive scenarios of renewable energy development, thus serving Greenpeace’s agenda (Pearce 2011; Lynas 2023). Such politicization of the IPCC’s work can have a negative effect on the public recognition and acceptance of its findings and should be carefully considered when determining whether to prepare or release a special report.