Today's children are the first generation born into a climate changed Earth

Small children are the most vulnerable to all climate change impacts 1. At present and   2. Throughout their lives 

Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)

A review of all IPCC policy approved assessments and reports reveals a shocking absence of attention to children.

There is no Special IPCC Report on children

The IPPC, for the past 5 years, by formal statements at the UN climate conferences (COPs), have called for the immediate rapid decline of global emissions, as in the 2022 6th IPCC Assessment.

Without the immediate global emissions decline, 2°C, as well as 1.5°C with be exceeded and by 2050

Keynote address by the IPCC Chair Hoesung Lee at the ceremonial opening of COP26 Glasgow (31 October 2021)

"Global warming of 1.5°C and 2°C will be exceeded during this century unless immediate, rapid, and large-scale reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, especially of carbon dioxide and methane, occur in the nearest future".

Remarks by IPCC Chair during the Opening ceremony COP28 (30 November 2023 by the new IPCC  Chair Jim Skea)

"Without immediate and deep emissions reductions across all sectors, we will not meet the goals of the Paris Agreement".

IPCC Climate change assessments and special reports (from 1990 1st Assessment)

Assessments produce Summaries For Policy Makers (SPMs), that are condensed from comprehensive long scientists' reports.

The SPMs are scrutinized for approval and publication by Panel policy makers of all governments

Below is from the SPMs

Most recent IPCC 2018 1.5°C Special Report  IPCC 6th Assessment   (AR6, 2021)

The IPCC 1.5°C Report made the climate emergency clear, but no mention of children.

AR6 There are three assessment Working Groups are  WG1:Science, WG2 Impacts Vulnerability, WG3 Mitigation

In the 6th Assessment 

WG3 Mitigation: No specific mention of Children  

WG1 Science: No specific mention of childen . A serious exclusion of children who are vulnerable by their anatomy and physiology

WG2 Impacts Vulnerability       

There are only two mentions of children,

1. as  being particularly impacted by extreme weather and 2. having climate change anxiety and stress  

The WG2 covers risk, but there is no mention of children in the risk sections, including the Reason For Concern 

Headline Statements do not not include children 

The previous IPCC assessments

1990 1st Assessment  

No mention of children

1995 Second Assessment

No mention of children

Overall children the risks and impacts of children, who are most vulnerable to all climate change impacts, are not represented in the IPCC Assessments. 

Final Synthesis Report has one important image that applies

to children- warming and impacts over life-time, which offers

some compensation for absence in the working groups. 

It states Adverse impacts from human caused climate change

will continue to intensity and it points out global warming

will continue after 2100. 

The Synthesis very last paragraph C.1.3

mentions future generations

Continued emissions

will further affect all major climate system components,

and many changes  will be irreversible on

centennial to millennial time scales 
and become larger with increasing warming.

Without urgent, effective, and equitable mitigation 
 and adaptation actions, climate change increasingly threatens 

ecosystems, biodiversity and the livelihoods
health and well-being of current and future generations. 

There is a detailed important children coverage in a Working Group 2 FAQ

The FAQs are designed to help the public but they are not government approved, so won't affect policy 

 FAQ. 3.  How will climate change affect the lives of today’s children tomorrow, if no immediate action is taken?

(Note the IPCC refers here to the AR6 finding that the 1.5°C and 2°C limits require immediate rapid decline of global emissions)

..., today’s children and future generations are more likely to be exposed and vulnerable to climate change and related risks such as flooding, heat stress, water scarcity, poverty, and hunger.

...Children are amongst those suffering the most, as we see today.

But what is our children’s future going to look like, if we do not limit global warming to well below 2°C, preferably to 1.5°C?

Its (climate change) impacts will intensify in the coming decades with profound implications for all aspects of human life around the world. Our food and water supplies, our cities, infrastructure and economies as well as our health and well-being will be affected.

For example: children aged ten or younger in the year 2020 are projected to experience a nearly four-fold increase in extreme events under 1.5°C of global warming by 2100, and a five-fold increase under 3°C warming.

(Note: As governments have taken no mitigation action, the world will be at globally disastrous 1.5°C around 2030. 

and one billion children will at ‘extremely high risk’ of the impacts of the climate crisis (UNICEF, Child centred risk index, 2021)

That means a billion children will soon suffer large increases in major health impairments including death from climate change.

A billion children have an 'unlivable future', to quote the IPCC AR6

The IPCC says that a 2°C warming will be by 2050, which will be devastating and deady to several billion children in 2050

         (This is because there is no prospect of government action avoid 2°C by 2050)  

IPCC