Sustained observations of the global climate system are essential for understanding, predicting, mitigating and adapting to climate change. GCOS has been responsible since 1992 to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) for ensuring a sustained, long-term and reliable system for monitoring the global climate. An important aspect of this is the definition of Essential Climate Variables (ECVs), which are critical to our understanding of the climate and that support the work of the UNFCCC and the IPCC, as well as many other international organisations and programmes.

The first conference with the title Global Climate Observation: the Road to the Future was held on 2-4 March 2016 at the Royal Academy of Arts and Sciences, Amsterdam. The conference gave the opportunity to producers and users of climate observations and other stakeholders to discuss the current monitoring of the Essential Climate Variables (ECVs) and to highlight possible new areas where use of the ECVs would be beneficial. These discussions provided a key input into the GCOS Implementation Plan 2016.

The second GCOS Climate Observation Conference, held on 17-19 October 2022 in Darmstadt, Germany, focused on activities and solutions to help achieving a fully implemented, sustainable, and fit for purpose global observing system for climate, taking also in account the recent publication of the GCOS Implementation Plan 2022. The Conference provided the occasion to celebrate GCOS 30^th Anniversary and take stock of the progress achieved by the global observing community in the last three decades. With roughly 100 talks and 100 poster contributions, it brought together 140 participants onsite and 400 online participants.

Please find further information on the 2^nd GCOS conference website.