* Jean-Claude Duplessy was one of the lead authors of the "paleoclimatology" chapter of the report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which was published in 2007.
* His mission was to coordinate the activities of some twenty scientists from the international community with the objective of showing how the study of ancient climates makes it possible to better understand the mechanisms that could come into play in a world whose climate is disrupted by greenhouse gas and dust emissions. He was co-recipient, with his IPCC colleagues, of the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize in this capacity.
* He has been a member of the French Academy of Sciences since 2011 in the "Sciences of the Universe" section.
* He is a member of the European Academy of Sciences, Academia europaea since 1989
* Winner of the Aimé Berthé Prize of the Academy of Sciences (1987)
* Milankovitch Medal of the EGS (1995).
* Winner of the Georges Lemaître Prize of the Catholic University of Louvain (1997)
* Dr Honoris Causa from the University of Kiel, Germany (2003).
* Grand Prix Louis D of the Institut de France 2004.
* Prestwich Prize of the French Geological Society 2004.
* Grand Prix Dolomieu of BRGM awarded by the Academy of Sciences in 2004.