By Larry Kummer. From the Fabius Maximus website
.
Summary: Volume II of the Fourth National Climate Assessment (NCA) has dominated the news in the weeks since its release. One of the major findings that journalists headlined was the effect of climate change on the US economy. Ten percent is vivid number to grab the attention of Americans still skeptical after thirty years of dire warnings about climate change. Unfortunately it is a dubious story, as explained in these tweets by Roger Pielke Jr.
The National Climate Assessment, a major government change report, concludes that unmitigated global warming could severely harm the American economy, including knocking about 10% from GDP. https://t.co/FeWVidwCrt
— Coral Davenport (@CoralMDavenport) November 23, 2018
Here is an analysis by Roger Pielke Jr. of the new NCA volume and its press coverage, from his tweets. Posted with his permission.
“Here is the NYT front page on 24 November, with Coral Davenport’s NCA story in the top right. It set the subsequent narrative of the NCA around the 10% GDP number, perhaps the least supportable claim in the entire report. The 10% figure should not have been in the report. How did this science communication failure occur?”
“Davenport is an excellent journalist and did not invent the 10% GDP number. I suspect it was promoted to her by someone involved in the report, unnamed in NYT article. I see no evidence that the 10% number was part of U.S. Global Change Research Program’s (USGCRP) promotion of the report.
“Where did the number come from? See this from Chapter 29 of NCA (annotated, legend below).”
“{The} graph shows projections of direct damage to the current U.S. economy for six impact sectors (agriculture, crime, coasts, energy, heat mortality, and labor) as a function of global average temperature change (represented as average for 2080–2099 compared to 1980–2010). …Dot-whiskers indicate the uncertainty in direct damages in 2090 (average of 2080–2099) derived from multiple combinations of climate models and forcing scenarios (dot, median; thick line, inner 66% credible interval; thin line, inner 90%). The gray shaded area represents the 90% confidence interval in the fit (black line) to the damage estimates.”
“Where does that graphic come from? “Estimating economic damage from climate change in the United States” by Solomon Hsiang et al. in Science, 30 June 2017. Same x-axis as in the NCA, but expressed in degrees C. Click to enlarge.
“But oddly, elsewhere the NCA associates RCP 8.5 with only a 4° C temp change. Even the 95th percentile is less than 5.5° C (10° F). See this graph from Chapter 2 of the NCA.”
“So the headline, repeated everywhere 10% GDP number is not consistent with the physical science part of the report and represents a temperature change twice that of the already implausible RCP 8.5 scenario. …Shouldn’t such an outlandish, outlier conclusion been caught in the review process? Not a good look that sole review editor for this chapter is an alum of the Center for American Progress …. Even rudimentary attention to COI {conflict of interest?} would avoided this.”
“Bottom line: If experts are going to demand that they be trusted, their numbers should add up right. They don’t here. One way to ensure robust assessments is to invite in critical voices, rather than exclude them. This error was easily preventable.
“Climate change is real, and aggressive mitigation and adaptation make very good sense. Trump is still wrong. Which makes an error of this magnitude so much the worse.”
Summary
“Such a major assessment needs to be water tight, not a vehicle for stealth advocacy. If I were a contributor to this report I’d be POed at how it has been spun.”
Also, “RCP 8.5 is problematic not because some use it as a ‘worst case’ scenario (reasonable people can disagree on that), but when it is used as a ‘business as usual’ (BAU) scenario, to predict future impacts and ground Community Based Adaptation (CBA). That is a misuse of the scenario. RCP 8.5 as a BAU is implausible, as per the IPCC.
“In the NCA, RCP 8.5 is presented both as an extreme scenario and as the business as usual scenario. This is sloppy, but also a “thumb on the scale” for expressing Integrated Assessment Model (IAM) results for future impacts and benefits of mitigation. That is a shame because justifications for climate policy do not need exaggeration.
“If justifications for climate policy depend upon any scenarios of economic impact to 2100, we are doing it wrong. Effective climate policy must be built upon policies that can be justified on political time scales, that add up to long-term progress.”
See his tweets at @RogerPielkeJr !
————————————
Editor’s afterward
(1) The headline 10% hit to GDP relies on assumption of an 8°C increase from current temperatures. Pielke gives a mild rebuttal to this massive failure in the NCA’s review process. Worse, the NCA authors and mainstream climate scientists remained silent as journalists ran with this number, far beyond anything likely to happen. To mention just one factor, the tech advances required to mine so much fossil fuel (mostly coal) contradicts RCP8.5’s assumption of tech stagnation.
(2) There is another oddity in the NCA. It says “RCP8.5 is generally associated with higher population growth, less technological innovation, and higher carbon intensity of the global energy mix. ….Current trends in annual greenhouse gas emissions, globally, are consistent with RCP8.5.” But the RCP Database shows that current emissions are also consistent with RCP 2.6, which is the best-case scenario used in the IPCC’s Fifth Assessment Report. The emissions trend (through 2016) lies between lines of the two scenarios.
(3) In one of the well-managed physical sciences, Pielke’s note would result in a promptly issued correction. Ditto with some of the comments submitted about the NCA. See them with the official replies. Some are amazing. My favorite is 142019 (top of page 4) by Ross McKitrick (professor of economics at the University of Guelph; see Wikipedia). He catches a sophomore-level error. The reply appears to have been written by a bot.
For more about this subject
“Climate Change Policy: What Do the Models Tell Us?” by Robert S. Pindyck in Journal of Economic Literature, September 2013.
Also see Roger Pielke Jr.’s “Opening Up the Climate Policy Envelope” in Issues, Summer 2018.
“Using RCP 8.5 to project future climate impacts can help us understand a potential worst-case scenario, but using it as a generic business-as-usual scenario thus contributes to the toxic politics of climate policy.”
For More Information
See these posts:
- About RCP8.5: Is our certain fate a coal-burning climate apocalypse? No!
- Manufacturing climate nightmares: misusing science to create horrific predictions.
- Good news from America about climate change, leading the way to success.
- Stratfor gives us good news, showing when renewables will replace fossil fuels.
- Focusing on worst case climate futures doesn’t work. It shouldn’t work.
- Updating the RCPs: The IPCC gives us good news about climate change, but we don’t listen.
- Roger Pielke Jr.: the politics of unlikely climate scenarios.
10% is pretty conservative. If warming continues for 20 years at the natural pace experienced before any changes in CO2 levels, it could be enough to get many of the policies favored by watermelons enacted. That would certainly cause a significant drop in GDP long before 2100.
No kidding Ted. Yesterday, I went ice fishing and it’s been a while since I had done that in November. With a 10% drop in GDP I will have to drill holes by hand instead of my gas powered auger 🙁
What warming? 0.8C in 150 years? Since temperature is a local phenomenon, desert temperatures will not increase through more CO2 because the alarmist theory requires more water vapour to get the extra forcing. There is little water in deserts. Thus global warming cannot happen in deserts. Since most deserts are the hottest places on earth, the increase in any warming has to come from places with water. Okay the tropics are a good example. So even if global warming caused an increase in water vapour forcing which then pushed up the temperatures, how would that affect the tropics? Well in the last 68 years we have only seen a maximum of 0.65C increase despite huge amounts of CO2 emissions. There is no acceleration of temperature increase. So if we continue to get a 0.01 C increase every year that means another 1 C increase in the next 100 years. You can double or triple that and add that to the average tropic temp now of 28C. So in the year 2118, we may have 30C to 31C average in the tropics. So what????????????????????? Nothing will happen. The oceans will not be 3C warmer. Oceans to atmosphere is a net loss of heat NOT the other way around. NOTHING WILL HAPPEN. No species will die because the tropics are 3C warmer. The sea level will not rise because there won’t be massive melting of the galaciers or ice sheets. 8000 – 5000 years ago Greenland lost 20% of its ice mass in 3000 years and it was 5C warmer then. And even that wasnt because it melted from on top. Greenland melts from the bottom. Greenland and Antartica are -20C 10 metres under the top of the ice all year around. A 3C increase wont melt them. So if the tropics are 3C warmer no island will get submerged . Nobody will die of heat prostration. NOTHING WILL HAPPEN. All this assumes that the increased CO2 in the atmosphere actually does cause warming. There is more chance of global cooling than global warming. The lies of climate science boggle the mind.
Alan,
Water vapor and CO2 have overlapping IR absorption features. CO2 has the least effect in humid climates because the IR absorption is saturated. However, in deserts, lacking water, the CO2 can have an observable effect. That is the usual explanation for the Arctic warming twice as fast as the global average. Actually, one observes the mixed effect in place like Phoenix that now has more water vapor present than 50 years ago, and also generates CO2 locally from cars and trucks.
Yes but in deserts, my point was you cannot have the fabled CO2 causing warming thus causing more water vapour thus causing more warming. The missing link in that is the absence of water vapour in a desert atmosphere because there is a lack of water as you put it. I don’t believe that the Arctic is warming twice as fast as the global average but it isn’t a desert anyway. You would have had a better example of a desert if you had mentioned the Antarctic. It really is a desert with very little rainfall/snowfall. However the temperatures of 97% of Antarctica are just as cold as they were 60 years ago when they began measuring them. I never understood the saturated effect of CO2 because there is always new CO2 being put into the air. Please enlighten me.
“Nobody will die of heat prostration.”
Maybe they will die of overheated rhetoric.
Why don’t we ban fossil fuels now? That would prevent a 10% drop in GDP . How much would the GDP drop in this case?
No, banning fossil fuels now is just not enough. The only real answer is to ban GDP. No GDP, no drop in it.
And that way Derg can continue to use a gas powered auger. (watermelons be damned)
GDP: Gosh Darn Prostate?
Need to do the opposite, increase fossil fuel use to increase GDP by 10%, then when the corresponding 10% decrease comes, we all break even. No one would know the difference, like it never happened. /s
So, does anyone know if this report factored in potential economic benefits that would result from a warmer climate…or did they only consider the “theoretical” downside?
Get em Roger…Their premise is weak and false.
Roger’s premise is weak. He thinks CO2 is a problem and needs to be “aggressively mitigated”.
Not to worry, sun will always shine (somewhere or another); back to serious climate change business, here is the latest update to solar activity:
November solar activity was almost static, the ‘classic’ sunspot count (Wolf SSN) rose fraction of a point to 4.5 while the new SIDC reconstructed number was at 5.9
Composite graph is here
SC24 is nearing what might be the start of a prolong minimum (possible late start of SC25 too), not even a dead cat could bounce back from the levels recorded during the last 12 months.
Isn’t 10% about what Obama did to the GDP during his terms /
No!
So we need to drop our GDP by 80% and pay a hundred trillion dollars — in order to save at most a few trillion dollars? That does not seem like a good deal – notwithstanding the fact that warming is probably mostly just natural variability.
Its been warming since the 18th century and there was no industry at the time. It seems absurd to think that this will be much of an issue.
But rational thought and calm approaches to the possible outcomes appears to be too much to ask of the current crop of ideologues.
Its been warming ……….at exactly the same rate……….since the 18th century
No it has not – and neither has CO2 ….
Anthony, with all due respect, posting graphs from “zFacts” will just bring a smile around here. At least get something from NOAA or BEST if you are trying to make a point.
NOAA and BEST cant be trusted. There was an article on WUWT that demonstrated that the BEST data was suspiciously extremely close to the average of 32 climate models. Tony Heller has proved that NOAA data is fake.
The graph is fake. Probably just a copy from NOAA and GISS fake graphs on temperature.
“Trump is still wrong.”…good grief
Roger, now you’re doing it too……you just wrote and entire piece about how inaccurate this report is….based on this report Trump said …he believes in global warming, just doesn’t think it’s a dangerous as this report makes it out to be…..Trump said the same thing you did!
….get it straight
Try the whole passage:
“Climate change is real, and aggressive mitigation and adaptation make very good sense. Trump is still wrong. Which makes an error of this magnitude so much the worse.”
Wrong wrong wrong. Trying to control the weather is a losing game. Adaptation is the ONLY thing that makes any sense, since we’ve been doing it, like, forever. If we can’t adapt to the very modest sea level rise that’s been happening for a century or more, then we really don’t deserve to live. As for the rest; extreme weather, droughts, floods, etc, the data doesn’t support a mitigation of CO2 policy, at all.
Jeff,
I saw a graph at Coyote’s Blog the other day attributing climate change to a large portion of the acres burned in the southwest (1).
What are the odds of a 2nd grade math teacher in CA using the scary looking graph in a Science class?
1) http://coyoteblog.com/coyote_blog/2018/11/knowledge-and-certainty-laundering-via-computer-models-2.html
That wasn’t Pielke, it was Kummer.
Roger, it was a Pielke quote in a Kummer article.
Amen,
Didn’t there used to be a Pielke that wasn’t as shill?????
I’ve already had a 10% drop in my economy due to expensive wind energy cons and higher electricity costs,
expensive repairs on bastardized engines forced to use “biofuels”,
inflation from money being printed to pay billions in failed green energy schemes, etc, etc,
“Effective climate policy must be built upon policies that can be justified on political time scales, that add up to long-term progress.”
What climate policy is needed? Kummer still believes in CAGW. CO2 causing CAGW is a non starter. There is no science behind it. The climate will always vary as it has for 4.6 billion years. The only thing that mankind can do to alter the climate is by geoengineering. That runs the risk of ending all life on this planet. For what? A 1 C increase in 168 years which has actually been beneficial. Give me a break Mr. Kummer. Quit listening to alarmists who are all part of a huge groupthink.
Alan,
If you read this seriously, you would see that those words are by Roger Pielke Jr. Not mine.
Note the quote marks!
Oops!
Like your oops above.
Sorry Larry, Too much to read too quickly.
The net present value of 10% GDP in 2100 approaches double ought zero. Ce n’est rien. Da nada.
To publish this ‘threat’ is to display gross ignorance of economics.
BWTM
“Long run is a misleading guide to current affairs. In the long run,
we are all dead.”— John Maynard Keynes
In 2100, pretty much all of us will be completely, totally, irreversibly dead.
The key here is “possible loss to climate change”. More likely is the “possible gain to climate change”… How anyone thinks a more moderate climate makes for a worse world is just ignorant.
I am a “the Beer is still half-cold” kind of guy. More moderate is better.
If you read and digested Willis Eschenbach’s posts about tropical climate and emergent phenomena then you’ll realize that the tropics will hardly if at all get hotter either. The thunderstorms will just arrive a little earlier each day.
I am going to post the following article one more time. It was written by an Obama appointee.
“The Climate Won’t Crash the Economy: A worst-case scenario projects annual GDP growth will be slower by 0.05 percentage point.” by Steven Koonin on Nov. 26, 2018
https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-climate-wont-crash-the-economy-1543276899
Mr. Koonin, a theoretical physicist, is a University Professor at New York University. He served as undersecretary of energy for science during President Obama’s first term.
* * *
The final figure of the final chapter shows that an increase in global average temperatures of 9 degrees Fahrenheit (beyond the 1.4-degree rise already recorded since 1880) would directly reduce the U.S. gross domestic product in 2090 by 4%, plus or minus 2%—that is, the GDP would be about 4% less than it would have been absent human influences on the climate. That “worst-worst case” estimate assumes the largest plausible temperature rise and only known modes of adaptation.
To place a 4% reduction in context, conservatively assume that real annual GDP growth will average 2% in the coming decades (it has averaged 3.2% since 1935 and is currently 3%). That would result in a U.S. economy roughly four times as large in 2090 as today. A 4% climate impact would reduce that multiple to 3.8—a correction much smaller than the uncertainty of any projection over seven decades.
* * *
If we take the new report’s estimates at face value, human-induced climate change isn’t an existential threat to the overall U.S. economy through the end of this century—or even a significant one.
* * *
What do you get when take the output of climate models out 70 years, which is junk, use that as input to econometric models? You get this kind of garbage. It is literally nonsense on stilts.
The “analysis” is a clumsy postulation attempt by Roger Pielke Jr. postulated, in what appears to be an apology for the NYT’s awful CAGW writing.
The “95th percentile” is opinion postulated by the politicians who prepared the summary for policymakers, not a valid percentage of probability.
As Alan points out so succinctly;
The alleged warming, based on temperature numbers from mercury thermometers compared to modern horribly sited and often poorly maintained temperature stations that are not properly or evenly distributed worldwide!
Meaning, the 0.8°C temperature anomaly is well within error bounds and uncertainties!
This is before asking how the polar temperatures were calculated into the 1880 temperatures so that slight polar temperature increases can skew the global anomaly. Though we wouldn’t be surprised if alarmists found a way to smear 1880 temperatures 1,200 kilometers to a location where an modeled thermometer pseudo-exists which allows smearing the modeled thermometer temperature a further 1,200 kilometers across the poles.
Unfortunately, activists and alarmists know they do need exaggeration! because without the exaggeration, there is no justification and definitely no urgency at all!
Now, if they could only tell us the truth about Earth’s warming since the LIA, which directly contributes the majority of the claimed 0.8°C anomaly to 1880s…
See Dilbert cartoonist, Scott Adams’ take on this in one of his recent youtube “Coffee with Scott Adams” videos. His take is that a 10% drop in GDP in 80 years time is the best news he has ever heard from climate alarmists. His stance is that with even modest growth the US economy will increase by compounding by something like 700% in 80 years, reducing the 10% drop to virtual invisibility.
Facts from our side of the Great Divide will not affect what the Media has to say, they are concerned with selling adverts, the news such as it is, is way down in their thinking
Snag is that the politicians either believe in what is said in the Media, or just go on what the result is in the thinking of the population.
Going on what is happening here in Australia first industry moves out, or if we have to build a submarine in South Australia then they will use diesel generation.
Only when the system finally breaks down and is not writton off as a once in a 100 year weather event, will the general public finally realise that the system is truly broken.
By then politicians of all parties will be either retiring on their fat pensions, or madly running for cover.
But Australia will by then be in one hell of a mess.
MJE
Is there any other discipline where academic papers based on a known false paradigm (e.g. RCP 8.5) routinely pass the peer (pal) review process?
Mohatdebos,
“where academic papers based on a known false paradigm (e.g. RCP 8.5)”
No paradigm is used in RCP8.5. It is a world in which radiative forcing in the year 2100 relative to pre-industrial values is 8.5 W/m2. People debate the likelihood of this happening, but we know far too little to declare it impossible.
We do know that RCP8.5 is unlikely, as appropriate for a “worst-case scenario” (using that term in the sense used by risk management professionals).
For more about RCP8.5, including links to the papers describing it, see:
https://fabiusmaximus.com/2015/07/13/coal-climate-apocalypse-87192/
Actually, we do know enough to declare that impossible.
The mere fact that CO2 levels have been over 1000 in the last few 10’s of millions of years and well over 5000ppm if go back 100 million years or so.
Nothing bad happened then. There’s no way that 700 or 800 ppm is going to cause any problems.
Mark,
“Nothing bad happened then.”
You are conflating studies about the results from the RCP8.5 scenario with the scenario itself. They are two entirely different things.
I can describe a scenario in which Iowa City gets 10″ rain tomorrow. You can predict what will happen if we get 10″ of rain. The scenario is not invalidated by the validity of your prediction.
Larry with all due respect, if I may ask…aren’t you missing something?…
that the main problematic point with RCP 8.5 is not actually simply, as you put it,
the “8.5 W/m2”, but actually the association of it with the temp variation and the tight connection with time in that regard, as per delta T (temp) versus delta t (time), not even mentioning that;
it, is not even a proper GCM simulation perse…too far man-handed and too far stretched
“artificially”….quite impossible to consider it as of any actual value, unless when considering that it could show”;
how weak and wrong the academic approach to RF has being for some time now.
A very much rigged “experiment”… where addressing it by merely the “8.5 W/m2”,
does not make it any better.
cheers
Whiten,
“the main problematic point with RCP 8.5 is …the association of it with the temp variation”
That exists only in your mind.
A scenario: Iowa City will get 3″ of rain tomorrow.
Your prediction (hypothetically): Iowa City will have 3′ of water running down Main Street.
These are entirely different things. The accuracy of your prediction is unrelated to the utility of the scenario. Other people can use this scenario for risk management, unaffected by your model’s use of it.
Sorry Larry, but are you really claiming that “8.5 W/m2”, is real, either as per reality of nature or as per reality of science, numbers, theory or experiment?
Larry that is only a deceptive make up, as per all counts above, a really intended
deception, intended rigged “experiment”.
Not only nature has no any room for it, but even numbers or any “experiment”
as per science and the method of it all, has no room for such b…shit.
Is non computable actually, not simply because of the actual value, but more like because of the method and means implied.
The way that it stands it does not make sense.
Helping…what actually does “8.5 W/m2”, stand for as proclaimed?
In my book, it stands only as big intended and very well crafted bollocks…
No any other meaning otherwise…
Sorry for maybe being a bit pedantic… i far much sillier than CS or ECS crap.
Oh well, if it had any value it will already be the main base for the Paris accord!
Please don’t take this harshly.
Thanks for the reply, really appreciated, and only speaking my mind as openly as I can, no way any offense meant there… 🙂
cheers
Whiten,
“but are you really claiming that “8.5 W/m2”, is real”
That is quite a reading FAIL. I’m saying the exact opposite of that. The RCPs are scenarios about the future. Let’s check the meaning of “real.”
Risk management consists of looking at what has happened in the past and what is possible in the future. Then assessing probabilities and impacts. The extreme scenarios at both ends of the spectrum should be improbable.
Haa, Larry, you talking about reading fail, when you clearly very selectively, by very cherry picking, even in the context of a sentence, let alone considering the whole comment, have chosen to address my comment harshly, from my point of view.
Please do consider to read and address at the very least the whole sentence there, which you have cherry-pick selected from, very strangely so.
My point was specifically addressing the RCP 8.5 indeed…not the whole of them scenarios in one go…in an attempt to clearly point out the impossibility there.
And when it comes to risk management, and especially the precautionary principle, I some how side with the “old school”, where the consideration
of having “all the eggs in one single basket” aint any where to be considered as
safe or acceptable as a good idea in the prospect of considering future outcomes
in the principle of “risk management”…but quite the opposite of it…but hey that is me.
Sorry again Larry, but let me restate the question again;
“Sorry Larry, but are you really claiming that “8.5 W/m2”, is real, either as per reality of nature or as per reality of science, numbers, theory or experiment?”
Where do you think you can find some support that RCP 8.5 scenario being any where considered as real there, according to you?
Maybe the support you find there is in the AGW failed hypothesis, and all the rest of silly claims involved with it?
Am I right, is that it? Or there some more there?
similar failures
Oh maybe scientific method and therefor science can not be a real process,
I guess!
(and anything else involved with it, like research, maths, experiments,
plus the billions or trillions invested in it all!.. maybe not real, just a figment of imagination, including a lot more proposed billions or more, to be keep going down that way
…if I may say – very carelessly as it stands up to now, in my opinion, but still very much real though.)
Oh, well, whatever! In the end it seems still like some kind of agreement there,
RCP 8.5 is not to be considered as real in any aspect, even in the realm of hypothetical extreme scenarios!
The point of improbabilities, or extreme ones, in whatever possible scenario, is not a blank check or an excuse for creating completely unaccepted totally fictional scary scenarios… the very meaning of the scientific method as the filter of such as silliness, to be considered there, I think.
Again, just speaking my mind, no any idea where you really stand with all this, my friend… so please do consider, with all that said above, I have not being judgmental, or trying to be, as far as I can tell, I think!
Thanks.
cheers
The USA’s Fourth National Climate Assessment (NCA) is false alarmist nonsense.
A hypothetical doubling of CO2 from the so-called “pre-industrial” level of approx. 280ppm to 560ppm would cause AT MOST about 1C of global warming (Christy and McNider 2017, Lewis and Curry 2018) , such that any credible humanmade warming projections would NOT be dangerous, but would be net-beneficial for humanity and the environment.
A more realistic temperature scenario is for no major change in global temperature, or moderate global warming or moderate global cooling starting by 2020-2030, the latter which I (we) predicted in an article published in 2002.
The greatest risk is global cooling, not warming. Any cooling more than a few tenths of a degree will cause significant economic hardship, along with an increase in Excess Winter Deaths, unless mitigating measures are taken.
Regards, Allan
Hsiang et al., 2017 literally referred to RCP8.5 as “business-as-usual.”
Figure 1.4 drom NCA4 Volume I with UAH 6.0 overlaid:
From Hsiang…
Another fact that’s never mentioned, is that the 10% is a decrease relative to about 300% GDP growth over the next 80 years. Hsiang’s fake 10% reduction would “only” yield about 290% growth, rather than 300%, by 2100.
Furthermore, almost all of that 10% is due to premature mortality, which isn’t even a factor in GDP.
David,
“Hsiang et al., 2017 literally referred to RCP8.5 as ‘business-as-usual.'”
That’s an important point! RCP8.5 was mischaracterized as BAU at the start in 2011. By 2015 many people had pointed out – in considerable detail – that his was inaccurate. In 2017 papers began to use the RCP’s more appropriately – correctly describing RC8.5 and comparing it with other RCPs.
But, as you note, many high-profile papers continue the BAU lie. This is yet another example of the breakdown of peer review in climate science.
Here are scores of examples of papers and news articles use and misuse of RCP8.5 from the beginning through today:
Manufacturing climate nightmares: misusing science to create horrific predictions.
Why would anyone believe anything said by someone who claims to know what the the GDP will be in 80+ years?
First, I’m curious if that is a 10% NET reduction. I’d expect more air conditioners to be made, at the very least. Although I can see where the CAGW part comes in — higher temps = more air conditioners = more electricity = more C02. Hmm.. Just realized that I had the climate drive CO2, and not the other way around! Somehow this feels right to me.
Second, I’m wondering if they used base line budgeting with respect to the GDP loss. Is that 10% from an expected growth of 1,000%? I’ll take that..
It’s a 10% reduction in the expected growth over the next 80 years.
The expected growth is something like 300%.
Most of the 10% is due to premature deaths.
Basically, the 10% is insignificant and bogus.
So the number was exaggerated just like this article title? I’m not really sure how you can say it’s not that bad when the best case scenario is a RCP increase of over 2 percent?