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June 28, 2007
Confirmed: The UN's Computerized Climate Models Are Useless
Kevin Trenberth heads the US National Center for Atmospheric Research and has been called "one of the advisory high priests" of the UN's pseudo-scientific Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which endlessly huffs and puffs about how the planet is doomed if something isn't done to stop economic growth. The IPCC's direful predictions about rising sea levels, soggy polar bears, etc. are based on computer General Circulation Models (GCMs). Interestingly, Trenberth dismisses these models as sheer bunk.
As Trenberth notes, GCMs don't consider many relevant climate factors, including recovery of the ozone layer and forcing agents. The models are not even initialized to reflect the current observed climate. GCMs "assume linearity," but many aspects of climate are not linear. Trenberth asserts that "we do not have reliable or regional predictions of climate."
He's not the only one with doubts as to the validity of the IPCC's colorful forecasts. In a paper being presented this week at the 27th International Symposium on Forecasting, Scott Armstrong and Kesten Green conclude that "because the forecasting processes … overlook scientific evidence on forecasting, the IPCC forecasts of climate change are not scientific."
Even Jim Renwick, a lead author of the IPCC Working Group 1 science report, admits that "climate prediction is hard, half of the variability in the climate system is not predictable, so we don't expect to do terrifically well." His admission comes in response to an audit revealing that forecasts by New Zealand's National Institute of Water and Atmosphere were accurate only 48% of the time.
Professor Bob Carter, a geologist at James Cook University, sums up:
There is no predictive value in the current generation of computer GCMs and therefore the alarmist IPCC statements about human-caused global warming are unjustified.
This is hardly surprising. If scientists can't reliably predict the weather for next weekend, why would a bunch of corrupt, ideologically motivated bureauweenies be trusted to make forecasts for the next 100 years?
But maybe we ought to slam on the economic brakes and plunge the world into abject poverty anyway, just to be on the safe side.
On a tip from Bergbikr.
Posted by Van Helsing at June 28, 2007 8:28 AM
Comments
Speaking of the UN, Ted Sorenson writes the Demoonbrats dream Convention speech.
Posted by: V the K at June 28, 2007 11:32 AM
The good Dr. Carter is fond of quote mining and misses the point of Trenberth's post entirely. Consider some other things Trenberth says:
"The current projection method works to the extent it does because it utilizes differences from one time to another and the main model bias and systematic errors are thereby subtracted out. This assumes linearity. It works for global forced variations, but it can not work for many aspects of climate..."
He points out that GCMs are spotty at forecasting regional change. But they are valuable in forecasting global temperatures, which is what they are used for. Your claim that Trenberth says they are "useless" or "sheer bunk" is inaccurate.
Further: "A consensus has emerged that “warming of the climate system is unequivocal” to quote the 2007 IPCC Fourth Assessment Working Group I Summary for Policy Makers (pdf) and the science is convincing that humans are the cause. Hence mitigation of the problem: stopping or slowing greenhouse gas emissions into the atmosphere is essential. The science is clear in this respect." ... "How disruptive and how much loss of life will there be because we did not adequately plan for the climate changes that are already occurring?"
It is also important to remember that the key metric for future warming on a global scale--climate sensitivity--is derived from known physical laws and results from clmate models match those from direct observation and paleoclimate reocnstructions.
Trenberth's post in question: http://blogs.nature.com/climatefeedback/2007/06/predictions_of_climate.html#more
Posted by: Boris at June 28, 2007 6:50 PM
Wow, they are EVERYWHERE! You can't even come to a nice, conservative rant blog without running into some member of the "reality community".
Further: A consensus has emerged that "people who believe that "warming of the climate system is unequivocal and that science is convincing that humans are the cause" are hypocritical socialists who, while claiming they can predict global weather in 200 years, are not certain when human life begins.
Posted by: Marshall at June 29, 2007 1:40 PM
I like it when this happens. I can't tell if Marshall's post is satire or not.
Posted by: Boris at June 29, 2007 8:22 PM
