The IPCC Reports Documented Failures
A few people will recall that I called the IPCC Sixth Report “utter garbage“. I had my reasons and still do. Along with being incorrect, for decision makers, it’s utterly useless.
Much of the Report contains ‘scenarios’, based upon incomplete climate modeling that do a poor job of conveying actionable information to policy makers. It’s unreasonable to expect climate scientists to understand why this is true. They are not trained in risk-analysis. They work in entirely different disciplines that do not fit in well with understanding risks and how governments and countries should attempt to deal with them.
a) None of the scenarios will help with any decision making.
b) None of the scenarios, and multiple scenarios will achieve the UNFCCC objectives nor the Paris Goal of remaining under +1.5C.
The stated objective of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) is:
“stabilization of greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system.
Such a level should be achieved within a time frame sufficient to allow ecosystems to adapt naturally to climate change, to ensure that food production is not threatened and to enable economic development to proceed in a sustainable manner” (United Nations, 1992).
Yet here we are, three decades later, with the Framework Convention having had almost no effect in stemming the growth of atmospheric greenhouse gases. The UNFCCC ‘Framework Convention’ has failed to meet any of its objectives. The COP system has also failed to meet any of its objectives or goals.
This alone would indicate that the IPCC review process, Report creation and inclusion, and the UNFCCC are actual failures. To wit: we would not be in the present predicament if this were not factually true.
The IPCC Reports (every one of them) has also failed to effectively communicate the scope and urgency of dangerous climate change. Failed to advise the UNFCCC to make sound science based decisions.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is the United Nations body for assessing the science related to climate change.
Created in 1988 by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), the objective of the IPCC is to provide governments at all levels with scientific information that they can use to develop climate policies. https://www.ipcc.ch/about/
Instead of developing sound climate policies, the IPCC Reports have been used to delay actions (extensively) by governments at all levels.
Climate scientists need to be refocused on risks and extremes, their inadequate efforts at mitigation and adaption has been quite poor. In effect, the IPCC Reports, including the latest Sixth Report fails (being unusable) for establishing effective climate policy. They also fail at establishing the correct pre-industrial baseline temperatures, thus making their predictions and expectations wrong (we are already past the 1.5C limit).
NOAA said combined land and ocean-surface temperature was 1.67 degrees Fahrenheit (0.93 degrees Celsius) above the 20th-century average of 60.4 degrees Fahrenheit, making it the hottest July since record-keeping began 142 years ago. Hottest Month On Record, July 2021
From the IPCC Press Release:
The IPCC was established in 1988 to provide political leaders with periodic scientific assessments concerning climate change, its implications and risks, as well as to put forward adaptation and mitigation strategies (that can reduce those risks).
The last 30 years adequately demonstrates that the IPCC has utterly failed to meet these objectives.
Saying in the Press Release – “Stabilizing the climate will require strong, rapid, and sustained reductions in greenhouse gas emissions” and saying “and finds that unless there are immediate, rapid and large-scale reductions in greenhouse gas emissions” – these are not mitigation strategies.
Saying “The report provides new estimates of the chances of crossing the global warming level of 1.5°C in the next decades” – is not defining or addressing implications and risks.
These statements are meaningless and undefined inconsequential statements. It’s no wonder many news organizations give these press releases a pass due to the lack of definition. The lack of clear language and meaning has left policy makers with enormous room for doubt and delayed actions. The word “risk” and “implications” are only rarely used, demonstrating a complete lack of addressing this most important topic. In effect, the IPCC Reports provide an insurance policy for contributors lest their claims and assertions be misconstrued or later shown to be inaccurate in some way.
c) The IPCC process does not facilitate contributors addressing real world Risk Assessments or the inherent Implications and potential Costs involved.
d) The IPCC process instead rewards, encourages and facilitates prevarication and reticence.
e) The IPCC process STOPS contributors from advising Policy Makers and Governments WHAT TO DO based upon the Scientific evidence – WHAT ACTION PLAN / STRATEGIES entail the least amount of RISK, the maximum ROI (Return on Investment) or the probability of SUCCESS (based upon the known facts and realistic projections of what will happen in the near future if nothing were done.)
f) Nothing provided by the IPCC informs policy makers on how to make rational, risk based decisions.
g) The IPCC does not advise anyone what the risks are for doing something or not doing anything.
h) The IPCC never defines specifically what if any action must be taken quantitatively, qualitatively or practically or in terms of timeliness.
i) The IPCC never does a cost benefit analysis for any possible action or inaction.
j) The IPCC never does a risk analysis on any aspect of climate or emissions or mitigation or adaption potentialities.
k) Nothing provided by the IPCC informs policymakers what are the global risks or what the direct implications will be in the real world if no action is taken – or what that will cost in financial, economic, societal, environmental, ecological, biophysical or in loss of human life terms.
l) The IPCC does not provide governments or politicians with the kind of scientific based information they can use to make appropriate well-informed effective and self-evident Decisions about anything.
For all the hoopla that is bestowed upon the IPCC, it’s painfully clear that the Reports produced do not meet their own objectives. On the other hand, this may actually be the objective of the world governments, to pretend to produce a “top scientific report” that does not convey any clear direction, risk or costs.
The pretense and the charade of “climate action” based upon United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and the IPCC Reports is inherently flawed, deeply inadequate and likely to utterly fail to stop deadly climate change (human extinction). For now, this is the “best we can do”, but it is not even remotely good enough.
Numerous positive feedbacks have been triggered, yet the IPCC still presents semi-linear scenarios.
Another talkfest coming up soon, this time in Glasgow.
After the planet-fucking air flights and all the hot air has been talked and the meals and drinks consumed, I guess they will tell us ‘we have only 10 years to save the Earth’. And they’ll propose some non-existent technology or technology with a proven record of failure as ‘the solution’. Never admitting that the financial-economic system is the cause of the accelerating meltdown is just part of the game they play.
Meanwhile the numbers in the real world continue to look ever grimmer:
‘Global wildfire carbon dioxide emissions at record high, data shows
Figures from EU monitoring service for August are highest since it began measurements in 2003
August was another record month for global wildfire emissions, according to new satellite data that highlights how tinderbox conditions are widening across the world as a result of the climate crisis.
The Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service of the EU found that burning forests released 1.3 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide last month, mostly in North America and Siberia. This was the highest since the organisation began measurements in 2003.
After a July record of 1258.8 megatonnes the previous month, scientists are concerned that areas with dense vegetation are becoming a source rather than a sink of greenhouse gases.
The increased flammability was evident across swathes of the northern hemisphere. Russia, which is home to the world’s biggest forest, was by far the worst affected as infernos in the taiga forests of Siberia pumped 970 megatonnes of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere between June and August – more than all the forests in the rest of the world put together.
“The number of fires, their persistence and intensity were remarkable,” Copernicus said.
A worker helps battle a wildfire in the taiga forests of Siberia.
A worker helps battle a wildfire in the taiga forests of Siberia. Photograph: Russian Aerial Forest Protection/Avialesookhrana/Tass
Summer fires are not unusual in the Sakha Republic of north-eastern Siberia, but 2021 was exceptional. Emissions during this peak season were more than double the previous record. Blazes are burning longer than usual and with more ferocity.
In July, choking smoke gave the city of Yakutsk, which is in the midst of the Siberian fire region, the most polluted air in the world. This followed measurements of unusually high temperatures and lower than normal soil moisture.
Fires are also increasingly common in the Arctic Circle. This far northern region, which has warmed more than twice as fast as the rest of the planet, released 66m tonnes of CO2 this summer.
It was a similar story in North America, which has sweltered through deadly heat and unusually long dry spells.
In northern California, the Dixie Fire is now one of the biggest ever recorded in the state’s history, having turned almost a million acres to ash. Several Canadian provinces have also been scorched by unusually intense fires.
Europe has far less forest cover, but record high and prolonged heat has resulted in devastating fires in Turkey, which were four times more intense than anything previously registered. Greece, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Albania, North Macedonia, Algeria, and Tunisia have also battled with huge blazes that sent smoke plumes billowing across the Mediterranean.
Mark Parrington, senior scientist at Copernicus said this year was not a one-off but a sign of a worsening trend caused by human-driven climate change. “It is concerning that drier and hotter regional conditions, brought about by global warming, increase the flammability and fire risk of vegetation. This has led to very intense and fast-developing fires. While the local weather conditions play a role in the actual fire behaviour, climate change is helping provide the ideal environments for wildfires.”
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/sep/21/global-wildfire-carbon-dioxide-emissions-at-record-high-data-shows
They can’t see it. What needs to be done is entirely outside their realm of acceptance and experience. Even to suggest what needs to be done has everyone looking at you like you’re a nutter. They don’t understand it, they can’t grasp it (yet). There is a gigantic disconnect that prevents their oil-soaked synapses from realizing that civilization IS the problem.