Carbon Brief (TCB) recently posted an interactive page online titled: Mapping: How climate change is affecting extreme weather around the world. However, the webpage gives the false impression that TCB is using actual data showing how climate change affects severe weather. It's not. Instead, TCB relies heavily on so-called “attribution studies,” which use climate model simulations and estimates. The climate model output is not the same as the actual data, which exposes the TCB web page as a lie.
TCB's interactive feature page on attribution research provides a comprehensive overview of “attribution” research linking climate change to extreme weather events. While the compilation is extensive, these narratives must be viewed with a critical eye, particularly when considering the broader context of severe weather trends and the methods employed in these studies.
Attribution studies aim to determine the extent to which human-induced climate change contributes to specific weather events. These studies often use climate models to compare realistic scenarios with hypothetical situations, without the model's (modeller's) hypothetical estimates of human impacts. The reliability of these models cannot be verified, and they fail to the extent that their outputs are tested against real-world data, historical events, and trends. as highlighted Climate at a glanceHistorically, climate models have shown significant differences compared to observed temperature data, raising questions about the accuracy of their predictions.
Contrary to popular belief, empirical data do not support claims that severe weather events are becoming more frequent or intense. For example, climate realism Pointed out that despite increased media coverage, data shows no significant upward trend in the frequency or severity of hurricanes, tornadoes or floods over the past few decades. As discussed in several articles Climate at a glance Papers and data show that floods, hurricanes, extreme heat or cold, tornadoes and wildfires have not increased over the past century, let alone over the past three decades. This strongly suggests that perceptions of worsening weather may have more to do with increased awareness, reporting, and the uncritical promotion of attribution studies themselves in mainstream media than to actual changes in weather patterns.
Media reports and technological advances often amplify the perception of escalating severe weather. In a 2011 article Wattedsome point out that the proliferation of instant messaging tools and the 24/7 news cycle has led to more immediate and widespread coverage of weather events. A follow-up article from 2017, “Reporting Bias and the ‘Rise’ of Weather Events in the United States,” noted the same problem.
This increased visibility can create the false impression of increased frequency and severity, even if statistics show no such trend.
Attribution studies rely on climate models to simulate scenarios with and without estimates of human impacts. However, these models are inherently limited by the assumptions and parameters set by the researchers. The main problem is that attribution models, and the studies produced using them, assume what they are trying to prove. Attribution studies start by assuming that for any extreme weather event “simulated”, climate change has impacted, influenced or caused it. The only question is how much of an impact climate change had. as discussed Climate at a glancethe fallibility of climate models is evident in their inability to accurately replicate observed climate patterns, casting doubt on their utility in attribution studies.
While TCB’s interactive page on attribution research provides some insights into ongoing climate research, it’s important to recognize that what they present is not rooted in actual data, but rather in computer model output.
Actual empirical data do not support claims of an increase in the number of severe weather events or an increase in the severity of such events, and there are clear failures and biases in the methods used in attribution studies. Furthermore, increased media perceptions of worsening weather are often a by-product of increased reporting capabilities rather than actual climate change. Therefore, TCB does a serious disservice to readers by not addressing these issues and limitations and incorrectly presenting model results as fact.
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