Current Affairs 🌡️ Weather / climate change

Surprise - lots of meaningless doomsday reporting about climate change for outcomes that’s never going to happen.

Why scientists retired the dire climate scenario used for over a decade:

While global warming is still a serious threat, the decision to back away from a worst-case outlook raises questions about whether some risks have been overstated.

It’s rare for technical papers about climate modelling to kick off a heated public debate, or attract attention from the White House.

But that’s what happened recently after an international team of researchers published a major revision of the emissions scenarios used to study global warming.

When scientists try to model how hot Earth could get this century, they typically look at a range of possibilities for how much planet-warming pollution humans might pump into the atmosphere. These scenarios get updated every seven years or so.

In this latest update, the researchers abandoned a dire – and often criticised – high-emissions scenario known as RCP8.5 that has been prominently cited in thousands of climate studies over the past decade. The authors said the scenario was now “implausible” given recent energy trends.

That provoked online arguments among scientists. For years, critics of the high-emissions scenario had argued that it was always unrealistic, in part because it envisioned that countries would burn coal at absurdly high rates. They argued that any studies or news reports relying on that scenario exaggerated the risks of climate change. Why, those critics now asked, did the course correction take so long?

Many scientific studies have wrongly referred to RCP8.5 as a “business-as-usual” scenario, suggesting that this was the pathway humanity is headed for. News stories about climate research often emphasised results based on RCP8.5 as a picture of what the world can expect unless countries slash their emissions, which isn’t right, either.

www.nzherald.co.nz

Why scientists retired the dire climate scenario used for over a decade

New York Times: Many on the political right have used the shift to attack climate science.
www.nzherald.co.nz www.nzherald.co.nz
 
Inruin said:
For over 100% of the warming? Wow!

I see the UN climate panel have scrapped their extreme scenarios on climate change.
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You guys on the right will carry on as you do. As always, you're utterly wrong, scientifically, morally, ethically, politically and factually with regards to climate science and climate change.

You're on the wrong side of history too.

If you're willing to dismiss science as a result of your superior questioning and knowledge, you should equally be able to question your own sources and dig deeper.

Anyway, as mentioned above.

You're corrupted by the ideology you live in, critical thinking is a useful skill that you can work on.
 
MaybeTop8 said:
You guys on the right will carry on as you do. As always, you're utterly wrong, scientifically, morally, ethically, politically and factually with regards to climate science and climate change.

You're on the wrong side of history too.

If you're willing to dismiss science as a result of your superior questioning and knowledge, you should equally be able to question your own sources and dig deeper.

Anyway, as mentioned above.

You're corrupted by the ideology you live in, critical thinking is a useful skill that you can work on.
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Take your own advice. This one line from your post should be a good start.

"Today, we know human emissions account for over 100% of the warming."

You're corrupted by the ideology you live in, critical thinking is a useful skill that you can work on.
 
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Inruin said:
How is your electric car going? Guess you arent prepared to take responsibility for the deaths of others with your actions.
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What are you actually defending Inruin? Who are you sticking up for? Big Oil? Israel? The far right? Coal? Act?

At least be honest about why you do this apart from the fact it's me you're responding to.
 
Inruin said:
How is your electric car going? Guess you arent prepared to take responsibility for the deaths of others with your actions.
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And this whole argument (it's not really an argument though is it Inruin, more a childish provocation) is pathetic as well. In terms of personal responsibility, I conform to the furthest right of you lot - I take full responsibility for myself and my actions.
 
MaybeTop8 said:
And this whole argument (it's not really an argument though is it Inruin, more a childish provocation) is pathetic as well. In terms of personal responsibility, I conform to the furthest right of you lot - I take full responsibility for myself and my actions.
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Hmm seems like you are quick to shout at others but not use your critical thinking to look at yourself....
 
MaybeTop8 said:
You still haven't answered if you're prepared to take responsibility for the deaths of others by your antivax stance. So yeah mate, it's easy to see where you situate yourself in the world of disinformation.
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apparently I live in your world Katharine, Karen whatever..
 
Do we need to look at climate change differently?

We hear a lot about the traditional lessening the use of fossil fuels. Is there a hidden issue no one is talking about?

Labour talked about a knowledge based economy. The IT industry has traditionally not been great environmentally. It is getting better.

The media like to report on data centres being built or the ones that were going to be built and for whatever reason isn't going ahead. Then push how they are environmentally friendly. Sure, they might be powered in a unique way that may be better than traditional means. But, I'd be sceptical on how much they know on what goes on day to day.

They create a lot of waste. A lot not biodegradable. IT equipment come with great metal work to run the cabling. This is often thrown out as it affects airflow. IT companies send parts to expand storage with each device boxed separately in an over sized box with anti static bags and polystyrene. Depending on the project you may now get a large plastic container with all of the disks for example. So things are getting better.

That storage example is why Facebook would be a better option if you are passionate about the environment, Not Twitter. The storage technology Facebook use is reliable and also shipped in a way that does not create much wastage.

It would be interesting debate/investigation to see if physical media which needs to be produced and eventually gets thrown out. Is better or worse than the current cloud streaming model. The streaming services are convenient but the amount of data still needs to physically take up space and in multiple places as it needs to be redundant so it will not be lost or become unavailable. Then add the social media platforms and the amount of data we are producing explodes.

Then move to A.I and things get worse as the processing requirements take up a lot of power. Often taking up more space to be able to accommodate the power requirements.

These two articles talk about how cities are generally warmer than regional areas due to concrete, amount of traffic etc. But also that data centres are increasing this again. One of these articles shows the solar ordinance (heat striking a certain area). It does they this needs to be investigated further.
www.forbes.com

Data Centers May Cause Hotter Weather, New Study Suggests

Is waste heat from data centers affecting the weather? A new study says they are making their local environment hotter.
www.forbes.com www.forbes.com
 
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