Climate Change, Risk Management, and ScienceFordham University Symposium on Climate Change, Economics, and Energy Finance, 2012

Jan W. Dash, PhDVisiting Research Scholar, Fordham University Climate Initiative Chair, Unitarian Universalist UN Office

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Outline Climate

Science General Remarks Climate Impacts Climate Risk Management Climate Ethics

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Climate Science General Remarks

Science = Web of evidence, different sources Observations Physics, models, theory

Science is not Mathematics

You never prove anything in science Always uncertainties (maybe small, maybe big) However can be relatively sure about some things Once convinced, skeptical on contrarian claims Informs us about risk from climate change Input into public policy, e.g. on renewable energy3

Scientists are skeptics

Why should we care about climate science?

Comparison of the spread of actual IPCC projections (2007) with observations of annual mean temperatures 1980-2011

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Natural variation out (El Nios/La Nias, volcanoes, sun changes) => global warming exists, due to humans

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Climate science expertise - counts Expertise

Anyone speaking out of his field is as dumb as the next guy (paraphrasing Richard Feynman) Example: You dont want your cardiologist or your chiropractor - to give a cancer diagnosis Filter #1 = PhD in science Filter #2 = (earth) science faculty/research position at a recognized university, laboratory Filter #3 = substantial recent publications on climate science in peer-reviewed journals These are the filters: experts on climate science6

needs to be in the right field.

Who

has climate expertise?

Who are the Climate Contrarians arguing against mainstream science?

With few exceptions, they fail 3 expertise filters Example: Christopher Monckton No science degree. No position. No publications: FAILS Gives talks. Gives expert testimony before Congress. Influential. Persuasive. Except he is completely wrong. Like an actor who misuses medical terms unless youre a doctor you cant tell He misquotes scientists (they say so) John Abraham - devastating critique of Moncktons claims

Cranks exist in every scientific field, are almost always wrong, are not Galileo, are justly ignored. In climate they get publicity and have outsize influence7

What do Contrarians Say? We

Have No Climate Risk position:

1. 2. 3. 4.

Deny global warming Deny human influence on climate Minimize climate impact risk Exaggerate cost of climate action mitigation

Tactical

shift made from #3, 4 to #1, 2 Oppose climate action, renewable energy Create doubt = tobacco tactic (Oreskes) Science cant prove so we shouldnt act8

Contrarian Cargo Cult Science

Cargo Cult Science = Form without content (Feynman) Contrarian Fallacies (partial list) Lawyer-like attacks nit-pick climate science (IPCC report) Promote ideas with little support (cosmic rays) Cherry-pick data (1998 temperature ) Ignore or overemphasize uncertainty (trends vs. noise) Malign climate models (ignore model back-testing success) Mathematical errors (principal components misuse) Irrelevant red herrings (Medieval Warming Period)

Ignore evidence, dont admit error, distort, misquote, change meaning of words, other errors

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What are some resources? Skeptical

One-liner responses: The sun is responsible for global warming wrong the sun has NOT been getting any warmer since 1975 Run by professional climatologists The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars

Science website

Real

Climate website

Prof. Michael Climate

Mann - new book

UU-UNO

Media get reliable scientific input for articles Overview, resources, news on climate

Science Rapid Response Team Climate Portal

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Climate Impacts

Climate amplifies naturally produced disasters Impacts are probably being observed right now Faint rumbling of impacts on our descendants if Business as Usual BAU behavior continues U.S. Quadrennial Defense Review (2010) Climate change = U.S. National Security Risk

Benchmark: 2 degrees C rise in temperature by 2100

Technical reports on impacts appear every week INCREASED: Food shortages, Water shortages, Migrations, Disease, Species extinction

Breakdown of financial, economic systems? Why bad? Perturb earth like dropping your watch11

A few reports - climate impacts

Background 1,000 pages: IPCC report,Vol. II (2007) China government report on climate impacts (1/18/12) Global warming threatens China's march to prosperity by cutting crops, shrinking rivers and unleashing more droughts and floods [Second National Assessment Report on Climate Change]

Oceans, climate change, and oxygen (2/11/12) Global warming could lead to more of the worlds oceans becoming dead zones [Federal Institute of Technology, Zurich]

Mayan civilization collapse, climate change (2/24/12) likely due to a relatively mild drought, much like the drier conditions expected in the coming years due to climate change [Yucatan Center for Scientific Research, Mexico and U. Southampton, Britain]

Los Angeles and climate change (2/23/12) Rising sea levels will increase the likelihood of coastal flooding; rising temperatures will threaten the snow pack in the Sierra Nevada mountains, which provides about a third of the drinking water (US Geological Survey)12

Climate Risk Management Recognition

of risks: 2 types

Average risk: probable, low impact Tail risk: less probable, high impact Rational The

response to risk - lower it!

Finance - hedging risk

best way to think about the response to climate is RISK MANAGEMENT If BAU, todays tail climate risk becomes tomorrows average climate risk13

Climate Mitigation no silver bullet. Progress exists, and need MORE Action

by individuals Action by organizations Corporations, Universities, Faith-based, NGOs Action Action

at all levels of government to support non-fossil energy

City, State, Regional, National, International Solar, wind, biomass, fusion, 4th gen. fission Innovative technology: Gasoline from biomass + sequestration; Cool Planet biofuels (2012)14

Climate Ethics

Science informs us: Prob(temps.) in future

ALL models: long term temperature trend is UP Scenarios; most of the uncertainty = our response

Climate justice: Poor have the smallest effect on climate are hurt the worst However, no place to hide

U.S. will be hit very hard if BAU prevails

Intergenerational ethics: Our descendants

Finance: Discount rate assumption for assessing future climate impact costs is a critical ingredient More humane and cheaper for preventive action now rather than disaster adaptive action in the future 16 scientists in WSJ misquote Prof. Nordhaus (Yale U.)15

Bottom Line Human

activities are causing the global warming trend of climate change Impacts are mostly bad, observed now, and will become far worse if BAU prevails

Shooting the messenger wont fix the problem

Its

not too late to prevent worst impacts Topics discussed at this Symposium certainly will help (renewable energies ) You can help Thank you16