Roger Pielke has a Twit complaining bitterly about Advancing the estimation of future climate impacts within the United States. He appears to be correct. I don't have much to add to what he said: it is so badly broken as to be useless. The paper itself beginsEvidence of the physical and economic impacts of climate change is a critical input to policy development and decision making. The potential magnitude of climate change damages, where, when, and to whom those damages may occur across the country, the types of impacts that will be most damaging, and the ability of adaptation to reduce potential risks are all important and interconnected. This study utilizes the reduced-complexity model, Framework for Evaluating Damages and Impacts (FrEDI), to rapidly assess economic and physical impacts of climate change in the contiguous United States (U.S.). Results from FrEDI show that net national damages increase 20 overtime, with mean climate-driven damages estimated to reach $2.9 trillion USD (95% CI: $510 billion to $12 trillion) annually by 2090.
So I think it is intended to be taken seriously; this isn't supposed to be wild, useless speculation. But, oh dear: the CI is so wide as to be utterly useless; RP says this is because they have averaged across all scenarios which looks rather likely; but it makes the answer useless. Furthermore, essentially all the damage is from Heath due to Extreme Temperatures. Ecosystem damages are by contrast trivial. This seems quite likely to be the wrong way round. But 2090, if it is needed, air conditioning will be universal, for people but not for plants.
Quite how this can be reconciled to 4th National Climate Assessment report: Extreme Temperature Mortality I don't know.
While I'm here: notice that RP isn't happy with Alex Epstein; as you'd hope.
Refs
* If I'm Old During the Next Pandemic by Bryan Caplan
* Unity at Last! by VERONIQUE DE RUGY
* The 1619 Project on Hulu Vindicates Capitalism by David Henderson
4 comments:
Boringly, I agree with you.
It's a bit of a #metoo post, sadly.
Gotta agree with both of you. But it's important to have that republished here, as it will probably be studiously ignored by the climate establishment.
Estimation of damages from climate change is a Hard Problem, and this is a fail.
AE is clueless.
BC is fighting the last pandemic, not the next one. The "Spanish" flu killed mostly the young and healthy. What if the next pandemic is like that? Will he want to expose his younger family members to death?
And VG is just another sad case of bothsiderism.
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