2025-08-25

A meta review of the no-longer-new DOE report

Screenshot 2025-08-25 104520 I still haven't read the bloody thing, and at this rate I never will, but happily CarbonBrief have read it for me. I'm going to assume that they've put their two best criticisms up front - you'd be mad to do anything else - and those are:

The executive summary of the controversial report inaccurately claims that “CO2-induced warming might be less damaging economically than commonly believed”.

It also states misleadingly that “excessively aggressive [emissions] mitigation policies could prove more detrimental than beneficial”.

Sadly, Stefan Rahmstorf was foolish enough to believe that CarbonBrief make sense

But "CO2-induced warming might be less damaging economically than commonly believed" is true; and "excessively aggressive [emissions] mitigation policies could prove more detrimental than beneficial" is also true. I mean FFS, "excessively aggressive" is almost by definition detrimental. These people are clowns. Of course, that doesn't actually make the report itself good; it just shows you how uselessly debased the "discussion" is.

Refs

If You’re So Smart, Why Aren’t You Happy?

6 comments:

Phil said...

"CO2-induced warming might be less damaging economically than commonly believed" is true? Based on the range of common belief in the USA, of course. You might get a different answer in the UK or some other civilized place, or from more educated people.

"CO2-induced warming might be more damaging economically than commonly believed" is surely true. Because the damage function isn't symmetrical, this is far more important.

Phil said...

Oh, and some economics to ponder.

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1993/12/how-the-world-works/305854/?gift=UXz-98yeZG1zYWv9OPYfe4KQMjNI7WSSqdu6d8SDhsc&utm_source=copy-link&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=share

William M. Connolley said...

I'd strip off the long irrelevant intro and the Rousseau/ Newton stuff. Then we're at (sorry) yet another attempt to argue against freedom again; this is an odd time to be pushing Trumponomics. Next step: while natural selection may seem clear and obvious here is a list of nitpicks...

William M. Connolley said...

Meh. On further thought, and perhaps to prove that I do think, I retract the Trumponomics dig and following.

Tom said...

IIRC, the IPCC said a decade ago that the impacts of climate change would actually benefit some developed economies for several decades before the negative impacts started to overwhelm the (admittedly slight) positive impacts.

Phil said...

Human caused climate change was a benefit to most at least to the time when it exactly canceled natural climate change. Oh, somewhere between 1920 and 1950. Maybe later if you want to match the Holocene Optimum climate of 6,000 years ago. We are past that now.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41597-020-0530-7

Future climate change is a different matter, of course.