Mistakes litter climate report
Source: Agencies |
July 7, 2010, Wednesday
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A LEADING Dutch environmental agency, taking the blame for one of the glaring errors that undermined the credibility of a seminal UN report on climate change, said it has discovered more small mistakes and urged the panel to be more careful.
But the review released on Monday by the Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency claimed that none of the errors affected the fundamental conclusion by a UN panel of scientists: that global warming caused by humans already is happening and is threatening the lives and well-being of millions of people.
Mistakes discovered in the 3,000-page report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change last year fed into an atmosphere of skepticism over the reliability of climate scientists.
These scientists have been warning for many years that human-induced emissions of greenhouse gases could have catastrophic consequences, including rising sea levels, drought and the extinction of nearly one-third of the Earth's species.
The errors put scientists on the defensive in the months before a major summit on climate change in Copenhagen, Denmark, in December. The summit had only limited success on agreeing how to limit carbon emissions and contain the worst effects of global warming.
The underlying IPCC conclusions remain valid, said Maarten Hajer, the Dutch agency's director. The IPCC report is not a house of cards that collapses with one error, but is more like a puzzle with many pieces that need to fit together.
"The errors do not affect the whole construction," he said.
But he said the boiled-down version of the full IPCC report, a synthesis meant as a guideline for policy makers, included conclusions drawn from "expert judgments" that were not always clearly sourced or transparent.
With some conclusions, "we can't say it's plainly wrong. We don't know," and can't tell from the supporting text, Hajer said. The IPCC should "be careful making generalizations."
The IPCC, in a statement from its Geneva headquarters in Switzerland, welcomed the agency's findings, which it said confirmed the IPCC's conclusion that "continued climate change will pose serious challenges to human well-being and sustainable development."
It said it will "pay close attention" to the agency's recommendations to tighten up review procedures.
The Dutch agency accepted responsibility for one mistake by the IPCC when it reported in 2005 that 55 percent of the Netherlands is below sea level, when only 26 percent is. The report should have said 55 percent is prone to flooding, including river flooding.
But the review released on Monday by the Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency claimed that none of the errors affected the fundamental conclusion by a UN panel of scientists: that global warming caused by humans already is happening and is threatening the lives and well-being of millions of people.
Mistakes discovered in the 3,000-page report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change last year fed into an atmosphere of skepticism over the reliability of climate scientists.
These scientists have been warning for many years that human-induced emissions of greenhouse gases could have catastrophic consequences, including rising sea levels, drought and the extinction of nearly one-third of the Earth's species.
The errors put scientists on the defensive in the months before a major summit on climate change in Copenhagen, Denmark, in December. The summit had only limited success on agreeing how to limit carbon emissions and contain the worst effects of global warming.
The underlying IPCC conclusions remain valid, said Maarten Hajer, the Dutch agency's director. The IPCC report is not a house of cards that collapses with one error, but is more like a puzzle with many pieces that need to fit together.
"The errors do not affect the whole construction," he said.
But he said the boiled-down version of the full IPCC report, a synthesis meant as a guideline for policy makers, included conclusions drawn from "expert judgments" that were not always clearly sourced or transparent.
With some conclusions, "we can't say it's plainly wrong. We don't know," and can't tell from the supporting text, Hajer said. The IPCC should "be careful making generalizations."
The IPCC, in a statement from its Geneva headquarters in Switzerland, welcomed the agency's findings, which it said confirmed the IPCC's conclusion that "continued climate change will pose serious challenges to human well-being and sustainable development."
It said it will "pay close attention" to the agency's recommendations to tighten up review procedures.
The Dutch agency accepted responsibility for one mistake by the IPCC when it reported in 2005 that 55 percent of the Netherlands is below sea level, when only 26 percent is. The report should have said 55 percent is prone to flooding, including river flooding.
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