Extreme extrapolations more common

ABC did not find the time to report on recent news revealing problems with climate models. Instead they have covered a paper that uses climate models to provide a taste of future heat waves. Not surprisingly defective models highly geared to an exaggerated climate sensitivity produce extreme outcomes.

Extreme heat waves to become more common

In their study, Dim Coumou, from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, and Alexander Robinson, from Universidad Complutense de Madrid used climate modelling to project extreme heat waves like those that hit Australia in 2009.

They found that extreme heatwaves will by 2020 affect about 10 per cent of total land area -- double today's figure. By 2040, it would have quadrupled.

And just one indication of the reliability of those models?

In contrast to earlier analyses for a ten-year period that indicated consistency between models and observations at the 5% confidence level, we find that the continued warming stagnation over fifteen years, from 1998 -2012, is no longer consistent with model projections even at the 2% confidence level.

In odd contravention of the normal rules of journalism ABC allow this "press release" to be published without question.

Naive journalism: the new standard in news from our public broadcaster.

Update: Some further comments at Judy Curry's Climate Etc blog. Curry one of ABC's missing climate commentators.

from The Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation in twentieth century climate simulations: uneven progress from CMIP3 to CMIP5

Variability of the AMO in the 10–20/70–80 year ranges is overestimated/underestimated in the models and the variability in the 10–20 year range increases in three of the models from the CMIP3 to the CMIP5 versions.