Met Office should withdraw grossly misleading study which is undermining its scientific credibility and integrity.
London, 9 March: A new study by the UK Met Office claims that accelerating global warming will make extreme rainfall events in the UK four times more frequent by 2080 compared to the 1980s.
This story has been widely covered in the news media.
The Met Office claims are derived from computer modelling based on the so-called RCP8.5 emissions scenario, the most extreme pathway for global greenhouse gas emissions, which the Met Office misleadingly describes as “plausible”.
In reality, most credible scientists regard RCP8.5 as implausible given that global emissions data and technological advances essentially rule it out. As a result, the Biden Administration has abandoned using this discredited worst-case scenario.
Moreover, the Met Office offers no empirical data in evidence that an increased trend in extreme rainfall events has actually been observed in line with their modelling. In fact some studies suggest the opposite may have occurred in recent decades.
Dr Benny Peiser, the director of the Global Warming Policy Foundation, called on the Met Office to withdraw its fatally flawed study:
“The Met Office should withdraw this grossly misleading and baseless study which is undermining its scientific credibility and integrity and makes it look incompetent.”
Additional information about RCP8.5
Roger Pilke Jr.: The Biden Administration Abandons RCP8.5
Anders Bolling: This is how the UN’s worst scenario was normalized and distorted our view of global warming
Tim Worstall: A Saviour Spurned: How fracking saved us from global warming (pdf)