[font face=Serif][font size=5]The "uncertainty loop" haunting our climate models[/font]

Updated by David Roberts on October 23, 2015, 2:20 p.m. ET

[font size=3]In the early years of the battle over climate science, advocates and scientists went out of their way to stress how much was understood and relatively certain in the study of climate. This "science is settled" approach was a predictable response to the well-funded campaign of obscurantism launched by fossil fuel interests and their friends on the right, which cynically used uncertainty as an argument for delaying action.

Now that climate hawks are emerging a bit from their defensive crouch, however, more attention is turning to the many uncertainties that haunt climate. Consider these layers:

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Grappling with this kind of uncertainty turns out to be absolutely core to climate policymaking. Climate nerds have attempted to create models that include, at least in rudimentary form, all of these interacting economic and atmospheric systems. They call these integrated assessment models, or IAMs, and they are the primary tool used by governments and international bodies to gauge the threat of climate change. IAMs are how policies are compared and costs are estimated.

So it's worth asking: Do IAMs adequately account for uncertainty? Do they clearly communicate uncertainty to policymakers?

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