A widely cited doomsday study on economic damage from climate change published in Nature was retracted Wednesday following criticism from peers.
The research, published last year, projected that the world’s economic output would decline 62% by 2100 under a high-carbon emissions scenario.
The estimate was much more severe than other forecasts, prompting scrutiny of the underlying data.
The study examined historical data from some 1,600 regions worldwide over the past four decades to project how changes in temperature and precipitation would affect economic growth, including factors like agricultural yields, labor productivity and infrastructure.
However, after the study was published, other researchers found that economic data from one country—Uzbekistan—during a short time from 1995 to 1999 had skewed the results. Without Uzbekistan, the 2100 damage forecast fell to 23%, not 62%. The researchers published their critique in Nature in August.
Another researcher who wasn’t involved in the original work, Christof Schötz, said the results were more uncertain than the study suggested and published a separate critique in Nature in August.
The study had been cited by the U.S. Congressional Budget Office, the World Bank and the Network for Greening the Financial System, or NGFS, a coalition of central banks from which the Federal Reserve withdrew this year, reports the Wall Street Journal.
The error-ridden Potsdam study has frustrated some researchers, who say it damages climate scientists’ credibility. Economist Lint Barrage, who believes the study has even more “methodological problems” that “bias the results upward” than the retraction note admits, told the Times that “it can feel sometimes, depending on the audience, that there’s an expectation of finding large estimates.”
Free Beacon writes, “If your goal is to try to make the case for climate change,” Barrage said, “you have crossed the line from scientist to activist, and why would the public trust you?”
The retraction comes as activists have toned down their apocalyptic rhetoric on climate change.
Billionaire Bill Gates, who spent $2 billion trying to prevent what he called a “climate disaster,” said in October that climate change “will not be the end of civilization.” He added tht ineffective climate protests are “diverting money and attention from efforts that will have more impact on the human condition.”
Axios last week reported that climate change is “fading in importance on some U.S. lawmakers’ priority lists,” according to Free Beacon.
