Attribution of Extreme Weather Events in the Context of Climate Change (2016) / Chapter Skim
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5 Conclusions
5 Conclusions
Pages 127-136
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From page 127... ...
The need for improved understanding is coming at a time when there is increasing inquiry by the public, policy makers, and practitioners about the relationship between specific weather events and climate change (e.g., the question, "Is it caused or affected by climate change?
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From page 128... ...
Furthermore, confidence in attribution results that indicate an influence from anthropogenic climate change is strongest when • there is an understood and robustly simulated physical mechanism that relates a given class of extreme events to long-term anthropogenic climate changes such as global-scale temperature increase or increases in water con tent of a warmer atmosphere. Confidence in attribution findings of anthropogenic influence is greatest for those extreme events that are related to an aspect of temperature, such as the observed long-term warming of the regional or global climate, where there is little doubt that human activities have caused an observed change.
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From page 129... ...
Extreme events are generally influenced by a specific weather situation, and all events occur in a climate system that has been changed by human influences. Event attribution studies generally estimate how the intensity or frequency of an event or class of events has been altered by climate change (or by another factor, such as low-frequency natural variability)
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From page 130... ...
• Estimates of changes in frequency are presented as a risk ratio: that is, in terms of the ratio of the probability of the event in a world with human-caused climate change to its probability in a world without human-caused climate change. Equivalently, one can compare the return periods of the event (i.e., how rarely an event occurs)
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From page 131... ...
THE PATH FORWARD Improving Extreme Event Attribution Capabilities A focused effort to improve understanding of specific aspects of weather and climate extremes could improve the ability to perform extreme event attribution. The World Climate Research Programme (WCRP)
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From page 132... ...
; and • the representation of a counterfactual world that reliably characterizes the probability, magnitude, and circumstances of events in the absence of human influence on climate. Research that is targeted specifically at extreme events, including event attribution, could rapidly improve capabilities and lead to more reliable results.
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From page 133... ...
Studies of a representative sample of extreme events would allow stakeholders to use such studies as a tool for understanding how individual events fit into the broader picture of climate change. Irrespective of the method or related choices, it would be useful to develop a set of objective criteria to guide event selection.
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From page 134... ...
First is the development and use of objective event selection criteria to reduce selection bias so stakeholders understand how individual events fit into the broader picture of climate change. Second is the provision of stakeholder information about causal factors within days of an event, followed by updates as more data and analysis results become available.
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From page 135... ...
Correctly done, attribution of extreme weather events can provide an additional line of evidence that demonstrates the changing climate as well as its impacts and consequences. An accurate scientific understanding of extreme weather event attribution can be an additional piece of evidence needed to inform decisions on climate change–related actions.
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