Teaming with the Irish Climate Science Forum (ICSF), Climate Intelligence (CLINTEL) has produced a 17 page catalog of “misrepresentations” on the 40th page of the IPCC AR6 Summary for Policy Makers, better known as the SPM. Now they have sent this error list to the IPCC Chair and other world leaders. You can read it here.

The analysis begins with a summary cover letter to Dr. Hoesung Lee, Chair of the IPCC, titled: “Critique of the AR6 WG1 Summary for Policymakers (SPM)”. It is signed by Guus Berkhout, President of CLINTEL, and Jim OBrien, Chair of the ICSF.

The principal conclusion of the detailed critique is stated in the letter, as follows:

“We regrettably conclude that the SPM is erroneously pointing to a climate crisisthat does not exist in reality. The SPM is inappropriately being used to justify drastic social, economic and human changes through severe mitigation, while prudent adaptation to whatever modest climate change occurs in the decades ahead would be much more appropriate. Given the magnitude of proposed policy implications, the SPM has to be of the highest scientific standards and demonstrate impeccable scientific integrity within the IPCC.”

The cover letter also contains this succinct summary of their findings of misrepresentation of the science:

“1. It is not unequivocalthat human influence alone has warmed the planet; the observed modest warming of ~1°C since 1850-1900 has occurred through some as yet unresolved combination of anthropogenic and natural influences.

2. The new hockey-stickgraph (Fig SPM.1), when analyzed in detail, is a concoction of disparate indicators from various time periods over the last 2,000 years, which together fail to recognise the intervening well-established temperature variability, for example of the  Roman and Medieval Warming periods and of the Little Ice Age.

3. The incidence of so-called extreme weatherevents is erroneously misrepresented in the SPM  compared to the more accurate depictions in the draft main report, which latter identify no statistically-significant trends in many categories over time.

4. Developments in the cryosphere are also misrepresented in the SPM, particularly noting that there is virtually no trend in Arctic sea ice in the last 15 years.

5. Likewise, developments in the ocean are erroneously misrepresented in the SPM; in particular, the likely modest GMSL rise to 2100 does not point to any climate crisis”.

6. TheCMIP6 climate models are even more sensitive than the already overly-sensitive CMIP5 models of AR5, and ignore peer-reviewed scientific evidence of low climate sensitivity. The models lead to invalid conclusions on ECS and carbon budgets”; the likely global temperature increase to 2100 does not indicate a climate crisis.”

Professor Berkhout points out that the CLINTEL/ICSF critique is in full agreement with the real world as recently described by professor Ole Humlums database (see the latest version of September 2021 here):

1. In the last 30 years, the global air temperature increase is only ca. 0.17°C per decade.

2. According to tidal gauges along the coasts, the average sea level increases about 1-2 mm/yr.

3. Since 2004, the global oceans above 100m had a maximum warming of about 0.2°C, mainly due to solar radiation near the Equator.

4. Changes in the atmospheric CO2 follow changes in global air temperature and global air temperature follows changes in ocean surface temperature.

5. The COVID-related drop in GHG emissions have no perceptible effect on the atmospheric CO2. It confirms that natural sinks and sources for atmospheric CO2 far outweigh human contributions.

The cover letter to Dr. Lee concludes with this critical observation:

“You may recall that, in 2010, the InterAcademy Council carried out an independent review of the IPCC procedures at the request of the then UN Secretary-General and IPCC Chairman. Among its recommendations were that reviewerscomments be adequately considered by the authors and that genuine controversies be adequately reflected in IPCC reports. The AR6 SPM inspires little confidence that these recommendations have been put into effect.”

The message of the CLINTEL/ICSF critique tells us loud and clear that the SPM seriously overstates and misrepresents the science, with a glaring bias toward unsupported anthropogenic global warming (AGW). The SPM describes a political make-belief world! The CLINTEL/ICSF critique also confirms that it is about time that the emphasis in climate science be shifted from theoretical modeling to climate imaging. See my article here

To quote Professor Berkhout: Let the data Speak.