The 2nd edition of my short book Disasters and Climate Change is being published this week by the Consortium for Science, Policy and Outcomes at Arizona State University, in their series, The Rightful Place of Science.The substantially updated and revised edition includes the following:
- Updated data from official government sources on trends in extreme temperatures, extreme precipitation, tropical cyclones, floods, drought and tornadoes.
- A summary of the conclusions of the most recent IPCC reports on extreme events.
- Documentation of the most recent peer reviewed science on trends in global disaster losses.
- A summary of the conclusions of the 2017 US National Climate Assessment on extreme events.
- Data on progress with respect to the UN SDG goal of reducing disaster losses as a proportion of global GDP.
- A discussion of the move within some parts of the scientific community to abandon the IPCC framework for detection and attribution (for extremes) towards a far less rigorous approach emphasizing partial event attribution.
- My experiences being investigated by a member of the US Congress, appearing in Wikileaks as the target of a campaign to silence me, and ultimately receiving the full support of my campus leaders as I have largely departed the climate field (but not entirely!).
- A broader discussion of the deeply pathological politics of climate policy and what it will really take to move in the direction of practical action, not just angry debates.
- Updated data from BP on trends in global carbon free energy consumption and the continuing expansion of fossil fuels.
The issue of disasters and climate change is fully politicized and draws a lot of heat.
With this short book I seek to shed some light.
The book will be available this week at Amazon.
If you are a journalist or would like an advance copy for reviewing purposes, just send me an email.
Roger Pielke Jr. 