The magazine of the european research area European Commission Copenhagen, a missed chance?

CLIMATE MODELS

   

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16 research

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eu No. 63 | APRIL 2010

SPECIAL REPORT

 CLIM

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to the multi-model scale of the project. “Before, 

it was possible to say, for example, that the 

number of storms could increase by 20 % by 

a certain date. Today we can say that 95 % of 

the results show that the increase in storms will 

be between 5 % and 20 %,” explains Gregor 

Leckebusch, a climatologist at the Berlin Institute 

of Meteorology.  

Paul van der Linden believes that the crea-

tion of this model constitutes major progress for 

the climate modelling community. “For the first 

time, we have probabilities, and researchers can 

now turn to this database to run their models.”  

But the fact remains that there is nothing 

like reality to test the very best models. The 

summer shrinking of the Arctic ice cap in 

recent years, for example, was only present at 

the very end of the previous model scenarios. 

This raises fears that we are underestimating 

the rate of climate change and must again 

revise the predictions.