“Glaciers in the Himalaya are receding faster than in any other part of the world (see Table 10.9) and, if the present rate continues, the likelihood of them disappearing by the year 2035 and perhaps sooner is very high if the Earth keeps warming at the current rate. Its total area will likely shrink from the present 500,000 to 100,000 km2 by the year 2035 (WWF, 2005).”

which is as we all know, utter nonsense and not a typo. the wwf, 2005 is here

http://assets.panda.org/downloads/himalayaglaciersreport2005.pdf

It was not a typo. After that it went to hundreds of reviewers, none whom knew anything about glaciology. The 90% probability was invented. There is no evidence the glaciers will be gone by 2350 unless you have a good cite?

That is not the worst criticism and I never claimed it was. There was a lot worse in Chapter I about glaciers (with which I am familiar). Claiming global warming is backed up because a list of 5 Greenland glaciers are receding (out of several thousand) is scientific fraud plain and simple.

One of the major criticisms of the IPCC is that it relied so heavily on campaigning documents from WWF for its ‘science’ rather than academic papers. That is the true source of the 2035 as you can see if you follow the IPCC references. This ‘grey’ literature is heavily used but ONLY if it paints a catastrophic picture.

You raise a good point about the opportunity costs of letting coastal settlements flood, protecting them or stopping anthropogenic climate change. I suggest the first and second options are the cheapest by many orders of magnitude.

The IPCC mistake was a typo, the date should have been 2350, out of over 3000 pages, that is the best criticism you can come up with. Actually that isn’t the worst mistake from the IPCC. It was the their whole approach to sea level rise, the papers that were coming out as the Fourth assessment report was being produced were suggesting that sea level rise was going to be significantly higher than what the IPCC was projecting, but because the IPCC likes to have papers to have been published for a while to have had time for criticism to be included in the report these new projections were left out and unfortunately since the Fourth IPCC assessment report was published the projections for sea level rise have all been on the upside.

In terms of how our coastal cities are able to deal with sea level rise whether or not sea levels rose at a rate of 40 mm per year at the end of the last ice age is irrelevant, we didn’t have millions of people with that huge amount of capital invested in the cities where they live to defend. How is this a relevant argument. The important point is whether or not it is cost effective to do something about climate change, defend our coastal cities, or just allow the cities to be flooded and relocate millions of people.

I would suggest that the IPCC is too conservative in its projections because of the typical reticence of the scientists involved, when they don’t appreciate how their caution will be interpreted.

Cornwall Tories simply dont care