A fundamentally flawed study that claims to lack scientific evidence of the climate crisis should be retracted from the peer-reviewed journal in which it was published, a leading climate scientist told AFP.

Appeared earlier this year European Physics Journal PlusThis study aims to examine data on changes in the frequency or intensity of rainfall, cyclones, tornadoes, droughts, and other extreme weather events.

It has been viewed thousands of times on social media and cited by some mainstream media outlets such as Sky News Australia.

“Based on observational data, according to many sources, the climate crisis we are experiencing today is not clear,” reads a 20-page summary of the study.

All four prominent climate scientists contacted by AFP said the study was badly manipulating the data, but they weren’t aware of it.

“This paper appears to have been written specifically to argue that the climate crisis does not exist, rather than present an objective, comprehensive and up-to-date assessment,” said the head of climate impact research at the UK Met Office. author Richard Betts said. .

The authors ignored the authoritative Intergovernmental Report on Climate Change (IPCC) report released months before their study was submitted to Springer Nature, Betts noted. .

“Man-made climate change is already affecting many weather and climate extremes in all regions of the world,” concludes the IPCC in its report.

“Observed changes in extreme events such as heat waves, heavy rains, droughts and tropical cyclones, especially the evidence that they are due to human influence, have strengthened since the last report eight years ago.” the report said.

Friederike Otto, a senior climatologist at the Grantham Institute for Climate Change and the Environment, said: “They are writing this article with bad intentions.

“climate skeptic”

“They don’t have a section on heatwaves” — mentioned only incidentally — “the observed trends are incredibly clear,” Otto said.

A peer-reviewed paper by four Italian scientists will be published in January 2022 in one of more than 2,000 journals published by Springer Nature, one of the world’s most prestigious scientific publishers. rice field.

Springer Nature said it “cannot comment at this time” when asked to explain why the study, which apparently contradicts current climate science, passed peer review and was published.

First author Gianluca Alimonti is a physicist at the Institute for Nuclear Physics. The three co-authors are agrometeorologist Luigi Mariani and physicists Franco Prodi and Renato Angelo Ricci.

Stefan Lamstorff, Earth System Director at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, said the study was “written by people who do not work in the field of climatology and who are clearly unfamiliar with the topic and related data.” said.

“This is not published in climate journals. This is a common step taken by ‘climate skeptics’ to avoid peer review by true experts in the field.”

“They simply ignore research that doesn’t fit their story and come to the opposite conclusion.”

All four experts consulted by AFP suggested the study should never have been published in the first place, two of whom asked for it to be withdrawn.

“I don’t know the journal, but if it’s self-respecting, it should retract the article,” said Rahmstorf.

Peter Cox, a professor of climate system dynamics at the University of Exeter, said the study was “scientifically not good”, but removing the article from the journal would “lead to further publicity and be presented as censorship”. I feared that there is a possibility.

Otto shared this concern, but still said the study should be denied.

“If a journal is interested in science, it should loudly retract the publication, saying it should not have been published.”

Betts didn’t go so far as to call for a retraction, distinguishing between taking the best of the data and outright fraud.

© 2022 AFP