Dec 4, 2025 02:40 PM
https://www.wsj.com/science/environment/..._permalink
EXCERPTS: A widely cited study on economic damage from climate change was retracted Wednesday following criticism from peers. [...] The estimate was much more severe than other forecasts, prompting scrutiny of the underlying data.
[...] The study examined historical data from some 1,600 regions worldwide over the past four decades to project how changes in temperature and precipitation would affect economic growth, including factors like agricultural yields, labor productivity and infrastructure.
However, after the study was published, other researchers found that economic data from one country—Uzbekistan—during a short time from 1995 to 1999 had skewed the results. Without Uzbekistan, the 2100 damage forecast fell to 23%, not 62%. The researchers published their critique in Nature in August.
Another researcher who wasn’t involved in the original work, Christof Schötz, said the results were more uncertain than the study suggested and published a separate critique in Nature in August.
The study had been cited by the U.S. Congressional Budget Office, the World Bank and the Network for Greening the Financial System, or NGFS, a coalition of central banks from which the Federal Reserve withdrew this year.
[...] Central bank models of the economic impacts of climate change could have far-reaching implications. If these models show impacts are going to be much worse than previously thought, regulators could make banks set aside more capital to buffer against potential losses associated with assets exposed to climate change, according to Ely Sandler, a researcher at the Harvard Kennedy School.
Scientists noted that despite problems with the data in this study, there is still scientific agreement that climate change hurts the world economy... (MORE - missing details)
EXCERPTS: A widely cited study on economic damage from climate change was retracted Wednesday following criticism from peers. [...] The estimate was much more severe than other forecasts, prompting scrutiny of the underlying data.
[...] The study examined historical data from some 1,600 regions worldwide over the past four decades to project how changes in temperature and precipitation would affect economic growth, including factors like agricultural yields, labor productivity and infrastructure.
However, after the study was published, other researchers found that economic data from one country—Uzbekistan—during a short time from 1995 to 1999 had skewed the results. Without Uzbekistan, the 2100 damage forecast fell to 23%, not 62%. The researchers published their critique in Nature in August.
Another researcher who wasn’t involved in the original work, Christof Schötz, said the results were more uncertain than the study suggested and published a separate critique in Nature in August.
The study had been cited by the U.S. Congressional Budget Office, the World Bank and the Network for Greening the Financial System, or NGFS, a coalition of central banks from which the Federal Reserve withdrew this year.
[...] Central bank models of the economic impacts of climate change could have far-reaching implications. If these models show impacts are going to be much worse than previously thought, regulators could make banks set aside more capital to buffer against potential losses associated with assets exposed to climate change, according to Ely Sandler, a researcher at the Harvard Kennedy School.
Scientists noted that despite problems with the data in this study, there is still scientific agreement that climate change hurts the world economy... (MORE - missing details)
