{"id":438563,"date":"2026-04-10T11:12:55","date_gmt":"2026-04-10T18:12:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=438563"},"modified":"2026-04-10T11:12:57","modified_gmt":"2026-04-10T18:12:57","slug":"no-bbc-disaster-losses-cant-be-tied-to-climate-change","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=438563","title":{"rendered":"No, BBC, Disaster Losses Can\u2019t Be Tied to Climate Change"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The BBC piece (and similar coverage) promotes a narrative unsupported by the empirical record on disaster losses. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Stanford study\u2019s trillions are hypothetical model outputs, not observed damages from storms or floods. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

As Pielke and the IPCC have long documented, societal choices\u2014where and how we build\u2014drive the dollar figures far more than greenhouse gases on climate timescales.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Better journalism would distinguish modeling from measurement and highlight what we can control: smarter land-use, resilient infrastructure, and adaptation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s far more immediate and effective than blaming every insurance claim on \u201cclimate change.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The data, not the headlines, supports the ClimateRealism headline.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

_____________________________________________________________________________________<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

From ClimateRealism<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Anthony Watts<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The recent British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) Science Focus publication\u00a0\u201cThe US is now paying more than any other country for climate change damage, study suggests,\u201d<\/a>\u00a0claims that the United States is \u201cnow paying more than any other country for climate change damage,\u201d citing a study estimating $16.2 trillion in U.S. losses since 1990. This is a fabricated falsehood. Decades of peer-reviewed research on disaster losses show no detectable long-term trend in normalized weather-related losses attributable to human-caused climate change and the BBC is wrongly conflating weather with climate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The BBC based its story on a\u00a0study from researchers at Stanford University<\/a>, who write \u201c[c]limate change is causing measurable harm globally.\u201d They admit that no research links loss and damages from extreme weather to climate change; a gap in knowledge they attempt to remedy by applying politically motivated,\u00a0flawed social cost of carbon estimates<\/a>\u00a0to econometric models tying carbon dioxide emissions to aggregate economic output in simulations of what output might have been had the Earth not warmed slightly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The study\u2019s model-derived GDP estimates don\u2019t, as the BBC story implies, represent documented observed damages. \u00a0There is a critical distinction between econometric modeling and real-world loss data.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Roger Pielke Jr., Ph.D., in his 2023 comprehensive review \u201cClimate Change and Disaster Losses<\/a>,\u201d surveyed the peer-reviewed normalization literature and found overwhelmingly that increases in reported disaster losses are explained by increased exposure, wealth, and development\u2014not by climate change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That is not a fringe claim. It reflects the dominant conclusion in existing scientific literature.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As Pielke explains in the\u00a0abstract of his 2020 paper<\/a>, understanding disaster losses requires separating climatic changes from societal changes. When losses are \u201cnormalized\u201d to account for inflation, population growth, and expanded infrastructure, the upward trends largely disappear. His review examined 54 normalization studies published between 1998 and 2020 and found \u201clittle evidence to support claims that any part of the overall increase in global economic losses documented on climate time scales is attributable to human-caused changes in climate.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Also in his publication, Pielke summarizes the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change \u00a0(IPCC)\u00a0Fifth Assessment Report<\/a>\u00a0(AR5) conclusion that \u201closs trends have not been conclusively attributed to anthropogenic climate change.\u201d That statement alone directly contradicts the BBC\u2019s framing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The visual tables Pielke published in his 2023 review, particularly the normalization summary table (seen below,) demonstrate that across hurricanes, floods, extratropical storms, tornadoes, and wildfire, the majority of peer-reviewed studies report no detection of trends in normalized losses and no attribution to greenhouse gas emissions.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

In fact, as updated through 2023, Pielke identifies 62 relevant normalization studies worldwide, and 61 of them make no claims of attribution. Normalization is essential because economic losses increase as societies become wealthier and more built out. A hurricane striking Florida today hits vastly more property than one striking the same coastline in 1950 or earlier. That does not mean the storm is stronger. It means there is more damage because more people have populated coastal areas and more real estate infrastructure exists there compared to decades before. Florida\u2019s population was just over\u00a02.7 million in 1950, but exceeded 23 million by 2024<\/a>. The number of homes in Florida has grown from roughly 600,000 in 1950 to over 10 million today, leading to a much\u00a0higher density of assets in high-risk coastal areas<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In a\u00a02022 substack post<\/a>, Pielke showed how different Miami beach has become in just under 100 years, and how much more infrastructure exists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Pielke published a\u00a0second peer-reviewed paper in 2024<\/a>\u00a0in the scientific journal\u00a0Nature<\/em>, and included this graph below.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

That downward trend is an overwhelming scientific fact against the position the BBC holds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The BBC article\u2019s trillions-of-dollars claim rests on counterfactual GDP modeling, not on normalized disaster loss data. It extrapolates temperature\u2013GDP relationships and then assigns financial liability across countries. That approach assumes temperature deviations directly and measurably suppresses economic output in a way that compounds over decades. It does not isolate actual disaster damages; it models hypothetical economic worlds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In contrast, normalization studies examine real disaster loss data adjusted for societal growth. When that is done, long-term trends largely vanish.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pielke is explicit that the lack of detection or attribution in disaster losses does not deny climate change. It simply reflects what the empirical literature shows. There is no statistically robust signal in normalized disaster losses that can be attributed to greenhouse gas emissions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is entirely consistent with the\u00a0IPCC Sixth Assessment Report<\/a>\u00a0(AR6), which continues to acknowledge large uncertainties in linking aggregate economic losses to anthropogenic climate change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Observed normalized disaster losses do not support the claim that the United States is uniquely \u201cpaying more than any other country\u201d due to climate change. The growth in economic losses over time is overwhelmingly explained by growth in wealth and exposure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When peer-reviewed normalization studies are examined collectively, the pattern is clear. There is no detectable, attributable upward trend in disaster losses driven by greenhouse gas emissions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In fact, U.S. GDP has grown considerably during the recent period of slight global warming. The opposite should be the case if climate change was causing multi-trillion dollar economic losses. In fact, the study can\u2019t tie a single extreme weather event explicitly to human emissions or the losses that were incurred. The losses are all in computer simulations, not borne out in the real world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Presenting trillion-dollar model outputs as settled economic fact is bad journalism and the BBC should be ashamed for presenting such easily falsified rubbish as fact. That\u2019s the true disaster here.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Better journalism would distinguish modeling from measurement and highlight what we can control: smarter land-use, resilient infrastructure, and adaptation. That\u2019s far more immediate and effective than blaming every insurance claim on \u201cclimate change.\u201d The data, not the headlines, supports the ClimateRealism headline.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":121246920,"featured_media":438565,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[691831336,691818056,691819743,691842214,691834208,691842215],"class_list":["post-438563","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-british-broadcasting-corporation-bbc","tag-climate-change","tag-climate-propaganda","tag-disaster-losses","tag-roger-pielke-jr-2","tag-science-focus-publication","fallback-thumbnail"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/0-No-BBC-Disaster-Losses-Cant-Be-Tied-to-Climate-Change.jpg?fit=1168%2C784&ssl=1","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paxLW1-1Q5B","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":294439,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=294439","url_meta":{"origin":438563,"position":0},"title":"Major U.S. Disaster Database That Was Quoted by President Biden as Proof of Climate Change is Slammed as an \u201cEgregious Failure of Scientific Inquiry\u201d","author":"uwe.roland.gross","date":"01\/10\/2024","format":false,"excerpt":"The findings from this database have fuelled climate alarm for decades, and it is widely quoted by scientific journals, media and politicians.","rel":"","context":"In \"Attribution studies\"","block_context":{"text":"Attribution studies","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?tag=attribution-studies"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/00tornado-supercell-evening-stock.jpg?fit=1200%2C847&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/00tornado-supercell-evening-stock.jpg?fit=1200%2C847&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/00tornado-supercell-evening-stock.jpg?fit=1200%2C847&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/00tornado-supercell-evening-stock.jpg?fit=1200%2C847&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/00tornado-supercell-evening-stock.jpg?fit=1200%2C847&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":289743,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=289743","url_meta":{"origin":438563,"position":1},"title":"Climate \u201cLoss and Damage\u201d: Political, Not Scientific\u00a0Notion","author":"uwe.roland.gross","date":"12\/03\/2023","format":false,"excerpt":"Draft resolution on a \u2018loss and damage fund\u2019 has attracted more than $400 million, but climate-vulnerable countries say more cash is needed. 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