{"id":446485,"date":"2026-05-25T13:20:13","date_gmt":"2026-05-25T20:20:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=446485"},"modified":"2026-05-25T13:20:15","modified_gmt":"2026-05-25T20:20:15","slug":"ssp5-8-5-garbage-in-doomcasting-out","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=446485","title":{"rendered":"SSP5-8.5: Garbage In, Doomcasting Out"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

From Watts Up With That?<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Guest Post by<\/em><\/strong> Willis Eschenbach<\/a> (@WEschenbach on X, and my blog is here.)<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

You might have read about RCP8.5, which is now called SSP5-8.5. It is the most extreme future scenario proposed by the IPCC. You might also have read that it is being thrown in the trash can.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finally, you may have seen claims from the usual suspects that the death of SSP5-8.5 is because we\u2019ve been so gosh-darned successful in reducing CO2 emissions. Gavin Schmidt\u2019s RealClimate blog (where I\u2019ve been banned for a couple of decades now) mentions the effects of \u201cthe Montreal Protocol, the Clean Air Acts, renewable energy price falls, fracking, the Paris Agreement, actual climate policies\u201d<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"
Figure 1. The inexorable rise of atmospheric CO2. If emissions were dropping as the usual suspects claim, the rise would be slowing.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

But some imagined drop in emissions is not the reason that SSP5-8.5 was killed. That hasn\u2019t happened. Here\u2019s a detailed look at the changes in the trajectory of the atmospheric CO2.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"
Figure 2. Actual atmospheric CO2 concentration, and the calculated acceleration of the concentration.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

There\u2019s been no change in the progression of atmospheric CO2. SSP5-85 died because it was alarmist nonsense from Day One, and the IPCC is finally admitting that obvious fact.

SSP5-8.5 is an economic fairy tale commissioned around 2011 for the IPCC, stitched together by a crew of modelers told to imagine how to drive CO\u2082 emissions into the stratosphere by 2100. The task was not \u201cwhat\u2019s likely?\u201d<\/em>, but \u201cwhat would it take to get the highest plausible emissions you can mathematically torture out of the system?\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

To get there, they had to run history backwards. Instead of continuing the observed move away from coal toward oil, gas, and non-fossil energy, they assumed a huge global lurch back to coal, with coal use multiplying several-fold so that by the end of the century, roughly half of all energy on Earth comes from coal alone.<\/strong> Not just for electricity either\u2014coal-to-liquids for cars and planes, as though the world looked at cheaper, cleaner competition and said: \u201cNo thanks, bring me more soot.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even that wasn\u2019t enough. So population growth, which in the real world has been slowing, gets dialed up to around 11\u201312 billion people by 2100, right out near the high end of speculative projections.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That still wasn\u2019t enough. So technological progress in energy efficiency, which has been marching along for decades, is assumed to more or less stall, so we keep wasting energy like there\u2019s no tomorrow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And on top of that, the scenario simply supposes that meaningful climate policy never really bites anywhere that matters\u2014no sustained global effort to bend the emissions curve for the rest of the century.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

String all of that together, and you get SSP5-85: a \u201cfossil-fueled development\u201d storyline where coal dominates, population balloons, innovation sputters, and policy sleeps.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It may or may not have been useful as a stress test of the climate system under extreme forcing. But as a picture of where the real world is actually headed, it depended on a long list of things all going wrong, all at once, for a very long time\u2014which is precisely why the common practice of treating it as \u201cbusiness as usual\u201d was alarmist storytelling, not science.

And telling these stories has caused real damage. SSP5-8.5 has been the backbone for all the exaggerated claims of sea level rise, extreme weather, and upcoming Thermageddon\u2122. It has been put forward as the main argument for the insane \u201cNet Zero\u201d policies bankrupting the nations foolish enough to sign on to them. It has caused no end of trouble.

So don\u2019t believe the merchants of doom and the serial failed doomcasters. SSP5-8.5 was garbage from the start, and that\u2019s why it was thrown out. Nothing to do with fancied changes in emissions, and everything to do with the fact that it was designed as a propaganda tool.

However, don\u2019t think we can rest on our laurels. The usual suspects will just latch onto the next most alarmist scenario, SSP3-7.0, which is only slightly better \u2026 you see, the problem is that the mainstream climate scientists are caught in the Sinclair Trap, viz:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.\u201d<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

My best to all on a foggy night here in the forest on a hill,

w.

Oh, yeah:<\/strong> When you comment, please do everyone a favor and QUOTE THE EXACT WORDS YOU ARE DISCUSSING. I can defend my own words. I can\u2019t defend your restatement of my ideas.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

You might have read about RCP8.5, which is now called SSP5-8.5. It is the most extreme future scenario proposed by the IPCC. You might also have read that it is being thrown in the trash can.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":121246920,"featured_media":446487,"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_seo_schema_type":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_wpcom_ai_launchpad_first_post":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":[691843275,691829997,691818153,691818362,691821642,691838747,691818154,691842983,691820252],"class_list":["post-446485","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-business-as-usual-2","tag-carbon-dioxide-co","tag-climate-models","tag-climate-policies","tag-ipcc-intergovernmental-panel-on-climate-change","tag-ipccs-rcp8-5-model-scenario","tag-net-zero","tag-ssp5-8-5","tag-thermageddon","fallback-thumbnail"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paxLW1-1S9n","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":442178,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=442178","url_meta":{"origin":446485,"position":0},"title":"RCP8.5 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These high-end emissions scenarios assumed massive, continued growth in coal use and very high forcing (~8.5 W\/m\u00b2 by 2100), leading to ~3\u20135\u00b0C+ warming by 2100 in many models. Critics (including Vahrenholt) have long called them unrealistic \"business-as-usual\" portrayals\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Article 20a GG (environmental protection)\"","block_context":{"text":"Article 20a GG (environmental protection)","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?tag=article-20a-gg-environmental-protection"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/0-IPCC-Quietly-Buries-Its-Own-Climate-Catastrophe-Scenarios.jpg?fit=784%2C1168&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/0-IPCC-Quietly-Buries-Its-Own-Climate-Catastrophe-Scenarios.jpg?fit=784%2C1168&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/0-IPCC-Quietly-Buries-Its-Own-Climate-Catastrophe-Scenarios.jpg?fit=784%2C1168&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/0-IPCC-Quietly-Buries-Its-Own-Climate-Catastrophe-Scenarios.jpg?fit=784%2C1168&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x"},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/00-ChatGPT-SSP5-8.5-Garbage-In-Doomcasting-Out.png?fit=1536%2C1024&ssl=1","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/446485","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/121246920"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=446485"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/446485\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":446501,"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/446485\/revisions\/446501"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/446487"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=446485"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=446485"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=446485"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}