NIWA needs new climate models before new computer

2 September 2009 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

NIWA needs new climate models before a costly new super-computer

“It is a national scandal that NIWA are squandering $12.7 million of taxpayers’ hard earned money on yet another supercomputer.” This comment today from Bryan Leyland, chair of the economics panel of the New Zealand Climate Science Coalition.

“In spite of buying a Cray T3A supercomputer several years ago, their predictions of the climate have been spectacularly wrong. They failed to predict the 1998 El Nino event, the cooling that has been noticeable since 2002 and the increased cooling that has been recorded over the last two years.

“NIWA’s predictions of the climate this winter were spectacularly wrong. They predicted a mild winter and we got an extremely cold one. Then they failed to predict that August would be unusually warm. Over the years, their three months ahead projections have been of little value to man or beast.

“What this tells us is that there is something fundamentally wrong with the climate models that they are using in their existing computer. The $12.7 million new computer will simply give them more wrong answers even faster than before. It will do nothing to solve the fundamental problem - that, all over the world, climate models have dismally failed to predict the climate,” continued Mr Leyland

“Rather than blow more millions of taxpayers money on yet another computer, especially in a period of financial restraint, NIWA should take a hard look at its own dismal record and also take a hard look at recent and compelling evidence from Australasian climate scientists that world temperatures are primarily driven by the Southern Oscillation Index which is related to the El Niño effect. Existing climate models cannot predict the next El Niño more than a few months ahead. Therefore they are worthless.

“NIWA should also take notice of the better than 80% accuracy of weather predictions produced by Piers Corbyn at Weather Action in the United Kingdom. For several years, he has successfully predicted severe weather events in United Kingdom months in advance and recently he has expanded this to hurricane prediction in the Caribbean Sea, the Pacific and Indian Oceans. Before NIWA get any money for yet another supercomputer they should be forced to explain exactly why a small organisation with desktop PCs has consistently outperformed all the supercomputers running climate models all over the world.

“To many climate scientists, the answer is obvious. Piers Corbyn bases his predictions on solar effects, not man-made greenhouse gases. It is high time that NIWA gave up its greenhouse gas induced delusions and followed suit,” Mr Leyland concluded.

Ends

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