Sometimes, I think journalists that work for the Guardian have mental health issues. This is one of those times. When you call natural atmospheric feedback processes (which BTW aren’t completely known and quantified yet, only modeled and in wide range of possible value) “Earth’s climate monsters” , it’s not just irresponsible journalism, it’s crazy talk.

Earth’s climate monsters could be unleashed as temperatures rise

As a UN panel prepares a report on 1.5C global warming, researchers warn of the risks of ignoring ‘feedback’ effects

his week, hundreds of scientists and government officials from more than 190 countries have been buzzing around a convention centre in the South Korean city of Incheon.

They are trying to agree on the first official release of a report – the bit called the Summary for Policymakers – that pulls together all of what’s known about how the world might be affected once global warming gets to 1.5C.

What will happen to coral reefs? How will extreme weather events and droughts change? What about heatwaves? And then, what are the different “pathways” that economies could choose to keep temperatures to 1.5C?

On Monday morning, the summary document is expected to be released, and there will be a cascade of headlines around the world.

The report, being pulled together by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, was one tiny part of the Paris climate change agreement.

As things stand, if you add up all the things that the 190-plus countries have committed to do as part of that Paris deal, global temperatures will probably go well above 3C.

We’re already at 1C of warming, so the extra half a degree isn’t far away – many scientists will say it’s already locked in, while others say there are plausible ways to stabilise temperatures at that level.

But in August, one of the world’s leading scientific journals – the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences – published a “perspective” article that has become known as the “hothouse earth” paper.

There was no new science in the paper and while it was speculative, it did raise fundamental questions about the ability of governments around the world to stop the Earth from spiralling into a “hothouse”.

(bold mine) Full story here (if you want to bother)

“Speculative spiraling”. Yes, surely a “monster” in the minds of journalistic snowflakes like Readfearn. Better check under the bed, as more tangible “climate monsters” like Al Gore and Rajenda Pachauri might be hiding there.

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