A brief overview uncertainties in climate change projections and their consequences for impact assessment

Abstract:

Using as an entry-point a recent study that quantified the risk of global crop production slowdown due to anthropogenic warming in the next couple of decades, I will talk about approaches to characterizing uncertainties in future climate projections; I will highlight the hurdles and challenges in translating characterization into quantification; and I will offer some examples of methodologies in the literature. I hope to span, with this overview, the space of assumptions that I consider crucial to any formal analysis of climate projections and their effects on human or natural systems.