THB Insider #12

Lots of great stuff to share today! First, some things for everyone before the paywall.

• As 2024 winds down, I’ll soon post my evaluation of my projections for 2024 from the THB 2024 Office Pool — Ha, I did not do great! Look out for the THB 2025 Office Pool before we put 2024 to bed.

• I’ve just posted a new preprint, which follows up discussions here at THB. I have just heard back from the journal where it is submitted and I am currently revising the paper (including cleaning up typos!) so your comments are invited. The paper will be published along with a response by an author of one of the papers that misuses the ICAT “dataset.” Here is the title, abstract, and a link to the full paper:

  • Do Not Use the ICAT Hurricane Loss “Dataset”: An Opportunity for Course Correction in Climate Science

    • Abstract: A fatally flawed time series of U.S. hurricane losses put together by an insurance company has found its way into analyses published in the peer-reviewed literature. The flawed time series is based on research that I and my colleagues published almost two decades ago. The uncritical use of the time series has led to erroneous conclusions in research which then were repeated in important climate science assessments. This paper explains the origin of the flawed dataset and demonstrates its many biases. While mistakes happen in science, what matters more is what we in the community do when mistakes are discovered.

• If you haven’t subscribed to the new newsletter of the AEI Center for Technology, Science, and Energy — which I am a part of! — what are you waiting for? Sign up here.

• I’m thinking about doing a Q&A post before the end of the year, so if you have any questions for me, please enter them in the comments and I’ll take the best for the post (and answer others in the comments).

OK, let’s get to the good stuff, after the jump . . . ...