Science Panel Supports Research Linking Climate Change to Extreme Weather

A leading scientific advisory group in the United States has released a report endorsing the burgeoning field of science that aims to hold oil, gas, and coal companies accountable for damage related to extreme weather. This field, known as extreme event attribution, addresses the question of how climate change amplifies recent heat waves, downpours, droughts, or wildfires.

Scientists have long recognized that global warming, caused by greenhouse gas emissions from burning fossil fuels, intensifies certain kinds of extreme weather. However, it is only in the last twenty years that they have developed tools to precisely determine how global warming influences specific weather events in specific locations.

The report, issued by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, stops short of advising on how to incorporate attribution science into policy and legal frameworks. Yet, it suggests that findings from this research could play a role in various legal processes. For instance, a $50 billion lawsuit against oil companies in Multnomah County, Oregon, referenced an attribution study. The study determined that the record-breaking summer heat wave of 2021 in the Pacific Northwest would have been almost impossible without human-induced climate change.

As more states and municipalities pursue similar lawsuits, critics from the fossil fuel sector have accused scientists conducting these analyses of being biased against oil companies. This week, Energy in Depth, a project of the Independent Petroleum Association of America, a lobbying entity, claimed that the report from the National Academies should be perceived as part of a “litigation campaign.”

The report highlights that methods for extreme event attribution have progressed greatly in recent years. Scientists now employ advanced techniques and have access to improved data, which enables them to assess with increased certainty the role of human activity in causing specific weather events, such as extreme heat.