The impacts
of climate change on freshwater systems and their management are mainly due to the
observed and projected increases in temperature, sea
level and precipitation variability (very
high confidence).
Such solecisms throughout the IPCC's assessment reports (including the insertion, after the scientists had completed their final draft,
of a table in which four decimal points had been right - shifted so as to multiply tenfold the
observed contribution
of ice - sheets and glaciers to sea -
level rise), combined with a heavy reliance upon computer models unskilled even in short - term projection, with initial values
of key variables unmeasurable and unknown, with advancement
of multiple, untestable, non-Popper-falsifiable theories, with a quantitative assignment
of unduly
high statistical
confidence levels to non-quantitative statements that are ineluctably subject to very large uncertainties, and, above all, with the now - prolonged failure
of TS to rise as predicted (Figures 1, 2), raise questions about the reliability and hence policy - relevance
of the IPCC's central projections.