Thread by @RogerPielkeJr

🧵New normalization paper

Franzke, C. L. (2021). Towards the development of economic damage functions for weather and climate extremes. Ecological Economics, 189, 107172.
doi.org/10.1016/j.ecol…

Comprehensively validates (again) the normalization literature

Short thread...

Economic damage from weather extremes has increased around the world as wealth & exposure have grown

But normalized for GDP, damage is down sharply

This is great news

This trend holds in Africa

This trend holds in Asia

This trend holds in Europe

This trend holds in North America

This trend holds in Central America

This trend holds in South America

This trend holds in Oceania

The paper concludes
"normalized damages have downward trends for all continents"
Why?
Wealth growing faster than damage
& improved adaptation to weather/climate

The analysis is fully consistent with my recent review of normalization studies

Pielke, R. (2021). Economic ‘normalisation’ of disaster losses 1998–2020: a literature review and assessment. Environmental Hazards, 20(2), 93-111.
doi.org/10.1080/174778…

I reviewed 54 normalization studies, most at the regional level and for specific phenomena & found little evidence for increasing normalized losses anywhere

This is great news!

Combine these analyses with evidence of decreasing vulnerability worldwide & across phenomena

Formetta, G., & Feyen, L. (2019). Empirical evidence of declining global vulnerability to climate-related hazards. Global Environmental Change, 57, 101920.
doi.org/10.1016/j.gloe…

FF2019 show that the world has become comprehensively less vulnerable to weather and climate extremes ... it is not a close call or dependent upon tricky methods

This is great news!

Study after study report findings completely at odds with media, policy & celebrity scientists discussions of weather and climate extremes

I do wonder how long this huge gap between evidence & spin can last ... it's already lasted way longer than I'd have guessed!

Now you know