Climate Projections

Climate projections help us to understand how the earth’s climate will change in the future. These ‘climate forecasts’ are created by teams of scientists who use computer models and observations from around the world to simulate the earth’s climate system. 

However, climate projections are always uncertain because we don’t know what human emissions will be in the future. It is also difficult to summarise the earth’s complex climate system into a set of mathematical equations contained in a computer model. Our ambition is to improve the next generation of climate projections. 

The process of developing a climate model is a long-term task, involving continuous updates and tests to improve our computer simulations. We regularly evaluate our climate model performances by comparing the computer-simulated projections with real-world measurements of the atmosphere. And, we have the expertise to fine-tune and update the climate models behind the projections.

We manage the UKESM climate model, which has created the UK’s first all-in-one earth system model, and we are working to share our climate projections with other international models.