Taylor, AL, Dessai, S and Bruine de Bruin, W (2015) Communicating uncertainty in seasonal and interannual climate forecasts in Europe. Philosophical Transactions A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences, 373 (2055). 20140454. ISSN 1364-503X
Abstract
Across Europe, organizations in different sectors are sensitive to climate variability and change, at a range of temporal scales from the seasonal to the interannual to the multi-decadal. Climate forecast providers face the challenge of communicating the uncertainty inherent in these forecasts to these decision-makers in a way that is transparent, understandable and does not lead to a false sense of certainty. This article reports the findings of a user-needs survey, conducted with 50 representatives of organizations in Europe from a variety of sectors (e.g. water management, forestry, energy, tourism, health) interested in seasonal and interannual climate forecasts. We find that while many participating organizations perform their own ‘in house’ risk analysis most require some form of processing and interpretation by forecast providers. However, we also find that while users tend to perceive seasonal and interannual forecasts to be useful, they often find them difficult to understand, highlighting the need for communication formats suitable for both expert and non-expert users. In addition, our results show that people tend to prefer familiar formats for receiving information about uncertainty. The implications of these findings for both the providers and users of climate information are discussed.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © 2015, The Authors. Published by the Royal Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/4.0/, which permits unrestricted use, provided the original author and source are credited. |
Keywords: | Seasonal climate forecast; decadal prediction; communicating uncertainty; risk communication; Europe |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Leeds |
Academic Units: | The University of Leeds > Faculty of Business (Leeds) > Management Division (LUBS) (Leeds) The University of Leeds > Faculty of Environment (Leeds) > School of Earth and Environment (Leeds) > Sustainability Research Institute (SRI) (Leeds) |
Funding Information: | Funder Grant number EU - European Union 284369 EU - European Union 308291 |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Publications |
Date Deposited: | 26 Aug 2015 09:43 |
Last Modified: | 13 Nov 2015 16:12 |
Published Version: | http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsta.2014.0454 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Royal Society, The |
Identification Number: | 10.1098/rsta.2014.0454 |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:87423 |