4-9 September 2022, Bonn, Germany
EMS Annual Meeting Abstracts
Vol. 19, EMS2022-586, 2022
https://doi.org/10.5194/ems2022-586
EMS Annual Meeting 2022
© Author(s) 2023. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Unpacking the logics of physical climate storylines

Marina Baldissera Pacchetti1, Liese Coulter2, Suraje Dessai1, Theodore Shepherd3, Jana Sillmann4, and Bart Van Den Hurk5
Marina Baldissera Pacchetti et al.
  • 1University of Leeds, Sustainability Research Institute, Earth and Environment, Leeds, United Kingdom of Great Britain – England, Scotland, Wales
  • 2Faculty of Environment and Sustainability Royal Roads University, CA
  • 3Department of Meteorology, University of Reading, UK
  • 4Center of International Climate Research, Oslo, NO
  • 5Deltares and VU University, NL

The Physical Climate Storyline (PCS) approach is increasingly recognized by the research community as a tool to produce and communicate decision-relevant climate risk information. While PCS is generally understood as a single concept, different methodologies are applied according to the aims and purposes of the approach. To unpack this diversity of detail, this paper gives an overview of the key methodological practices and assumptions, i.e. the “logics” that are associated with variants of the PCS approach. We analyze physical climate storylines as both a product and a process and recognize that (i) those who build the storylines (e.g. physical climate scientists, interdisciplinary groups of scientists, or transdisciplinary groups of scientists and societal stakeholders) and (ii) the purpose for which these storylines are built (e.g. improving scientific understanding or communicating information) influence key features of the methodology (process) and hence key features of the storyline (product). We note that PCS can have cognitive aims, i.e. aims related to the pursuit of knowledge and hence promote cognitive values, and non-cognitive aims, i.e. the practical, social and ethical aims of the knowledge that is produced, and hence promote non-cognitive values. We then examine how value judgements are implicitly or explicitly included in the aims and construction of PCS. We conclude the discussion by suggesting that the PCS approach can further mature (i) in the way it incorporates the narrative element, in particular in trans- and multi-disciplinary contexts, (ii) in the way it incorporates value judgments, and (iii) in the way that the evidence chosen to build PCS constrains what is considered plausible.

How to cite: Baldissera Pacchetti, M., Coulter, L., Dessai, S., Shepherd, T., Sillmann, J., and Van Den Hurk, B.: Unpacking the logics of physical climate storylines, EMS Annual Meeting 2022, Bonn, Germany, 5–9 Sep 2022, EMS2022-586, https://doi.org/10.5194/ems2022-586, 2022.

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