POLITICO admits UN’s worst-case modeling predictions (RCP8.5) were designed to scare nations into climate action: ‘High-emissions scenario was always viewed as an unlikely outlier to help galvanize policymakers to reduce greenhouse gases’

https://www.eenews.net/articles/climate-change-alarms-are-flashing-washington-isnt-paying-attention/

By Zack Colman

Key excerpt:

The shift in Washington has been driven by President Donald Trump, who has for years dismissed climate change as a hoax, and even sought as recently as last weekend to discredit the IPCC as “WRONG! WRONG! WRONG!” in a social media post.

That message was a response to last week’s announcement by the IPCC that it will not consider the worst-case emissions pathway known as Representative Concentration Pathway 8.5, or RCP8.5, in its next synthesis of climate science because it no longer appears plausible. But that high-emissions scenario was always viewed as an unlikely outlier to help galvanize policymakers to reduce greenhouse gases.