Climate models predict the main features of future climate
There have been major advances in the development and use of models over the last 20 years and the current models give us a reliable guide to the direction of future climate change.
Computer models cannot predict the future exactly, due to the large number of uncertainties involved. The models are based mainly on the laws of physics, but also empirical techniques which use, for example, studies of detailed processes involved in cloud formation. The most sophisticated computer models simulate the entire climate system. As well as linking the atmosphere and ocean, they also capture the interactions between the various elements, such as cryosphere (ice) and geosphere (land).
Climate models successfully reproduce the main features of the current climate (e.g. rainfall in the map below), the temperature changes over the last 100 years, the Holocene (6,000 years ago) and Last Glacial Maximum (21,000 years ago).
Current models enable us to attribute the causes of past climate change, and predict the main features of the future climate, with a high degree of confidence. We now need to develop the models to provide more regional detail of the impacts of climate change, and a more complete analysis of extreme events.
