‘A sideways look at climate research’ — Weather column (1990)

By Selectra UK | Article reviewed and updated by Cornelia Zavoianu, Selectra Energy Expert | Updated 11 July 2026 | 3 min read

This is ‘A sideways look at climate research’, a short column published in February 1990 in Weather, the magazine of the Royal Meteorological Society. In it, the author reflects candidly on the culture and funding of climate science.

A sideways look at climate research (Weather, February 1990)

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What this document is

The two-page column is a personal, reflective piece published under the ‘Weather Column’ heading in the Royal Meteorological Society’s magazine.

Its author voices worries about scientists over-promising on climate solutions in pursuit of funding, about the rush for new supercomputers, and about whether such claims could rebound on the field and undermine support for long-term climate monitoring and ecosystem research. It draws an analogy with how long numerical weather forecasting took to become reliable.

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