A major climate change study published in the prestigious scientific journal Nature has been withdrawn, sending ripples through the research community and the broader debate over climate risks. Nature is one of the world’s most influential peer-reviewed journals and has long been a gold standard for scientific credibility. Its decision to retract a high-profile paper is rare, and it immediately sparked discussion about how climate science should be communicated and evaluated.
What the Study Claimed
The retracted study was led by Leonie Wenz and Maximilian Kotz of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany, along with coauthor Anders Levermann. Their work attempted to measure how rising temperatures and changes in rainfall have affected economic growth over the past four decades. By analyzing data from around 1,600 regions worldwide, they evaluated factors such as agricultural yields, labor productivity and long-term infrastructure damage.
Their most dramatic claim was that global economic output would fall by 62 percent by 2100 under a high-emissions scenario. This figure was far more dire than other respected forecasts and quickly gained global attention. It was cited by the U.S. Congressional Budget Office, the World Bank and the Network for Greening the Financial System, a coalition of central banks that use climate forecasts for tools such as stress tests.
Why the Study Was Retracted
Shortly after publication, outside researchers began noticing problems. The most serious issue came from economic data for Uzbekistan between 1995 and 1999 that had been included in the model. When critics removed the Uzbekistan data, the projected economic decline by 2100 dropped sharply from 62 percent to 23 percent. In August, the critics published their findings in Nature.
Another researcher, Christof Schötz of the Technical University of Munich and also affiliated with the Potsdam Institute, raised additional concerns. He argued that the study failed to account for important correlations between regions that share similar economic or environmental characteristics. According to Schötz, this omission made the uncertainty in the original analysis so large that the results were “statistically insignificant when properly corrected.”
In response, Wenz and Kotz agreed that the problems were too substantial to fix through a normal correction. “These changes are too substantial for a correction of the original article in Nature,” Wenz said. Nature then followed its formal review process and confirmed the retraction. Karl Ziemelis, a senior editor at the journal, said the top priority was “to uphold the integrity of the scientific record.”
What the Revised Analysis Shows
Although the original paper has been withdrawn, the authors have released revised results that make more conservative claims. They now estimate a 17 percent drop in global income by 2050 rather than 19 percent. Their earlier claim that there was a 99 percent chance that climate damages would exceed the cost of resilience efforts by midcentury has been reduced to 91 percent. These updated figures have not yet been peer reviewed.
Even with lower projections, the group maintains that the overall conclusion remains unchanged. Kotz told reporters that climate change will still be enormously damaging, especially for low-income regions that contribute little to global emissions. Wenz noted that the broader research literature consistently finds large negative economic effects from climate change, and that these impacts outweigh the cost of mitigation.
Broader Implications for Climate Science
The retraction has renewed debate over how to model long-term climate risks. Some experts argue that unusually extreme results should be treated with skepticism. Stanford professor Solomon Hsiang said that even before the retraction, most researchers believed that a 20 percent global economic loss by 2100 was already extremely high. A claim more than triple that amount naturally raised concern.
Others warn that climate damages may still be underestimated. Economist Timothy Neal recently published work suggesting a 40 percent global income loss by 2100 if emissions remain high, arguing that traditional models do not fully capture ripple effects such as wildfire smoke, sea-level impacts on housing or cross-country economic shocks.
Some researchers also worry about credibility. Lint Barrage of ETH Zurich said the controversy raises the risk that scientists may appear to be pushing for large estimates rather than following the evidence. “If your goal is to try to make the case for climate change, you have crossed the line from scientist to activist, and why would the public trust you?” she said.
Others take a different approach. Noah Kaufman of Columbia University argues that instead of trying to predict the entire global economy decades in advance, researchers should focus on practical questions such as how to decarbonize while keeping electricity affordable.
How the Retraction Affects the Climate Debate
Though the withdrawn study temporarily added confusion, most experts say it does not change the general understanding of climate risks. Schötz himself stated that there remains “a broad scientific consensus regarding the severe negative economic effects of climate change.” Climate economist Gernot Wagner echoed this, noting that real-world climate costs are already visible in rising home insurance premiums and other economic stresses.
Still, the incident highlights the importance of accuracy in models that influence governments, central banks and regulators. Some of these institutions used the original study in their forecasting tools and must now adjust their assumptions. The Network for Greening the Financial System has added a disclaimer to its materials until it updates its models.
The authors of the retracted paper say they will submit a revised version for peer review. Nature continues to review concerns as part of its standard process, and the broader scientific community is reexamining how best to incorporate uncertain long-term climate impacts into economic forecasting.
Even with the retraction, the fundamental conclusion shared by scientists remains consistent. Climate change is already harming the global economy, the damage is likely to grow, and the world’s poorest regions stand to suffer the most. What has changed is how precisely those impacts should be measured and how much confidence policymakers should place in any single forecast.
FAM Editor: This is a major problem with the entire climate change agenda, papers like this are published without proper review and the non-scientific world uses it to attempt to move money in their direction. So much of this is fake, so much of this based on unlikely assumptions and the cherry picking of data that the issue has lost credibility.
