Hans von Storch

Dr. Hans von Storch

	Director emeritus of Institute for Coastal Systems (previously Institute of Coastal Research) of the Helmholtz-Zentrum Hereon in Geesthacht (previously: Helmholtz-Zentrum Geesthacht - Zentrum für Material- und Küstenforschung, and even earlier: GKSS Research Center)
	Professor at the Meteorological Institute and member of the Faculty of Social Sciences of the University of Hamburg
	Foreign member of Polish Academy of Sciences
	Doctor honoris causa of Göteborgs Universitet
	Guest professor of Ocean University of China
	Editor in Chief of Oxford University Press Research Encyclopedia on Climate Science
	Recipient of Östersjöfondens pris 2014
	Lead author of the IPCC WGI of AR3, and WGII of AR5
	Recipient of the Officer's Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany (Bundesverdienstkreuz 1. Klasse)

News	peer reviewed publications	conferences, public talks
on Hans von Storch	other publications	books
intellectual achievements	Brückner-Preis	Beiträge in Zeitungen
adresses	story of the Climate Research affair in 2003	Weblog Klimazwiebel
中文简介	ResearcherID J-4165-2012: h = 60	Kolumne Globkult: Zur Sache Klima
Academia.edu	ORCID
Speaker Agentur	Der digitale Hamburger Donaldist	Statements

News

Books of Hans von Storch

20. September 2023 - The manuscript "The Stochastic climate model helps reveal the role of memory in internal variability in the Bohai and Yellow Sea", coauthored by Lin L. (林璘), H. von Storch, and Chen X., (陈学恩) has been accepted for publication by Communications Earth & Environment.
The abstract reads: Hasselmann's theory elucidates how short-term random noise leads to longer-term unprovoked variations, i.e., red spectra. Here, we study ensembles of numerical model simulations of the hydrodynamics of the Bohai and Yellow Sea concerning internal variability formation. Short(/long) term variations are associated with small(/large) spatial scales, and the internal variability of long-term temporal and large-scale variations is markedly enhanced, even without external forcing on these scales, when the tides are turned off. This pattern is well explained by Hasselmann's theory. A critical element in this theory is the concept of memory, which in our ensembles exhibits a scale dependence that aligns with the scale-dependent nature of redness. Additionally, this framework clarifies why there is a significant reduction of long-term fluctuations during winter and when tides are active: the system's memory is notably diminished under these conditions.

7. September 2023 - Welt TV führt ein life-Interview mit Hans von Storch zur Häufung von Extremen Niederschlägen in Südeuropa, was allerdings als zum Thema "Bias in den Wissenschaftsmagazinen"angekündigt war.

7. September - Peter Amenda interviewt Hans von Storch für BILD: Klimawissenschaftler geht auf Klima-Politik der Ampel los - Tragisch verdaddelt durch Selbstüberschätzung.

7. September 2023 - The 320 pages-anthology Science in Society: Societies, Climate Change and Policies by Stehr, N., and H. von Storch has been published by World Scientific Publishing Europe Ltd. doi: 10.1142/q0399
The book is characterized by "Hans von Storch and Nico Stehr, the authors of this anthology, reflect on the popular and scientific perception and construction of the phenomenon of climate, climate change, climate policy and the impact of climate on society. In the early 1990s, the authors encountered notable resistance to the idea of climate change, especially as they wrote about the urgent need for societal adaptation. Something is wrong with our planet, and it is obvious that this has to do with human conduct. Many, if not the majority, of countermeasures to climate impacts require the innovative capacity of science and technology. However, the translation of scientific knowledge into society is not an automatic or autonomous force. Moving science into society is subject to economic, political, and cultural constraints - a central issue of the book.
Nico Stehr is a sociologist specializing in the theory of modern society and the sociology of knowledge; Hans von Storch is a mathematician and is also a physical climate scientist. Since the authors "inhabit" rather different scientific cultures, their collaboration is genuinely exemplary of transdisciplinary work. The book documents the interdisciplinary path and the wide range of themes that has occupied Nico Stehr and Hans von Storch during more than three decades of joint research and writing, which continues to benefit current research and reflection on the interrelation between nature, democracy, society, governance, and climate."

28. August 2023 - Hans von Storch's forword to Jon Naustdalslids book The Climate Threat. Crisis for Democracy? has now been published by Springer Publisher.

After one month, "news" are moved to this archive.

Events

5. Dezember 2023 - MITKlartext, Mittelstands- und Wirtschaftsunion Krefeld
Vortrag

28. September 2023 - Universidad de Colima, México
Climate science as a social process - history, climatic determinism,Mertonian norms and post-normality"

8-12 January 2024 - Winter School Dealing Professionally with Climate Change Issues, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, online

Hans von Storch is interested in coastal climate and impact (wind, storm surges and waves) in recent times and in possible futures, and methodical issues of statistical climatology (such as detection and attribution of anthropogenic climate change, or utility of proxy data). He is also engaged in joint research with social and cultural scientists since many years.

Hans von Storch has published 20 books, and numerous articles. He is associate editor of Journal of Climate, and a member of the review board of Advances in Climate Change Research (the official journal of the Beijing Climate Center), and of the Advisory Board of Atmosphere. In Poland, he serves on the editorial boards of Oceanologia, and the "Papers on Global Change, IGBP", and in Italy on the Scientific Advisory Panel of CMCC.
He chaired the publication of the 1st and 2nd BACC report and of the 1st and 2nd "Klimabericht für die Metropolregion Hamburg" (see here). After having served as a Lead Author for Working Group I of IPCC TAR, he acted as a Lead Author of Chapter 2 "Foundations of Decision Making" of Working Group II of IPCC AR5.

Hans studied mathematics, physics and Danish at the University of Hamburg, and received a diploma in mathematics in 1976. While a student he also worked as a programmer at the Department of Oceanography. He went on to receive his Ph.D. from the Meteorological Department of the University of Hamburg in 1979, and his "Habilitation" in 1985. From 1987 - 1995, he was Senior Scientist and leader of the "Statistical Analysis and Modelling" group at the Max Planck-Institut for Meteorology (Hasselmann division). During 1996-2015, Hans von Storch was a director of what became later the Institute for Coastal Research at the GKSS Research Centre (now Helmholtz Zentrum Hereon, after many years as Helmholtz Center Geesthacht) and professor at the Meteorological Institute of the University of Hamburg. Later he became also a member of the Faculty of Economic and Social Sciences at that university. Within the Institute for Coastal Research, he headed the division "Systems Analysis and Modelling" until September 2015. In October 2008, he was awarded a doctor h.c. by Göteborgs Universitet, and in May 2013 he was elected a foreign member of the Polish Academy of Sciences. His efforts in generating knowledge about climate dynamics and change, and in communication with the public was recognized by the bestowal of the Officer's Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany (Bundesverdienstkreuz 1. Klasse) in 2019.

He is married to Prof. Dr. Jin-Song von Storch (徐劲松).

During his academic life, which began in about 1971, Hans von Storch made a number of intellectual achievements. (Werner Krauss wrote a nice subjective piece about his role and his achievements; see also Sven Titz' "Klimawissenschaft zwischen Skylla und Charybdis" in NZZ, 27. January 2010. An overview of work is also given by the citation of the IMSC achievement award "to recognize his key contributions to statistical downscaling, reconstruction of temperature series, analyses of climatic variability, and detection and attribution of climate change". Laudatio by Senator K. Fegebank on the occasion of presenting the "Bundesverdienstkreuz". The Hamburger Abendblatt included him in its series Menschlich gesehen in 2010. (See also Quotes.)
See also the web-of-science based Researcher ID or the Google Scholar citation tool

The invention of the "downscaling"-terminology and the first examples of using the statistical variant of this approach for the construction of climate change scenarios. (Details)

Also in the field of downscaling: introduction of the spectral nudging technique for usage in mainly reconstructing regional climate across decades of years but also for scenario construction. (Details) Hans von Storch was among the first, who demonstrated that numerical experiments with regional models need signal-to-noise analysis, just as global model experiments do. (Details)

Assessing changing storminess, and marine implications (surges, waves) in Europe. Also subsynoptic storms are addressed, among them Polar Lows.(Details)

Implementation the rather abstract concept of Principal Oscillation Patterns of Klaus Hasselmann for routine analysis and prediction purposes. (Details)

In the early 2000s, the debate about historical variations of climate was widely suppressed by gatekeeping, with the claim that the "hockeystick" would already describe the past millennium with good accuracy. A simulation study using ECHO-G millennium simulations demonstrated that the methodology behind the "hockeystick" was flawed. The publication of this result lead to the end of the unfortunate blockage which had prevailed so far. (Details)

Joint work with social scientists allowed Hans von Storch to embed the practice of climate science and its interaction with public, media and politics into concepts such as "post-normal science". This has significant practical implications, such as the insight that even if reduction of emissions may be morally superior but the exclusive focus on it would be misleading when the unavoidable need for early planning of adaptive measures is at the same time neglected. (Details) From these insights followed also the initiative to develop regional climate services (see next items).

Initiating assessments of scientific knowledge about climate and climate change in specific regions, such as the Baltic Sea catchment (BACC), the metropolitan region of Hamburg, and the North Sea. As a first, an assessment of the scientifically legitimate knowledge about climate, climate change and climate impact in the Baltic Sea Region (BACC) ws concluded in 2008 with the publication of a extensive book, under the leadership of Hans von Storch, organized by the BALTEX secretariat (Hans-Jörg Isemer, Marcus Reckermann). As a second a similar report was published about the metropolitan region of Hamburg in 2010. (Details)

The issues of post-normal science, assessment reports, building science-stakeholder dialogs and regional reconstructions of climate are elements of a practical concept, named Regional Climate Service. Different from conventional concepts, a key element is the recognition of knowledge competetion in public and political decision processes, and of climate science being a social practice embedded in a cultural milieu. (Details)

Bilder der Küste: Mapping different views, perceptions and conceptualizations of "coast", together with cultural scientists.(Details)

Personal accounts of experiencing the changing conditions, ideas and moods of clinate research, provided by interviews with important scientific personalities in the field. (Details)

Participation at special editorial projects
- Post-Normal Science: The Case of Climate Research, Nature and Culture, Volume 7, 2 (Jun 2012), https://www.berghahnjournals.com/view/journals/nature-and-culture/7/2/nature-and-culture.7.issue-2.xml
- Special issue of ATMOSPHERE: "Storms, Jets and Other Meteorological Phenomena in Coastal Seas", 2018, and
- Modelling, Simulating and Forecasting Regional Climate and Weather, Volume II" at FRONTIER, 2022
- Fishing for human perceptions in coastal and island marine resource use systems at FRONTIER in Marine Research, 2016 ff

Address

Kirchenallee 23
20099 Hamburg
Germany

e-mail: hvonstorch(at)web.de
cellular: +49-171 212 2046
skype: hvonstorch

Impressum: Hans von Storch, Kirchenallee 23, 20099 Hamburg, +49 40 41924472, hvonstorch(at)web.de
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