BBC Largest Climate Change Prediction Experiment

Join in the largest climate change prediction experiment ever, developed by climate scientists for the BBC using the Met Office climate model.

Trying to predict climate change is difficult due to various factors involved – air temperature, sea temperature and cloud cover etc. Scientists can use large supercomputers but even the biggest supercomputers are not enough. So they want to want to use your computer’s spare processing power.

Some excerpts of how this works-

“Using a technique known as distributed computing, we’re hoping to harness the power of thousands of PCs around the world. If 10,000 people sign up, we’ll be faster than the world’s biggest computer. And we’re hoping to be even better than that.”

“All we’re asking you to do is download a simple programme, which doubles as a screensaver. Once you’ve installed it, your computer will take care of the rest. You don’t have to send us anything. You don’t have to enter any data.”

“The experiment works by making use of your spare processing power. All you have to do is use your computer exactly as you normally would, and the programme will run calculations in the background. When it’s done, it will send results back to scientists in Oxford, who will combine everyone’s results. The more people who take part, the more complete their predictions about the future climate will be.”

You can Take part in the experiment by downloading your own individual climate model software. Read the FAQ for more information and queries.