It’s all up on Watts Up now.
What Anthony Watts and Evan Jones have revealed is breathtaking, a must see. Half of the warming trend has gone. 92% of the artificial rise was due to” erroneous adjustments of well sited stations”. Muller et al used an older siting classification system. The new classification system shows that siting does have a major impact on the data.
We always knew thermometers were never meant to be stuck next to air-conditioners. Now we know they shouldn’t be recording global warming near airports either.
[Art thanks to: Cartoons by Josh]
Go and Visit Watts Up and enjoy!
I’ll be posting my own analysis with graphs and information soon.
This is one of those blockbuster moments when the pieces come together. For Anthony it’s five years work, and overturns so many studies all at once. This graph rather sums it all up. Raw well placed thermometers recorded 0.15C per decade. Badly sited thermometers recorded 0.25C, and adjusted ones recorded 0.3C! Fully twice the warming trend.
Figure 19 – Comparisons of regions and gridded values for all CONUS compliant stations, all CONUS non-compliant stations, and final USHCNv2 adjusted CONUS data
—————————————————-
PRESS RELEASE – July 29th, 2012 12PM PDT – FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
A reanalysis of U.S. surface station temperatures has been performed using the recently WMO-approved Siting Classification System devised by METEO-France’s Michel Leroy. The new siting classification more accurately characterizes the quality of the location in terms of monitoring long-term spatially representative surface temperature trends. The new analysis demonstrates that reported 1979-2008 U.S. temperature trends are spuriously doubled, with 92% of that over-estimation resulting from erroneous NOAA adjustments of well-sited stations upward. The paper is the first to use the updated siting system which addresses USHCN siting issues and data adjustments.
The new improved assessment, for the years 1979 to 2008, yields a trend of +0.155C per decade from the high quality sites, a +0.248 C per decade trend for poorly sited locations, and a trend of +0.309 C per decade after NOAA adjusts the data. This issue of station siting quality is expected to be an issue with respect to the monitoring of land surface temperature throughout the Global Historical Climate Network and in the BEST network.
Today, a new paper has been released that is the culmination of knowledge gleaned from five years or work by Anthony Watts and the many volunteers and contributors to the SurfaceStations project started in 2007.
This pre-publication draft paper, titled An area and distance weighted analysis of the impacts of station exposure on the U.S. Historical Climatology Network temperatures and temperature trends, is co-authored by Anthony Watts of California, Evan Jones of New York, Stephen McIntyre of Toronto, Canada, and Dr. John R. Christy from the Department of Atmospheric Science, University of Alabama, Huntsville, is to be submitted for publication.
The pre-release of this paper follows the practice embraced by Dr. Richard Muller, of the Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature project in a June 2011 interview with Scientific American’s Michael Lemonick in “Science Talk”, said:
I know that is prior to acceptance, but in the tradition that I grew up in (under Nobel Laureate Luis Alvarez) we always widely distributed “preprints” of papers prior to their publication or even submission. That guaranteed a much wider peer review than we obtained from mere referees.
The USHCN is one of the main metrics used to gauge the temperature changes in the United States. The first wide scale effort to address siting issues, Watts, (2009), a collated photographic survey, showed that approximately 90% of USHCN stations were compromised by encroachment of urbanity in the form of heat sinks and sources, such as concrete, asphalt, air conditioning system heat exchangers, roadways, airport tarmac, and other issues. This finding was backed up by an August 2011 U.S. General Accounting Office investigation and report titled: Climate Monitoring: NOAA Can Improve Management of the U.S. Historical Climatology Network
All three papers examining the station siting issue, using early data gathered by the SurfaceStations project, Menne et al (2010), authored by Dr. Matt Menne of NCDC, Fall et al, 2011, authored by Dr. Souleymane Fall of Tuskeegee University and co-authored by Anthony Watts, and Muller et al 2012, authored by Dr. Richard Muller of the University of California, Berkeley and founder of the Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature Project (BEST) were inconclusive in finding effects on temperature trends used to gauge the temperature change in the United States over the last century.
Read the whole press release on Watts Up.
Watts and Nova are Legends of the 21st Century for their tireless work.
00
In this case it’s Anthony that deserves all the credit. Years of work has gone into this. Thank him not me! Jo
00
I seem to remember that you have both won Webby awards?
“Different paths may be taken, but wisdom, peace, and serenity are always the destination”
00
Agreed but many here in Australia would not have found out about WUWT without you!
00
You obviously were not hanging about weather forums. Without WUWT I wouldn’t have discovered Jo!
10
Anthony did yeoman’s work, to be sure. But let’s not forget his co-authors and others who helped him along the way; I’m sure he isn’t.
10
Satellite records match the ground based records so closely that these claims are clearly nonsense.
Perhaps, seeing Anthony has done all the hard work, Jo could explain why the satellite records show the same degree of warming as the ground based records.
hot little meteorites perhaps?
00
“Poorly sited station trends are adjusted sharply upward, and well sited stations are adjusted upward to match the already adjusted poor stations”. Oops.
“Well sited rural stations show a warming early three times greater after NOAA adjustment is applied”. Oops^2
Surely head must roll at NOAA over this … ?
00
10 to 1 they’ll try to rationalize it away.
00
I wonder did Noah feel the need to exaggerate the Great Flood.
00
LMAO – Do you think that is where the precedent originated?
00
If not Noah then repeated telling would be enough. Hey! that’s just like the global warming story, isn’t it?
00
It was creationism wot done it m’lud
00
Sounds like a very Intelligent Design.
00
Different NOAA altogether 🙂
00
Hey, about 15000 to 1000 years ago, sea levels rose very rapidly, even to flooding the Black Sea (or what was originally there). This was the start of human civilization … as we know it … and therefore I suggest this is the source of the many Flood Mythologies. Remember, even biblically, Mount Ararat, in Turkey no less (not far from the Black Sea) was where the Ark landed, as it were.
00
yep
00
My understanding is that the adjustments previously made were appropriate for the method opf categorising of station previously considered to be appropriate.
It is only now, with a new gold standard for station quality being applied, that the catastrophic effect of this previous mis-categorisation of stations is being recognised.
The paper relies on standard, mainstream statistical methods (rather than innovative adjustments) and a new gold standard metghod of categorising the stations (Leroy 2012) has previously endorsed as the current gold standard by the WMO.
So these results will not easily be dismissed.
Hopefully they will lead to debate amongst proper scientists about proper science rather than what we have had previously.
00
No, adjustements were unjustified, just lots of handwaving. Watts’s et al paper states that the inclusion of low quality data, and the manner it was included, elevated the temperatures of all sites, including those producing quality data. AND THEN, after that, there is still a mystery why the temperatures were further increased after NOAA “adjustments”.
00
To use an analogy.
[1] You have two buckets of water, one clean (the well sited stations), one dirty (the poorly sited stations).
[2] You are told that you have to produce two buckets of clean water.
[3] You tip and mix the water together until both buckets are the same.
[4] Wallah! – Your done.
Now the Alarmists need to drink their own water.
00
‘Wallah!’ is a literal phonetic translation for Voila! – which is a french word roughly meaning ‘there you go’.
00
Il y a vous alez
00
wallah – see that! ou peut etre – see there!
00
Anthony Watts et al. deserves a GOLD MEDAL for their work.
It seems that NOAA and BEST should be disqualified from this race….
“…with 92% of that over-estimation resulting from erroneous NOAA adjustments of well-sited stations upward…”
Well, that`s the USA Sorted..
Hmmmm, I wonder if our own BOM is feeling guilty ??
00
BEST has been outclassed by the WEST (Watts Earth Surface Temperature study).
00
I’d give him a Nobel if that rize hadn’t been tainted so …
00
Certain Nobel s are now being used as a promotional device to encourage certain ways of thinking, rather than as a well earned reward for the recipient. Sometimes embarrassingly so.
00
“Poorly sited station trends are adjusted sharply upward, and well sited stations are adjusted upward to match the already adjusted poor stations”.
This is the problem in a nutshell. They wanted warming… so they just warmed everything up. Easy!
“Man made global warming” indeed…
00
So Heartland and so many others have been right all along. Whaddaya know?
It should stop a lot of the nonsense cold in its tracks but probably won’t.
Good job and BRAVO to all who contributed to the work.
00
Another gem:
“Airport USHCN stations show a significant differences in trends than other USHCN stations, and due to equipment issues (1) and other problems, may not be representative stations for monitoring climate (2).”
(1) People who have, or currently do, work in aviation, have repeatedly pointed out that (a) equipment at avionic sites are specialised for use, and consequently not compliant with NOAA standards; and
(2) Equipment at airport sites are calibrated to accurately reflect the surface air temperature directly above the runway, since modern jet aircraft must allow for heat thermals during landing, and to a lesser extent, during takeoff.
The fact that they are still being used is another indictment on NOAA.
00
Blimey. That has to be the fastest Joshing ever.
How Josh created this cartoon , within minutes of Anthony’s announcement is quite astounding, unless he was in on the editorial already.
As for Anthony’s findings. More than twice the reported warming across the US, attributable to siting. Blimey !
I can hardly wait to see how the warmists try to squirm and spin on this one.
And as for the effect on the rest-of the world’s readings …
Popcorn anyone ?
00
Well, they are simply going to have to adjust the temperature records somewhere else (Mongolia?) to compensate.
It is, after all, the global average temperature that is important.
00
Oh, this is pivotal; its not such much the data itself, rather the analysis, assumptions, conclusions, research and ultimately funding that are based off this data which are at real risk.
Think about it – if someone comes along and fundamentally and absolutely kicks the ground out from under your dependent or grant cited research using very defendable and repeatable techniques – its back to ground zero. Your reason for doing is gone.
This is one elephant that will refuse to go under the carpet.
00
There must be thousands of papers that relied on the original adjusted data…
What happens to those papers?
00
Suitable for starting the fireplace I’m sure.
00
Brilliant point.
Love seeing foundations crumble.
00
Anthony certainly is having his pound of flesh here. Do you remember how he was pissed off by the treatment he received by Muller, the BEST guy, by pre-releasing something without Anthony’s consent, although h contributed and had his name used?
00
Wasn’t aware of that but he certainly used it to justify his early release.
looked like there was something behind it
🙂
00
The Warmistas will state that the US is only 2% of the world’s surface (land? or total? .. not sure myself) therefore this article is not significant. They will then go out and perform a mock inspection of all the other stations in the world and say .. “Yep, we were right, and we have used Watts et al. methodology as well. Even, it’s worse than we thought. The US is an outlier, the world is scorching to death”.
The out-right-liars must be outed.
00
I am not sure that line of argument is going to work very well.
Because if they want to argue that the US is different to the rest of the world, they are going to have to show that the datasets are entirely separate, and admit that the same “high standards” of adjustment have not been applied to other datasets. Worse case scenario (for them) from this line of reasoning is that they will have to release their code in support their position.
Wouldn’t that be a sad state of affairs?
00
Remember Australia’s BOM record meets worlds best practice…. according to NOAA. 😐
00
Very droll. That wouldnt be BEST practise would it ?
Isn’t that what to do when not very good at something… best practise.
00
Another very solid brick in the wall of hard fact about the scam.
The concoction that has been Man Made Global Warming could not have been exposed without sites like this.
Here, people have pushed and shoved ideas and knowledge around to come up with a fair and reasonable assessment of Global Warming claims but
what has been startling is the exposure of the duplicity of so many people and Governments.
The mixture of Science, Politics, Money, Power and need to Control and Manipulate has taken a lot of unraveling but from now on nobody who
has had their hand in our pockets should feel safe.
They will be exposed.
Thanks to JO for providing the forum needed to explore.
KK
00
Agree KK.
It is sites like this that keep me coming back to my computer!
Otherwise I would have thrown the damn thing in the bin years ago!! 🙂
00
“Poorly sited station trends are adjusted sharply upward, and well sited stations are adjusted upward to match the already adjusted poor stations”
….And that’s just in the U.S…..
00
The Urban Island Heat Effect has certainly been used to create the appearance of Global Warming but a simple analysis helps to see why using
temperatures from city areas is not representative of the worlds climate.
If every city and town in the world was placed side by side and all were butted up together and if they could all be placed in one spot on
the surface the result is interesting.
This mass of cites would fit inside the borders of one country, Spain.
While this is not a thermal analysis, it does give some perspective to how unrepresentative those temperatures are which have been taken
inside city areas.
KK
10
And UHI is not just “urban”,IMO, with altered patterns of land use providing artificial “warming” also in rural areas, as well as semi-rural, small villages beoming townships, and suburbia sprawl all representing small incremental changes in temperature independent of CO2 induced alleged rises. Then adding artificial adjustments to this data which are not justified to inflate trends effectively makes a mountain out of a molehill.
I now look forward to Tristan, JB and Adam Smith’s mea culpas about Anthony Watts disagreeing with Muller and BEST purely because he didn’t like the results of the study. It is now completely plain and clear with this analysis that Anthony Watts was sold a big “dummy” (in Rugby parlance) by a scientist he initially trusted to be objective, a wolf in sheep’s clothing if ever there was one. And now that wolf has been effectively unmasked, and the scale of his deception is apparent. Nice to be vindicated, isn’t it. So where are the trolls, then? I think a little crow is on the menu at “Chez Alarmiste” tonight.
10
I hate to be cynical but reading this stuff will do that to you. Just remember, those august persons have not been heard from yet. 😉
00
They are all probably out shopping right now – buying a brand new spinning top, a credibility stretcher, and a bigger megaphone.
00
Good outline Winston.
Wasn’t aware of the dirty deed done to Anthony but the comment about early release now takes on more significance.
The old saying “hell hath no fury like a —- ” could, in this case, become:
“Hell hath no fury like a SCIENTIST who’s been used”.
Anger provides a lot of energy – wow!
Not sure about the use of that apostrophe but I’m sure GA or Tristan will correct it.
🙂
00
I think he just took a chainsaw to the Global Warming Tree of knowledge.
TIMBER!
Well Done
00
MadJak, you say here:
Maybe now we’ll get to see some real tree rings!!!
Tony.
00
Excellent assesment of this at Roger Pielke snr’s site. With objective if somewhat scathing comments on Muller and BEST. Really worth a read.
00
Should have added this link. http://pielkeclimatesci.wordpress.com/
00
ColdinOz (yes – isn’t it)
Thanks for the link – note this absolute classic:
“Indeed, this type of analysis should have been performed by Tom Karl and Tom Peterson at NCDC, Jim Hansen at GISS and Phil Jones at the University of East Anglia (and Richard Muller). However, they apparently liked their answers and did not want to test the robustness of their findings.”
I have always said (here & elsewhere) that in the end the truth will out.
“It is error alone which needs the support of government. Truth can stand by itself.” ~Thomas Jefferson, Notes on Virginia
Cheers,
00
My takeaway points:
1. A generalized surface warming trend is real, although this trend appears to have begun to reverse around 1997.
2. The surface warming this century was overstated by a factor of about two.
3. Atmospheric warming still isn’t being recorded, the tropospheric hot-spot still hasn’t been found, etc.
So this isn’t “no warming”. This is “sloppy science” and biased assumptions” from those with either a career or political axe or both to grind.
I believe many of those mistakes will have been honest ones. And that’s the thing: it’s easy to fool yourself especially when self-interest is at stake.
00
The belief that one is right is incompatible with the conduct of science.
Sloppy non-science results. The training of scientists in schools and places of supposedly higher education inculcates practices that tend to confirm, rather than discover what is wrong with current methods; where nature doesn’t fit theory. The teaching IME, seldom deals with the assumptions and uncertainties of the scientific hypotheses, theories, laws and rules. Some fail to grasp that the assumptions, etc. are simplifications to aid in trying to explain underlying component principles.
When undergraduates do lab reports, the results have to fit the theory, or they risk failing the course. A scientist would simply do the experiment as carefully as possible and record the results, analysing the divergence from theory/hypothesis.
I think it was Feynman who said that if the results of an experiment don’t “surprise”, then you’ve done it wrong.
00
Good comment Bernd.
00
The key point is surface warming is real. It doesn’t mean GHGs are the cause of this surface warming.
00
Sir Paul Nurse, President of the Royal Society has recently come out to ask scientists to forget impartiality and agitate for political change: http://hauntingthelibrary.wordpress.com/2011/07/05/impartiality-in-science-cast-aside-political-activism-and-attacks-on-sceptics-now-called-for/
The fight is out in the open now. Science got hijacked by Trotskyites like Nurse.
IPCC Climate Science is a piss-poor scientific fraud cloaked in pseudo-complexity. There is no possible CO2-AGW. The positive feedback was deliberately engineered by exaggerating IR into the lower atmosphere by a factor of 5 and offsetting it by exaggerated cloud albedo cooling. Result; correct average temperature, evaporation over sunlit oceans rockets.
00
The most telling result in Watts’ analysis is that his estimate for the temperature trend closely matches that measured by sattelite sensing. This is hugely important; when two radically different methods of measurement give roughly the same results, it gives one confidence that the results are likely to be correct.
00
Excellent point RCS – well done.
00
Yep, this was the first thing I noticed when I read through the article.
Josh should make a cartoon showing the Aqua satellite and a big mercury thermometer holding hands, smiling, and dancing/skipping, with the caption
“Satellites and Thermometers together at last!”
Chances we’ll see the “WEST” temperature series displacing “BEST” on WoodForTrees.org ? virtually nil.
00
That is exactly right. In addition the methodology from Leroy, while simple is also elegant because it focuses on the temperature effects and sources. By comparison the Muller Jacknife method is flawed because it covers a non-temperature indice, height above sea level, to distinguish site micro-effects.
There is no doubt BEST is flawed as Jeff Id’s great critique shows.
BEST however is not going to lie dowm; their latest temperature analysis says this:
This statement is extraordinary as Lord Monckton has noted in a previous post; for instance the declaration that “The good match between the new temperature record and historical carbon dioxide records suggests that the most straightforward explanation for this warming is human greenhouse gas emissions” when combined with this “the Berkeley Earth team was able to conclude that over 250 years, the contribution of solar activity to global warming is negligible” is astounding and contradicted by such AGW luminaries as Mann and Schmidt.
00
Sorry Mods! When I copied that BEST press release I left in all their junk links!
Here is comment without links:
That is exactly right. In addition the methodology from Leroy, while simple is also elegant because it focuses on the temperature effects and sources. By comparison the Muller Jacknife method is flawed because it covers a non-temperature indice, height above sea level, to distinguish site micro-effects.
There is no doubt BEST is flawed as Jeff Id’s great critique shows.
BEST however is not going to lie dowm; their latest temperature analysis says this:
“
Berkeley Earth has just released new results, showing that the average temperature of the Earth’s land has risen by 1.5 °C over the past 250 years. The good match between the new temperature record and historical carbon dioxide records suggests that the most straightforward explanation for this warming is human greenhouse gas emissions.
The new analysis from Berkeley Earth goes all the way back to 1753, about 100 years earlier than previous groups’ analysis. The limited land coverage prior to 1850 results in larger uncertainties in the behavior of the record; despite these, the behavior is significant. Sudden drops in the early temperature record (1750 to 1850) correspond to known volcanic events.
In its 2007 report the IPCC concluded only that “most” of the warming of the past 50 years could be attributed to humans. It was possible, according to the IPCC, that increased solar activity could have contributed to warming prior to 1956. Berkeley Earth analyzed about 5 times more station records than were used in previous analyses, and this expanded data base along with its new statistical approach allowed Berkeley Earth to go about 100 years farther back in time than previous studies. By doing so, the Berkeley Earth team was able to conclude that over 250 years, the contribution of solar activity to global warming is negligible.
This statement is extraordinary as Lord Monckton has noted in a previous post; for instance the declaration that “The good match between the new temperature record and historical carbon dioxide records suggests that the most straightforward explanation for this warming is human greenhouse gas emissions” when combined with this “the Berkeley Earth team was able to conclude that over 250 years, the contribution of solar activity to global warming is negligible” is astounding and contradicted by such AGW luminaries as Mann and Schmidt.
00
Cohenite
I see over on Climate Depot that both William Connelly and Micheal Mann are VERY critical of Muller and the Best team.
So I think the MSM will be dragged into this whether some of the journalists like it or not.
00
Ah so thats their plan of attack, they cant touch Watts so they are now going after BEST. If they can smear BEST then they by default smear Watts and everything can go back to normal. The fact that they applauded BEST not long ago by no way affects their credibility on this issue……afterall they are climate scientists.
00
I don’t follow your logic, Crakar. Could you elucidate please?
00
Rereke
From Watts site,
Lead author of the paper, Anthony Watts, commented:
“I fully accept the previous findings of these papers, including that of the Muller et al 2012 paper. These investigators found exactly what would be expected given the siting metadata they had. However, the Leroy 1999 site rating method employed to create the early metadata, and employed in the Fall et al 2011 paper I co-authored was incomplete, and didn’t properly quantify the effects.
The new rating method employed finds that station siting does indeed have a significant effect on temperature trends.”
Ergo you find a flaw(s) in the Mueller & Fall and you discredit Watts as his work is based on theirs (station site data etc), or am i reading this incorrectly?
00
OK, I now understand your comment.
But when I originally read AW’s post, I assumed that he was inferring that the 2011 paper, with Muller, was correct at the time with with regard to methodology, but was flawed because the site metadata (Leroy 1999) was flawed. This then uncouples him from that previous piece of research, because he is now using a different approach towards assessing the site metadata. It also leaves Muller high and dry with the his current paper, which I can’t see AW shedding many tears over.
It all comes down to whether or not the new site metadata is a more accurate representation of reality. If the usual suspects are going to attack AW, surely they must do it on the grounds that this new paper is still flawed, and not based on a previous working relationship with Muller?
Having an apparent close correlation between the new results and the existing satellite data would present a few problems to anybody who wanted to mount a frontal assault. They will have to either fight two realities together, or knock them both of individually, to be replaced by, what?
Interesting times.
00
My comment @ 50 was meant to be a reply your comment @ 57 Rereke — I think you are right.
( Mods. please remove my comment @ 50 )
00
Oh, Watts will be plenty touched, until such point his conclusions follow from his methods 🙂
But right now, it’s all just PR. Oops!
00
Trying to divorce the BEST man. 🙂
Mann has a bone to pick with Muller anyway. Muller didn’t support the hockey stick once it was shown how bad it was. (So bad that it wasn’t even wrong.)
Mann now tries to dismiss Muller as an attention seeker on Facebook
Of course Mann won’t let me hold up the mirror to him as he’s blocked me on FB.
00
unfortunatley today’s mainstream news are reporting a strange interpretation of this, and the ABC are more interested in “carbon” being sucked into the earths core in the oceans.
check out the sydney morning herald’s effort. (dont worry, I know it is ridiculously left wing etc)
00
I have only read the Press Releases but two comments :
1. We should all note who the co-authors are here. People with indepth knowledge of the issues and fields of expertise ( eg. SM with his stats. knowledge)
2. It is good to see someone take it to the alarmists with their own promotion methods. ( Although I think AW took it to another level with his clever use of the blogsphere.)
00
This quote from Radio New Zealand in the midday bulletin:
I would say that succinctly reflects the veracity of broadcast media in this country. I will await tomorrow’s print media coverage with a large magnifying glass.
00
Rereke,
Look in the ‘obits’. They’ll probable bury it.
Tony.
00
C’mon Rereke –give them abit of time ( at least a week or so !!!)
As I’ve pointed out below , Connelly and Mann are ripping into Muller and the BEST report so I think it will get into the MSM eventually.
00
The world moves in truly wonderful ways – wrt to my earlier comment, I think I just had one of my ‘best’ steaks ever… (Dei Dogi Venice…)
Hats off to Watts!
00
Would that have been a BEST / WESTern Steak ?
00
Wow, just wow, Maxine was right about something – it has been warming!!!!
(Just not so much as too worry about…hmmmm)
00
…and still not connected in any credible way to CO2 by any evidence whatsoever.
00
I predict this will be downplayed in the press as “new study by skeptic confirms temperature increasing in US.”
00
Since the team at WUT have promised to make all the data used to compile their paper available for peer review I hope scientists from all sides of the debate will engage and do so robustly. This would be a nice change – and a unique opportunity to see genuine scientific inquiry in action, whatever the eventual conclusions. In the meantime, I congratulate Anthony and his team for this valuable contribution.
00
But.. but… all the highly qualified experts who agree with the BEST findings can’t wrong, surely? Err… and there’s a lot more of them than the few who contributed to this paper, so they must be right. Oh yeah, and Watts is just a maverick on the fringe. And… and… Watts and McIntyre are in the pay of Big Corporate, not like the real experts at the Hallowed IPCC who are pure as the driven snow and who giveth of the goodness of their hearts. And… and this is just an itsy-bitsy teenie-weenie bit of the earth and of Climate Change data in general. Even if USA data is proved to be wrong and highly biased, it doesn’t change the general bigger picture that the majority of real experts (thousands, in fact) all unanimously agree on. Who am I going to trust? Thousands, millions, trillions, zillions of real, honest, poor put-upon scientists like Jones, Mann or Trenberth – or an ex-TV-Weatherman?
Have I missed anything, Warmists?
00
You could try praying to the great god “Windmill”. I understand that every village in Britain now has one as a shrine …
00
Jo – I’ve already suggested on Anthony’s site that a better headline might be:
“Applying UN standard shows that half of US warming is spurious.”
Also worth adding somewhere that the US climate network has been considered the highest quality in the world. That’s my understanding, but most journos won’t know it, so will miss the import of the study.
All the best.
00
Jo – a second thought: how easy would it be for some bright spark to apply the Watts et al. methodology to climate stations in Oz and NZ?
00
It was a well-led major volunteer effort. So you’d need someone to organizing gathering the data according to accepted means. Then quality scientists and statisticians to analyse the data. Perhaps Watts et al. would publish such a paper.
So the key thing is getting a leader to organize the collection of the data.
00
Thanks, Christoph. I agree with what you say, but I do not consider myself qualified to undertake the task. It does occur to me that the Oz and NZ climate networks are so small (relatively speaking) to the US, that the projects might be much more manageable. Although both might founder on poor historical data, site change records etc.
All the best.
00
I doubt “the team” will take this lying down. What might they make of it (if not just total dismissal)? Maybe “It’s worse than we thought … less warming than we believed and look at how the ice disappears, glaciers calve, 97% of Greenland melts. Now we have to limit temperature increase to just 1 degree not the generous 2 degrees we’ve been aiming for”.
I’m also wondering, if these results call the global temperature record into question, what does that say about assertions that there has been no significant rise in temperatures in the past 10+ years? That there has in fact been cooling? Much greater warming outside the US? Or that we really have no idea what the “global temperature” has done?
00
Use the satellites for the last 30 years.
The warming has stagnated over the last 14 years.
00
satellites have only really been “accepted” for those last 14 or so years.
Isn’t it strange how the warming suddenly stops when a reliable, untamperable (we hope) measurement system comes along. 😉
00
Aaargh well tar and feather me leg, pink,the blogsphere has a scientific use other than a means to gossip about starlets knickers and who’s a humping whom.
Someone above this post pointed out the sattielites and this analsyis are close to each other, which beats that lonely yamal tree hands down. (if I be knowing where it was that tree that caused so much fuss was, I’d be standing on a new leg this very day, albeit a very crooked leg).
Proxies are just that proxies and these twain systems with argos yet in it’s infancy a third leg for the future, will be the bench standard.
It has me buggered how our merry land of Oz and the Bureau of Astrology can group sites for smoothing and bridging and other arcane methodologies in entirely different geographies.
IN stats there is an underlying rule apple – apple and then you can play with apples.
His best analogy was the clear water test. IN future lets hope the water will be much cleaner.
00
apple = apple, (sorry me eye patch slipped whilst I was thumbing this keypoard computer thingy.)
00
“(sorry me eye patch slipped whilst I was thumbing this keypoard computer thingy.)”
well take the darn thing off then ! 😉
you know its only for looks, to get them there gals.
You don’t need it while you are at home typing 🙂
00
He has probably got it on the wrong eye!
00
Here is a terrific aussie site dedicated to destroying this Green Communism.
http://www.conscious.com.au/
00
Two humble questions:
Firstly, I am assuming that the (unstated) point is that, 0.155 deg/dec since 1979 is in keeping with what has been occurring over the last two and half centuries and therefore can’t logically be attributed to human activity. Correct?
Secondly, as forceful as the Watts et al study is, what is to stop the CAGW cheer squad (climate astrologers, media and politicians) ignoring it the way they do with anything else that doesn’t fit their paradigm?
00
One in a nutshell, yes it’s mostly UHI and poor siting issues, if you were to look at a world map, the United States with the most maintained sites show the most abnormal (or fictitious part of the rise) the most. Homogineity practices have made a lot of results actually non results.
Two, of course they will try, but they have been steadily backing down albeit dragged at every turn. The smarter ones are already disappearing and the rest have nowhere to go. Nobody is going to retrench themselves and admitting the issue to be a non issue is the same thing.
As governments turn and they are turning on this issue, whole departments of these people are being shown the door, because the electorate has had enough.
00
That bit and what follows it has been well stated here and elsewhere. What hasn’t, is the the matter of there still being warming in Watts et al’s data without the fudges – albeit half. I believe that more focus – there has been none – should be on the fact that the outcome doesn’t permit warmists a perception of a half victory.
I’m not trying to be a party pooper. I just want it made clearer what the party is really about. I might be missing something here, but it isn’t UHI and homogenisation issues. Like most of us here, I am well aware of the cheating that has been happening with that.
Thank you for your reply.
00
Sean,
If I can be permitted to butt in here …
The whole question is around the whether or not the observed variations in climate are natural or are influenced by the activities of mankind.
Climate variation prior to the Industrial Revolution in western Europe is taken to be the norm, and any increase in the magnitude of variation since that “idillic” period is laid at the feet of mankind.
What this study shows is that, yes, there has been some impact from mankind (there are more of us for one thing), but that increase has been magnified by persons unknown, to achieve their own political or commercial ends, through fear of a calamity.
What this study has shown is that the real increase is probably within the expected range of variation. But much more importantly, it has demonstrated that the people charged with being the keepers of the sacred writ, have been rewriting the writ, for their own purposes.
There is a name for that, that people are not using … yet.
00
Acquiring money through deception is Fraud.
00
… and they are now …
00
Rereke,
I agree and have said the equivalent. My point is that one needs to extract that one’s self from the announcements. Unfortunately, the ones who will be able to do that are the ones who don’t need to. Novices are simply likely to infer, if anything, that CAGW is only half as bad as we thought! Here is a reply I saw on ACM:
I empathise with the commenter’s frustration – perhaps not the diplomacy. The recipient, Simon, apologised. As important as Watts’ work is, I still have to agree with Simon when he said: “Wasn’t quite the bombshell I was expecting”. I am not sure about Anthony’s use of the word, “unprecedented”. Perhaps someone could enlighten me on that.
Not expecting any green thumbs.
00
It hasn’t runaway warmed since the super el Ninio of 1998, yet CO2 has continued to climb.
There are arguments heating stalled and some people reckon it’s cooled depends on your start points and stuff.
What Watt’s and his teams of volunteers have done, the have identified the cause of the identified most significant warm spot which was the United States and nailed half of it to poor instrumentations and poor sitings and bad statistical usages (yes I mean BAD as in Snow White ate a BAD apple).
00
Not all climate scientists are ideologues or grant whores. This will allow the honest ones to more openly challenge the IPCC ‘consensus’.
There are important areas that are just not studied, because they will throw up inconvenient data and conclusions. One example is studying the Weekend Effect on temperatures, which would give us more accurate quantification of the effects of aerosols and particulates. And restrict the ability of the climate modellers to use aerosols as a fudge factor in the models.
00
Another impact.
What is the climate sensitivity for increasing CO2 concentrations if the temp series is only half of what it was – all other things being equal, and using the UN IPCC accepted calculations?
00
I can remember waiting at the local airport waiting for my dad to come home from a business trip – in 1955! The parking area was less than 200 yards from the door to the airport terminal (they only had 4 or 5 flights a day). On the other side of the fence was the “weather station” equipment – like those you see in SurfaceStation.org pictures. But back then there was at least 30 yards (meters) of grass around the station. After joining the Navy I had not been back to this airport in over 60 years, however, on a recent trip back to my hometown I noted that this weather station has been encroached upon by the new terminal, air conditioners, the drop-off lane and even the aircraft blast shields. It looked similar to the recent picture of the Bartow, Fl station on WUWT site a few days ago. How can anyone possibly think that the temperature that this station provides is in any way related to the actual temperature? How can they use this data in any scientific analysis? How many other stations throughout the world are just like this? The AGW group has only provided us with proof that the airports are getting warmer and staying warmer!
00
I would like to draw your attention to Ian W’s comment.
If you look at the global relative humidity graph that show %RH is declining since WWII and add it to this study, you blow CAGW completely out of the water.
In otherwords these No-Bell prize winning boobs have been looking at the WRONG metric from day one!
00
Anybody in SW Western Australia can tell you that temperature fluctuations are much stronger in a dry winter than a wet one.
And it’s not just down to more sun getting to the surface.
Water vapour (humidity) is a substantial “damper” on temperature changes due to its enthalpy. I recall being advised by a climate scientist that water vapour wasn’t considered because it can’t be controlled. Well, nor can CO2 because of the quasi-equilibrium of partial pressures at the surface of the oceans, but I didn’t get a chance to make that point to him.
00
naturally, “sceptic” Muller turns “CAGW believer” is all over the MSM. plus:
30 July: ABC: Ocean study reveals carbon not sinking
Research co-author Richard Matear from the CSIRO says the deep currents which draw carbon into the ocean actually vent it upwards in some areas…
The research has been published in the journal Nature Geoscience.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-07-30/carbon-storage-trends-revealed/4163274?section=tas
on BBC radio last nite, with Sulston saying climate deniers are now fewer, and getting more shrill:
29 July: BBC World Service: The Forum: Inequality
We present a special edition of The Forum hosted by former President of Ireland, Mary Robinson.
Joining her in front of a lively audience at the RSA in London are Nobel prize-winning biologist John Sulston…
John Sulston is a Nobel prize-winning biologist and chair of a recent report ‘People and the Planet’. He is particularly interested in the challenge of inter-generational inequality; the likelihood that our present overconsumption will make life worse for future generations. John argues that we have a duty to preserve resources for those who come after us…
Mary Robinson: She now leads the Mary Robinson Foundation working for Climate Justice…
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00vtkcs
the fight is far from over, but kudos to Watts et al.
00
1. The press release is not of a standard expected by Journalists. It can be easily misread. It needs to be sharper.
2. The Watts Up release is poorly written and seems to be assembled in great haste from past information. It is confusing to read and contains a few mistakes on the graphing.
3. This is Anthony’s LAST shot at it. If this paper has any faults – it will be challenged. If you fire your bullets all at once – you will run out of ammunition.
4. Thermometers are not the only measurements that can show a reasonable distinctive AGW global warming signal and climate responsiveness.
5. One paper does NOT cause a game change. The usual suspects are involved. It is never the case in science – it requires perhaps a hundred more science papers to gain traction. In all cases proper peer review CRITICAL processes MUST BE applied.
6. A weak AGW signal of warming has been proven wrong in the past – in this case it is Christy.
7. Embarrassments do happen when things are hastily presented like this paper.
8. A. Watts is showing signs in being panicked into releasing it prematurely. It is not a good show in the light of the Best announcement and presents like a war against proper rational debate of other good scientists. “It’s us or them”
9. Whether you like or not – this is a (“social”-ist) movement of people force looking at weather instruments. Be aware that extremists exist among any movement. Conspiratorial movements are rife in the States. Many are good people at Watts Up. I do read most posts at Watts Up. It is plain defamatory that good scientists are daily accused of perpetuating some kind of false science. That is wild conspiracy.
__________
Ross J.
—————————
REPLY: And all Watts has shown is the bleeding obvious… that hot air rises off concrete. Shouldn’t we expect any honest climate scientist to know that? — Jo
10
It will be hailed as a success regardless of quality. It’s already being hailed as a success by Jo!
If the methods are robust it’ll become part of the science. If they’re not it wont. Correcting for only a few of the known biases in the raw data and then claiming the rest must be UHIE is jumping the gun in my opinion.
There will be no embarrassment, just claims of unfairly treating his paper, not understanding his techniques blah blah
00
So if they were known, why were they not corrected earlier? Was it too inconvenient to correct for a bias, when the result would be a halving of the increase at some of the “premium” sites?
These are interesting questions, you raise.
00
A bit like using the “known biases” in just using the CO2 radiation meme to justify ALL of Global Warming.
There were other known mechanisms, like convection, water vapour, rain, the sun etc.
🙂
00
They are corrected for, you can read about all the corrections at the GHCN site. Once Watts’ paper gets refereed by someone with a clue, and his mistakes are pointed out and he corrects them, his temperature record will look just like all the others. 🙂
00
Really? What just like a hockey stick?
Seriously Tristan, you cant just (s)troll in here and gob off, you need to show where these corrections are made, why they are made and then explain where Watts et al went wrong.
If you dont then you look very much like “just another warmbot”…..which for all i know is the look you are gunning for.
You need to read the preamble in Jo’s latest thread (yes i know Jo turns them out quite quick at times but that is just we can keep ahead of the trolls), read what Jo states there and then we can revisit your claim that “it is all accounted for”.
Regards
Crakar
00
Tristan writes:
The paper is based on empirical data. If their is a flaw Watts will admit to it and make the necessary corrections. Try and get the raw data from Mann, let alone a correction!
Your non sequitur statement has already been deftly destroyed by Monsieur Whakaaro!
Of course the freeloaders riding on the backs of the taxpayers will be fair as they have a track record of being so. As Phil Jones quipped in one of his many infamous climategate emails, “I can’t see either of these papers being in the next IPCC report. Kevin and I will keep them out somehow – even if we have to redefine what the peer-review literature is!” What are you blathering on about techniques for? The paper is based on empirical data. Is there anything you care to dispute about it? Or do you wish to continue with your usual “blah blah”?
00
Anyone looking at the original 1998 Hockeystick who gave it even a moment’s credence had to be:
a)utterly ignorant of human and natural history
b)dumber than doggie-do
These tend to be the same people who demand a stupendous level of scientific sophistication before they will open their minds to a skeptical position on climate.
If you’ve bought a two-bob watch, don’t lecture buyers of better merchandise, however roughly finished.
00
1. The press could care less about standards and won’t bother to read the Watts, et al paper because it would give them qualms of conscience, assuming any amongst them has one!
2. The Watts Up release is well written and based on empirical data and was thoroughly researched. It is easy to comprehend and contains readily understandable graphs.
3. This is another great contribution by Watts. The CAGW cabal will do all in their power to discredit the paper even if they have to reinvent the peer review process, again! The CAGW is out of ammunition and all they ever had were blanks, anyways.
4. Thermometers were much easier to fraudulently adjust then satellite data or Argo buoy data that show less global warming. Now the warming attributable to man has practically disappeared.
5. One paper can cause a game change. As Einstein once remarked Why 100 [scientists]? It would only take one to prove me wrong! The usual CAGW suspects are sweating bullets. When it comes to the case of CAGW in science – there are hundreds of peer reviewed papers that falsify the bogus CAGW hypothesis. That’s amazing considering how corrupt the
palpeer review process is!6. The CAGW hypothesis has been debunked in the past by Christy and a host of other brave scientists willing to risk it all to tell the truth!
7. Embarrassments do happen when things are hastily presented like the Gergis paper!
8. A. Watts put his vacation on hold because of the importance he attaches to his work. It shows the true depth of his character and his dedication to the truth. I hope he is prepared for the war that the catastrophists are going to wage against him through their puppets in the lame stream media. For the paranoid climate scientists, “It’s us or them”.
9. Whether you like it or not, this is a critical moment and will force many to realize that they have been had. Be aware that the extremist greenbaggers will not go gently into that goodnight! There is a small criminal coterie at the heart of this conspiracy and many otherwise reputable scientist go along because they have families to feed. I love reading the posts at WUWT. The core conspirators blatantly defame and destroy good scientists if they dare to challenge the CAGW dogma. The crimes of the warmanistas are nothing short of conspiring to attempt to commit crimes against humanity. If all of the policies based upon their fraudulent findings were implemented then billions would suffer and millions would die! Go Watts go!
00
Well said, Eddy.
00
Author: Ross James
Comment:
1. The press release is not of a standard expected by Journalists. It can be easily misread. It needs to be sharper.
Then reread the pre print draft
What has this comment got to do with the paper?
2. The Watts Up release is poorly written and seems to be assembled in great haste from past information. It is confusing to read and contains a few mistakes on the graphing.
Well why didn’t you say so a poorly written release can only mean one thing so lets all not read any further and just ignore it.
3. This is Anthony’s LAST shot at it. If this paper has any faults – it will be challenged. If you fire your bullets all at once – you will run out of ammunition.
Last shot? Firing blanks? WTF?
What has this comment got to do with the paper?
4. Thermometers are not the only measurements that can show a reasonable distinctive AGW global warming signal and climate responsiveness.
Another WTF? This is pure gibberish from someone who has nothing to say, the only other measurement that can show what you ask for is satellite data and that data does not show any AGW signal. Of course weather balloons also show no AGW signal but they use thermometers.
What has this comment got to do with the paper?
5. One paper does NOT cause a game change. The usual suspects are involved. It is never the case in science – it requires perhaps a hundred more science papers to gain traction. In all cases proper peer review CRITICAL processes MUST BE applied.
No one paper does not…oh hang a second what about the hockey stick, this one paper singlehandedly changed the course of climate science, ignored decades of papers showing a variation in temp over thousands of years, change the outlook of the IPCC over night and emboldened our idiot in charge to bring in crippling taxes.
What has this comment got to do with the paper?
What has this comment got to do with the paper?
6. A weak AGW signal of warming has been proven wrong in the past – in this case it is Christy.
? What has this comment got to do with the paper?
7. Embarrassments do happen when things are hastily presented like this paper.
Speaking from experience Ross? What has this comment got to do with the paper?
8. A. Watts is showing signs in being panicked into releasing it prematurely. It is not a good show in the light of the Best announcement and presents like a war against proper rational debate of other good scientists. “It’s us or them”
? What has this comment got to do with the paper?
9. Whether you like or not – this is a (“social”-ist) movement of people force looking at weather instruments. Be aware that extremists exist among any movement. Conspiratorial movements are rife in the States. Many are good people at Watts Up. I do read most posts at Watts Up. It is plain defamatory that good scientists are daily accused of perpetuating some kind of false science. That is wild conspiracy.
The only movement here Ross is a bowel movement, oh and what does this comment have to do with paper?
Overall any piss poor effort on your part Ross James.
00
Come on Ross. You can do better.
There are 13 Aristotlean Fallacies. You’ve barely scratched 4 or 5 of them of them.
vis e.g.
Genetic fallacy.
Your personal, subjective judgement has no bearing on the objective value of Watts’ press release. Further: All information is from the past. Everything else is fantasy or speculation.
Irrelevant conclusion:
1. argumentum ad populum
2. argumentum ad verecundiam
It only takes one person to determine that thermometers are “broken”.
Fallacy: Equivocation
“Social” is not the same as “socialist”
Fallacy: Apophasis/Composition
“Conspiratorial movements are rife in the States”
Not defamatory if the information is in the public interest and illuminates the facts without distortion and doesn’t attack the person. Shoddy science and non-science. Not “false science”.
There is a difference between being accused of being stupid and of being reported as having done something stupid.
00
What a nice list…
Here they come, spewing their petty criticism at those who dare defy them.
There is not a single fact based argument against Anthony’s analysis in the whole list. If I couldn’t think up something stronger than this mess of petty distractions I’d keep my mouth shut.
The bunch of these trolls, singly or together don’t qualify to polish Anthony Watts’ shoes.
Let’s call this what it is. Global warming is a fraud, a scam. And by any name it smells like dead fish — or worse. And its defenders defend dishonesty of the worst sort, deception under the guise of authority. Don’t tolerate them.
00
Here is what Ross James really said:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
That was an impressive list of reasons why we should take your OPINIONS seriously.
Congratulations!!!
00
Sulston:
30 May: IPS: Julio Godoy: Climate Change and Family Planning – Twin Issues for LDCs
The reproductive rights agenda, from improving women’s access to education to systematic family planning to reducing birth rates and combating poverty, has become a cornerstone of most industrialised nations’ development policies toward the least developed countries (LDCs), comprised primarily of sub-Saharan African states…
Simultaneously, the Royal Society of London (RS) released its new People and the Planet report, which focuses on reproductive rights and social justice as cornerstones of global economic sustainability…
British biologist John Sulston, co-author of the report, said that “population growth and high consumption must be considered together” while searching for solutions to climate change.
Sulston, who headed a working group at the RS while preparing the newest People and the Planet report, said that family planning is indispensable in countries with the highest fertility rate, mostly LDCs.
He also pointed out that populations in industrialised countries, which consume resources at a rate that the planet cannot afford, must realise that their way of life is not sustainable.
The report is extremely timely, coming just ahead of the Rio + 20 summit, which is poised to deal with sustainable development and the planet’s future…
Sulston added that climate change is making clear that humanity “is running out of space.” Evidence of climate change and of social injustice fuels the crucial need “to put all these issues – population growth, human consumption and environment – on top of the agenda of the forthcoming Rio + 20 summit.”…
http://www.ips.org/TV/rio20/climate-change-and-family-planning-twin-issues-for-ldcs/
not unrelated, but Beckham replaces Bono/Geldhof this time!
26 July: BBC: David Beckham discusses global hunger plan with PM
David Beckham has met Prime Minister David Cameron to urge the UK to ensure child hunger remains a global priority.
The ex-England footballer and Unicef ambassador gave Mr Cameron a letter, calling on him to lead the way.
The UK is to host a “hunger summit” on the final day of the Olympics, hoping to use the global sporting event as a catalyst for progress on the issue…
During their meeting at Downing Street, Mr Beckham handed the prime minister a letter signed by 50 sports and film stars, urging him to “pick up the pace” on the issue and keep child hunger at the top of the global agenda…
Next month’s gathering will bring together world leaders, business figures, non-government organisations and development campaigners in an effort to generate renewed momentum and political will behind tackling malnutrition in Africa and other parties of the world…
But Unicef says leaders must set an ambitious global target to reduce stunting, and businesses must make nutritious food more widely available to the most vulnerable.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-19004101
as if they care.
00
Gosh, it’s much less than we thought!
00
You Anzacs should immediately get on this methodology for your own weather stations. The NZ establishment is already in denial and there cannot be so many “thermometers” in Australia either.
00
A few quality analyses published by Jo:
* BOMs new data set, ACORN, so bad it should be withdrawn (954 min temps larger than the max!)
* Australian temperature records shoddy, inaccurate, unreliable. Surprise!
* Threat of ANAO Audit means Australia’s BOM throws out temperature set, starts again, gets same results
* Has North Victoria cooled, and is that the ghost of a solar cycle signal we see?
* Australia’s High Quality Data: 12-year-sites used for “long term” trends
A few of many links to other efforts:
* Australia ACORN-SAT temperature fraction audit – WA Climate
* ACORN-SAT: A Preliminary Assessment – Ken Stewart
00
One of my partners is “in discussions” with NIWA, as I type this, and trying not to smile. 🙂
00
What you can have more than one “partner” in NZ? I am on the next boat meet me at the docks.
00
Robert, unfortunately Australia is almost as large as mainland US. We don’t have as many records going back as far, but there are 100 plus stations in the ACORN or HQ compilations, and I’ve seen numbers like 1000 for total number of records… it’s a very big job, and I don’t know that we can get hundreds of volunteers to photograph and analyze those stations.
00
No time to make a comment (where are the warmbots) just want the emails
Cheers
00
Her is the LeRoy paper, powerpoint presentation, and metadata on which Watts based his paper. Can’t evaluate Watts without LeRoy!!
http://www.wmo.int/pages/prog/www/IMOP/publications/IOM-94-TECO2006/3(2)_Leroy_France.pdf
http://www.wmo.int/pages/prog/www/IMOP/publications/IOM-104_TECO-2010/5_1_Leroy_France.doc
http://www.knmi.nl/samenw/geoss/wmo/TECO2010/ppt/session_5/5(01)_leroy.ppt
00
I’d like to add my congratulations to Anthony and his co authors on what is the culmination of a huge amount of work by them and the team of volunteers involved in the surface stations research
As someone rightly said Watts et al ‘brings it home’. We weren’t disappointed by the wait
There are some articles – Climate Depot of course, then The Examiner http://www.examiner.com/article/devasting-blow-to-temperature-records-u-s-temp-trends-spuriously-doubled;
Then there’s the irrepresible Delingpole http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100173174/global-warming-yeah-right/
It’s a day for celebration that we still are lucky enough to have these tireless scientists who do research the old fashioned way – in the field (that includes Warwick Hughes, Jo and others who are my heroes)
00
Morning All.
If the ABC was Relevant (Pt ??)
[Scene: A climate institute, somewhere. JOHN is concocting a climate model. BRYAN rushes in.]
Bryan: Have you heard? Watts has good news?
John: Good news? That sounds bad.
Bryan: It is.
John: How Bad?
Bryan: Bad enough. he climate. It’s better than we expected.
John: You mean it’s not worse?
Bryan: It couldn’t be worse, it’s better.
John: That’s bad news!
Bryan: It’s not good…
00
[Scene: A climate institute, somewhere…..
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Oh, For Monty Python, If we had a Star Trek: The Next Generation could we please have a “The Return of Monty Python?”
Perhaps Elmer and the Minnesotans for Global Warming can do a video. (you might run your idea by them)
00
Speedy,
Short, but a classic – definitely a keeper.
00
This is going to be very hard to tear down or ignore. That paper is thorough! 🙂
00
So if Watts and company’s paper is upheld… Then that means the temperature data is flawed and all those other papers that relied on that data…. are buggered. Their conclusions flawed or wrong…
Boy, is there gonna be some pissed Climate pseudoscientists!
00
“Boy, is there gonna be some pissed Climate pseudoscientists!”
I sincerely Hope So !!!!! 🙂
00
The real question is: will the mainstream press ignore it?
It amazes me that the temperature “adjustments” are almost always made to show the past cooler and the near present to present as being warmer. Besides demonstrating confirmation bias, it flies in the face of common sense.
From the fair and balanced folks at the US EPA.
Since urban sprawl has caused a significant increase in UHIE in recent decades, shouldn’t the raw data for the most recent decades be “adjusted” downwards instead of upwards?
My gut feeling tells me that the CAGW team will go into smear mode. It will probably resemble something from the classic movie Mr. Smith Goes To Washington. After all, it is always about the
moneyfunding with these charlatans and Watts has put something on the track that could potentially derail their taxpayer funded gravy train!Will the Republicans capitalize on this revelation? Unfortunately, they probably will not.
00
This is not a serious question, they will ignore it because he is not a “climate scientist”. At best they will ridicule.
00
[…] http://joannenova.com.au/2012/07/the-big-news-is-out-on-watts-up/ […]
00
Was that it then.Untill the world developes a fundimental oriface that a thermometer can be pluged into then my guess is that any temperarures we measure are a guess.
You want to show a temperature increase just choose stations closer to the equator.If you want to show cooling just choose stations closer to the poles.Even if you used the data from every temperature ever taken it would still be a guess.
Seeing how the majority of the earths population lives closer to the equator than the poles you would think the earths temperature is already biased to the warn side before the alarmists get their grubby fingers on it.
All anybody has to do is produce the scientific formula that ties CO2 to temperature then the show will be over and we can all go home.
00
I’m confused. Over on the SMH site they have this (dated today) http://www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/climate-results-convert-sceptic-let-the-evidence-change-our-minds-20120730-23769.html
I thought the Muller report came out months ago but it’s being presented as today or has he published a new paper? Or is it just a MSM smoke screen on the same day as the Watts paper is published?
00
As I have often said, when it comes to Science, I tend to ‘lurk’ around, in an attempt to ‘learn stuff’.
Sometimes it may seem I make light of things by (attempting to) inject some humour into the Thread.
So here’s another (pretty lame) attempt at humour from a sparkie’s point of view.
Watts just became KiloWatts!
Tony.
00
Yes Tony and this new study Mega Hertz
00
As I was saying to Henry, I have only so much capacitance for bad jokes. I am beginning to wish that I had stayed at Ohm today.
00
Me too Rereke i am trying to be resistant to its ability to induct me in such a way, unfortunately my current capacity to this is not amplified in any way watt so ever.
(tried to get Farad in there but could not find a way)
No more bad jokes from i promise.
00
Hmm, rereke,
Henry, (inductance) capacitance, and Ohm (resistance)
Almost a tuned circuit. All we need is the correct frequency, and we’ll have resonance!
Tony.
00
We already have that Tony, the reason why we cant convince the warbots of anything is because of all the ringing in their ears. The thing that keeps the tank circuit (resonance in their heads) going is the propaganda they are subjected to.
Remove that and the resonance stops.
00
Hmm,
Three ex-military guys having some fun … Crakar – you need an anti-tank weapon. I will talk to my mate Farad bin Load to see if he can get me one.
00
Rereke,
I use a RPG or SMAW on Battlefield 3 and they work quite well, might be a bit of an over kill in this situation though i am sure Farad Bin(ary) Load…..(i must appologies for that one in advance) can come up with something.
00
Or rather KillerWatts as far as his impact on the manufactured CAGW meme goes.
00
A comment on Watt’s game changer paper by David Appell notes the thermometers used cover only 1.6% of the Earth’s surface and…”the trend of the USA48 lower troposphere, as measured by satellites as calculated by UAH, is 0.23 ± 0.08 °C from 1979 to present (95% confidence limit, no correction for autocorrelation).
Satellite measurements almost completely avoid the urban heat island problem.”
In addition, the paper has yet to, like Muller’s, go through peer review.
00
I’ve posted my analysis and some of those lovely lovely graphs. Cheers
Jo
00
Been busy on own stuff (nothing to do with climate change) so haven’t had a close read yet.
To me it seems that the methods are coming much closer to what is required to actually account for the UHI signal that must exist in nearly all land temp readings. I’m still not sure that they have taken care of all other possible things that might adversly affect readings, but it certainly is a BIG step in the right direction.
I suspect that the calcs and research have been done very carefully, but I get the impression that the paper itself may have been a bit hurried.. (actually, pretty obviously), but hey, the draft did need to be released, like, right now !!!
Thanks to the finicky, nit-picking lot of proof readers on WUWT, it will be even more solid once it reaches final release… 🙂
00
I think you right Rereke.
00
Good work by Anthony though as Jo mentioned elsewhere he is simply stating the “bleeding obvious” although it would seem those such as Tristan and those who call themselves “climate scientists” can’t grasp such simple concepts as they don’t support their meme.
I’ve been running a weather station at the house for close to 10 years now. Had nothing to do with AGW or any of the other alarmist hogwash, it had to do with the simple fact that temperatures can vary significantly in just a few miles and I want to know:
1 – what the temperature, humidity, wind speed, etc. is where I live not what it is 20 or even 2 miles away
and
2 – that to the best of my ability given natural obstacles, neighboring homes, etc. that my temperature/humidity sensor is sited so as to avoid direct sunlight, allow for a breeze to move air through the enclosure, reduce or eliminate radiant heat from ground sources, etc.
In other words I want the station I get my primary weather data from to be as close as possible to what a properly sited, installed, and maintained station should be.
In researching this over the years I knew long before this work by Anthony and others that proper station siting and installation was the exception not the rule when dealing with the “professional” stations out there.
That the NOAA then has to screw with the data even more is just further proof they shouldn’t be doing the job they are doing as they don’t understand how to do it correctly.
This is something many of us have known for years, Anthony has just provided the empirical evidence to prove it. Good work and far more meticulous than anything we have seen from the warmist “science.”
00
A bit OT but global warming FRAUD related…..
Flannery’s Commission tells another outrageous porky
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/flannerys_commission_tells_another_outrageous_porky1/
00
Even for a non scientist like myself, I always suspected this. I learnt about the UHI in High School and extrapolated it to what I suspected was a major part of the whole ruse. Urban areas have naturally expanded in the last 30 – 40 years and I’ve always wondered how many formerly rural weather stations have now become urban. Also, how many weather stations have been established in wholly unsuitable locations like airports and the like within the last 20 years and why. That they would further skew the data is extraordinary. Whilst this is great news and all kudos to Anthony Watts and his team it is also cause for reflection and sadness because there once was a time when scientists excused themselves from all matters political and religious for fear of contaminating their work and their own self respect. Charles Darwin v The Church, imagine the Church won, where the flock would we be now. I think we all owe a great debt of gratitude to the people who are willing to stick their heads above the ramparts and be counted.
00
Yep, there is UHI which would require a downwards adjustment of the data to remove the effect of external influences on the sensor. The same with an unshielded sensor in direct sunlight, it would require a downward adjustment to remove the solar influence.
Yet whenever these “scientists” adjust the data it is always upwards. I have never seen a temperature sensor that read low unless it was absolute junk to begin with. Anytime I have seen a deviation from the actual ambient temperature it has always been one where the sensor was reading high due to no airflow, exposure to direct sunlight, radiant heat from surrounding objects, etc.
My sensor here is located in shade in a Stevenson screen roughly 3.5 feet above ground level over dirt and grass. The thermometer on the deck is exposed to direct sunlight. I see a difference of 20-30 degrees F between them regularly due to that solar radiation warming the one on the deck.
I don’t adjust the data from the one in the Stevenson screen upwards to match the one on the deck, nor do I consider the one on the deck to be accurate.
00
One of the questions raised is what this means for the global temperature network. Digging in the Clay sort of addresses this with the very nice graphs on The ‘Station drop out’ problem
You can click on a graph and get a good look at something like how many stations there is raw temperature data available in the NOAA GHCN raw dataset (the v2.mean file) for each year from 1880 to 2009. and the answer is not much especially in recent years.
As the Author states:
If you are a researcher going from a peak of 5348 (raw) stations in 1966 to only 840 stations in 2009 would be ringing loud bells. But this is the real corker
Any real scientist trying to use this data should be pulling his hair out and screaming bloody murder! So why aren’t they? Are they just too lazy to bother checking another person’s data before using?
DIgging in the Clay has several other articles on temperature data that is worth the read.
00
[…] Jo Nova boils it down: “This is one of those blockbuster moments when the pieces come together. For Anthony it’s five years work, and overturns so many studies all at once. This graph rather sums it all up. Raw well placed thermometers recorded 0.15C per decade. Badly sited thermometers recorded 0.25C, and adjusted ones recorded 0.3C! Fully twice the warming trend.” […]
00
If you suspect a scientist of malfeasance ,check his/her politics. The more hysterical and socially manipulative, the less credible is their work imho.
00
Seriously all worked up over this article. Give it a few days it will pass I assure you all.
I cannot see anything new – the old RAW data (non-adjusted) verses the homogenised (corrected) argument.
Here we go again and again and again.
Pity global warming evidence is not all dependent on the first 3 meter atmospheric layer as an absolute temperature reference.
A fellow systems analyst (software engineer) colleague examined randomly rural stations around the globe in RAW data.
Bleeding obvious as Jo would say. Global warming is real due to greenhouse gases.
USA = 2% of globe. Whole world temperatures waiting to be corrected by the NON-WARMING anti-homogenise crowd.
Sorry I don’t trust you guys. WHY?
This video on the MWP leaves me speechless. I have never seen so much PROVEN B.S. presented so clearly.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CY4Yecsx_-s
_______
Ross J.
00
Maybe this is the “missing metric” the silent Ross J was gibbering on about
http://www.sciencemag.org/search?submit=yes&site_area=sci&fulltext=ozone&sortspec=date
Note this link takes you to science mag butthe link to paper is busted
https://www.commondreams.org/headline/2012/07/26-7
This gives you the run down, but let me spoil it for you all,
1, We pump out CO2
2, This creates more water vapor
3, This water vapor goes up higher into the atmosphere that ever thought possible
4, this water vapor then destroys ozone
Its global warming:The next generation
Is there anything that the Co2 Gods cannot do?
00
This papers existence bother you because you know deep inside of your little crinkly eyed self that this is a paper that effectively exposes the artificially created warming inflation due to siting deficiencies and then adjusted upward for no credible reason.
Your depression is coming into your year future as you learn more about how false the warming trend was created and that it utterly fails to support your AGW religion at all.
It is obvious that you miss the main point of the paper.A point you appear to be resisting because deep down into your twinkly toes know that is bad news for your AGW religion.
Nope this is a NEW presentation that makes some pointed comments about how far off the mark those siting guidelines are for most of the stations that records daily high and low temperature and how they effect the quality of the data they collect over time.
I am glad to know that you know what the rest of us already knew that there are 33 years of satellite temperature data that are running cooler than the ground based contaminated temperature data.
Give me a break with your desperate attempt to minimize the ground based temperature data because it is suddenly cooler than you had hoped for therefore you now start your new tack against it because in the back of your little head you realize that Watts team has effectively shown evidence that the data has been inappropriately adjusted upward thus creating a false warming trend.
I once saw an UFO because a friend over the phone told me it was there above my house.
Was there a point you tried to make?
The paper is not about greenhouse gases but about how temperature data are collected and how reliable they are.
ZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz………………………….
We already know what YOUR problem is.The real question is when are you going to figure out why we laugh at you for your incoherent meandering irrelevant comments.
What does a 900 year old climate event have to do with Watts paper which only covers a past few decades of temperature data?
When are you going to make a smart comment that actually make sense and relevant to Watts paper?
00
Ross will have a good explanation for this (as soon as he takes his silly old coot meds)
He is correct. There’s nothing new in this. The fraudsters have been at it ever since Ben Santer got away with his “discernable human influence” scam of a paper.
Graph courtesy of S Goddard
00
In response to another “foot in mouth” moment by Ross J,
Let me try and simplify this for you Ross as i know complexity gets you all confused.
The people that run the US network have a standard that they apply to all of their weather stations, or to put it another way, in an effort to get reliable data on a continuous basis they have laid down a set of ground rules about the positioning etc of the station. For example it cannot be near a BBQ, it cannot be near an AC exhaust or it cannot be siting on an acre of concrete or bitumen for if it is they need to know about it so they can “adjust the temp back down so it is more realistic” still with me Ross?….good.
What Watts et al have done is they have discovered that less than 20% of the stations in the US are sited within the guidelines of the standard (no environmental adjustments required) the remaining 80 odd % require adjustments.
Also Ross it is important to note that the less than 20% stations that adhere to the standard DO NOT SHOW ANY AGW SIGNAL that is they show a small 0.155C per decade rise exactly the same as it has n=been since the little ice age, ergo Ross there is no global warming at these sites.
Of the remaining sites (80 odd%) that do not adhere to the standard the warming trends are up to 0.4C per decade, this 0.4C per decade warming trend is largely produced by “adjustments” adjustments made to data that comes from a station that does not meet the standard, a station that is deemed not fit for purpose.
Do *you* Ross beleive that this is method of record keeping will produce an accurate result?
Do *you* Ross endores this method of record keeping?
Ah the game changer rears its ugly head
To translate Ross J speak “Even if the surface record is all crap it matters none because surface temp does not count, there is another metric more important a metric that i am not going to mention”.
Then we have a random acknowledgement to a fellow propeller head that has no bearing on the conversation.
Not sure what this means or why it is even included
Then the claim as to why he does not trust us followed by a youtube link to the MWP………..WTF?????????????
Ross your comments are becoming more and more detached, maybe its all that running around in ever decreasing circles whilst waving your arms in the air screaming the sky is falling or maybe its just the realisation the you have been had?
00
Crakar24,
I brought in the MWP video to shove you irrefutable proof of fraud and malpractice from the anti-warming group.
I simply do not trust any raw data – it is unreliable and has to be homogenised.
Even so the extent of global warming is NOT at all just based on thermometer obsession.
If you don’t understand this process you will be having this unconnected debate for all time.
It is bleeding obvious why we have it. It is not fudge and malpractice as quantified here.
The posturing over this non-event will not stand the test of time. You will get over it.
This is not new stuff. You see as new and novel. I don’t.
Ross J.
——————————————————-
Ross as a matter of site etiquette you should address the points raised by Crackar 24 which you have made no effort to do, or advise him you choose not to do so.
Applying the Leroy temperature station classification methodology to US temperature stations and then measuring temperature readings since 1979 is absolutely new. Comments will be snipped in future if you don’t make a better effort Ross. – Mod
10
We where discussing the Watts et al paper if irrefutable proof of malpractice is what you are after then you would no longer beleive.
THATS THE WHOLE POINT ROSS, THE RAW DATA FROM 80% OF US STATIONS IS CORRUPT DUE TO POOR SITING THAST WHAT THE WATTS PAPER IS ALL ABOUT RAW DATA THAT IS NOT TRUSTWORTHY……………………
FOR THE LOVE OF GOD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
You cannot change the rules this late in the game Ross, for the SECOND TIME ROSS WHAT IS YOUR PREFERRED METRIC TO MEASURE BOOGA BOOGA AGW?
The rest is just rambling crap…and no i dont expect you to respond.
00