A guest post by Steven Goddard:
A Chronology of UK Met Office press releases
The UK Met office is the official UK meteorological agency and is one of the leading promoters of the idea of climate change. Their web site is in fact titled “Met Office: Weather and climate change.”
In 2007, they made several notable predictions, starting with this one on Jan 4.“2007 is likely to be the warmest year on record globally, beating the current record set in 1998, say climate-change experts at the Met Office.”
On April 11, 2007 they issued this press release stating “there is a high probability that summer temperature will exceed the 1971-2000 long-term average of 14.1 °C ….. there are no indications of an increased risk of a particularly dry or particularly wet summer.” This was interpreted by The Guardian as “Britain set to enjoy another sizzling summer.”
On August 31 The Met announced that summer 2007 was the wettest on record with “normal temperatures,” though his description did not adequately describe the miserable summer – because high temperatures and sunshine were well below normal.
On August 10, The Met Office proudly announced new climate models which included modeling of “the effects of sea surface temperatures as well as other factors such as man-made emissions of greenhouse gases, projected changes in the sun’s output and the effects of previous volcanic eruptions.” The same press release forecast that “2014 is likely to be 0.3 °C warmer than 2004.”
Turns out that global temperatures in 2007 dropped nearly 0.8 degrees according to satellite data, one of the sharpest drops on record. In order to hit The Met’s 2014 prediction, there will have to be a large increase over the next few years. So how is The Met doing in 2008 with the new models?
On April 3, 2008 the Met made their annual UK summer forecast – “The coming summer is expected to be a ‘typical British summer’, according to long-range forecasts issued today. Summer temperatures across the UK are more likely to be warmer than average and rainfall near or above average for the three months of summer.”
On August 29, 2008 The Met reported that the summer of 2008 was “one of the wettest on record across the UK.” Here is how the Independent described the UK summer – “It has been a miserable summer for bugs as well as people….The combined effect of low temperatures and rain has presented Britain’s invertebrates with a double whammy.”
The Met is getting a new Chief Scientist – Julia Slingo. In the July 22 announcement she said “I am delighted to be returning to the Met Office after 28 years and to lead work into enhanced weather and climate-change science, and importantly see this deliver improved services to societies in the UK and around the world.”
We wish Professor Slingo best wishes and look forward to seeing the “improved services.” If the spate of miserable summers is to continue, Brits should know so that they can at least plan holidays someplace warm and sunny, like the Arctic.
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I can’t comment about the rainfall levels but in terms of temperature they were correct when based on the long term average and using the HadCET mean figures.
Long term average 14.1 deg C
Summer 2007 15.23 deg C
Summer 2008 15.43 deg C
To quote that great American thinker, Larry the Cable Guy: “I don’t care who you are, that right there is funny!”
Great post, Steven. Maybe the Met office should start consulting The Farmer’s Almanac for their
weatherclimate predictions? 😉Great article. Those who are not from the UK will not know just how miserable this “summer” has been here. I believe that we have broken the record for the fewest hours of sunshine ever – and we are not exactly drenched in sun during an average year.
The Hadley Centre predictions for the annual global temperature are always great for a laugh. A few months ago somebody posted a link to an archive showing just how bad they had been over the years: I wonder if anyone remembers how to find it.
is “Climate Change Science” the new & politically correct name for “Climatology”
Would anyone using the term “climate change” be comfortable using the different but equally stupid expression “water wet”.
Just curious.
Just to add an example of the Hadley Centre forecasting ability this document is very revealing http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/research/hadleycentre/pubs/brochures/clim_res_had_fut_pol.pdf and the graph updated assuming an August 2006 anomaly of +0.4 (note that the graph uses a different baseline).
http://www.holtlane.plus.com/images/climate_forecast_updated.jpg
If you leave out the UKMET daily weather predictions, NAO predictions, and future climate predictions, they do a reasonably good job. 🙂
One more direct evidence that Met is using the almanac of King Canute.
“Professor Slingo’s research interest has focused on tropical climate variability”…. coherent
The minister of environment (Irish -UK); Sammy Wilson: found the lost map of Greenland.
The King Canute died in 1035.
Pamela: Helping the Oregon. Snow in southern Brazil.
http://www.metsul.com/blog-24hs
Oldjim,
The Met 2007 wrap up said that temperatures averaged 14.1C, not 15.2C as you wrote.
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/corporate/pressoffice/2007/pr20070831.html
This is deceptive because due to all the clouds and humidity, night time temperatures were elevated. The high temperatures were well below normal and there was no escape from the cold, damp cloudy weather.
Same with this summer. July had two weeks of warmer weather which brought the numbers up some – but most of the summer was cloudy and rainy with low daytime temperatures.
Are you American? I don’t suggest that you walk into an English Pub and tell them that they had an above average summer.
Starting in 1970 (which falls within the last cooling period) the data from HadCet for June-July-August, expressed as a single averaged figure, are:
15.0, 14.2, 15.6, 14.8, 16.9, 17.8, 14.4, 14.5, 15.0, 14.8, 15.0, 15.9, 17.1, 16.3, 14.5, 14.8, 14.8, 14.8, 16.5, 16.2, 15.5, 15.7, 14.9, 16.2, 17.4, 15.8, 16.6, 15.2, 15.9, 15.7, 16.1, 15.8, 17.3, 16.2, 17.2, 15.2, 15.4
Looking at the last 10 years in particular, it is difficult to understand why the panicky predictions of dangerous warming continue to be released by a government office of “scientists.” Note that the maximum value for summer in England came in 1977 — 17.8 degrees Celsius.
Note, too, that the long-term mean alluded to by Oldjim includes 200 years’ worth of the Little Ice Age.
Here in London it has been constantly overcast and raining torrents for the past few days, with daytime high temps struggling to reach 17 or 18 degrees. Feels like October out there! It has been a bad year for UK farmers, with much rain and not enough sunshine for the crops.
Here’s a news story about the horrendous summer they’ve had over in Ireland too, and here’s yesterday’s Guardian article about the current rainfall and flooding here in the UK.
A quote from the Guardian article: “Not surprisingly, the number of people suffering from seasonal affective disorder, which affects 4 million across the UK, has reached a record high because of the poor summer. Amanda Cross, of the charity Sada, said: “Many people already find autumn a difficult time of the year, with summer – and this one wasn’t particularly great – seemingly a distant memory.”
However, there is some good weather news on the distant horizon. The Met Office says its long-term forecast for September to November suggests there will be less rainfall than average.”
Hmm, so the Met are predicting less rain than average in the next few months, which probably means – expect the opposite… Yikes – we’ll need to build an Ark!
Summer CET averages (Hadley):
1961-1990 – 15.33
1971-2002 – 15.6
2000 – 15.73
2001 – 16.10
2002 – 15.80
2003 – 17.33
2004 – 16.23
2005 – 16.20
2006 – 17.23
2007 – 15.23
2008 – 15.43
The 1961-90 30 year mean is the one the Meto use for their anomaly calcs on their website – so not sure why they’ve started dragging the 14.1 ‘long term mean’ in. Unless it is to make the summer look warmer than it would have using their usual mean.
http://hadobs.metoffice.com/hadcet/cet_info_mean.html
Steven,
You are correct but I was referring to the Hadcet numbers which you can download from here http://hadobs.metoffice.com/hadcet/ these are representative of a roughly triangular area of the United Kingdom enclosed by Lancashire, London and Bristol. I use these numbers because they go back to 1659 and let me look at the really long term trends.
However I did mess up a bit because the summer average for 1971-2000 using these figures is 15.6 not 14.1 (I made the mistake of not checking the average)
Hence using those figures it is colder than average.
Actually, although it has been wetter than usual, the temperatures down here in Dorset haven’t been too bad although the lack of sunshine was very obvious.
Looking a bit deeper at individual months during Summer (defined as June, July and August) June and July were well down on the average but August was about average.
June July August
13.9 16.2 16.2 actual
14.14 16.44 16.21 average
A graph of the long term averages shows that the summer hasn’t been far away from the normal lousy English summer and really shows the effect – or lack of – of global warming on our summers.
http://www.holtlane.plus.com/images/cet_graph.jpg
alex, hang in there, buddy! If the Sun’s slumber continues for any appreciable amount of time, as some are predicting/warning, you wonderful residents of the UK will be able to drive to the U.S. across the solid slab of Arctic ice when it bumps up against your shores. The first beer is on Reverend Anthony’s tab, BTW. 😉
OT: Anthony, I’ve looked everywhere on the site for your e-mail address and can’t find it. Am I missing something hidden in plain sight? I’ve got a PhotoShop® gift that I’d like to send to you. 🙂
Reply: info (at) surfacestations.org ~ charles the moderator
Everyone is missing the point.
Our current efforts to mitigate global warming have been a resounding success.
Celebrate.
I was in a debate on another web site about whether any of these cherished computer models had made good predictions. Somebody linked to the Met Office predictions.
Well, it turns out that if you just used the Met Office temperature each year as the prediction for the next year, you would have done a much better job of predicting.
Of course, in testing a model or simulation, that should always be one of the first questions you ask: Can the model do better than a “naive” model which simply assumes that current conditions will persist?
If not, then you’ve got a problem.
It seems that in climate science, researchers are completely ignorant of even the most basic principles of simulation, statistical analysis, and statistical inference.
Subjectively, from Gloucestershire and Worcestershire – West Central England – , it’s been mostly cloudy, dark and wet, particularly late in the summer. There’ve been few nice periods. There’s a lot of talk of how the wet weather has interfered with the harvest.
This last week or so there have been a lot of heavy squally showers which have caused flooding.
Not a good summer at all.
For the Met Office to claim the past two summers in the UK have seen “average temperatures” is a ludicrous assertion, typical of their shockingly biased, generally unscientific practices in recent years. The fact they include temperatures recorded during the LIA to come to this conclusion essentially means the above statement is not unlike saying temperatures throughout the year 2007 were well above average because it was colder 20,000 years ago.
I have been around enough years to realise these past two summers have seen well below average temperatures for England and yet the Met Office are doing their utmost to convince the public that what we’re all seeing and feeling is totally wrong – the statistics are the truth, apparently. I was sat outside in the beer garden at my local pub about 3 weeks ago and it was so cold under the clear night sky I could see my breath in the air and I had to put my winter coat on.
I won’t even get into how poor their predictions are. On some occasions, they even get the current observations completely wrong.
Old Man Winter (12:29:12) :
“Looking at the last 10 years in particular, it is difficult to understand why the panicky predictions of dangerous warming continue to be released by a government office of “scientists.” Note that the maximum value for summer in England came in 1977 — 17.8 degrees Celsius.””2
It’s not a bit difficult to understand. AGW has become accepted by the establishment; the three main political parties, the EU, the BBC, the press. It’s passed into school science syllabuses. Big money is being spent on Windmills for power generation.
Don’t forget, that the Met Office aren’t just scientists, they’re also Civil Servants and there isn’t much mileage in saying, “Nothing to see here, move along”.
I find their short term forecasts are pretty accurate. Longer term – well there was talk in the papers of an Indian Summer, which must have come from the Met Office, unless it was made up – not impossible. I suppose it could still happen. Longer term still, one’s entitled to ask questions about whether taxes are being directed to fruitful ends.
WeatherAction long range forecasters 6 Sept 2008 8pm (19:00hrs GMT)
Contact: Piers Corbyn (+44/0)7958713320 / (+44/0)2079399946 piers@weatheraction.com / piers.corbyn@googlemail.com announces:
“MORE FLOODS TO COME – LONG RANGE SEVERE WEATHER WARNING FOR BRITAIN & IRELAND
THE DELUGES HITTING PARTS OF BRITAIN 5th/6th SEPT ARE A FORETASTE OF WORSE TO COME OVER A WIDER PARTS OF BRITAIN AND IRELAND AFTER MID SEPTEMBER. THE WETTEST SEPTEMBER ON RECORD IS VERY LIKELY FOR MANY PLACES”
today warns Piers Corbyn of WeatherAction long range forecasters.
“6 months ago we forecasted the exceptionally wet summer – the worst floods of which confirmed our forecast to the day – and also forecasted further exceptional rainfall events in September.
“The deluges around now* are driven by the same solar forcing factors which ramped up Atlantic Hurricane Ike (an increase in power which we also predicted). Furrther solar factors will cause more exceptional and prolonged deluges later this September especially after mid-month.
“Heavy rains from the West will attack Ireland around 15th Sept and develop into a series of deluges from the West and SouthWest covering most of Ireland, Wales, England and – at times – Scotland from around 16th to 28th. Further serious flooding is 95% certain”
{* Footnote on current detail. Although the basic scenario is as forecast our long range forecast had placed the present Low more towards or over Denmark than its realisation which is more centred over England – hence bringing major deluges (eg in parts of Wales, West Midlands and NorthEast England) rather than South/East parts.
Weather Action accurately forecast the washouts in the summer of 2007 and 2008, see http://www.lowefo.com.
The MetOffice refuses to recognize the predicitve powers of the Solar Weather Technique of Piers Corbyn. The reason becomes obvious from the following statment of Piers Corbyn on 4th September:
“”CO2 has never driven, does not drive and never will drive weather or Climate. Global warming is over and it never was anything to do with CO2. CO2 is still rising but the world is now cooling and will continue to do so. Those who claim man’s CO2 is driving weather or Climate must produce evidence. They cannot do so because there is no such evidence and they cannot even forecast anything. All they do is wait for extreme events and say that whatever happens is what they expected. Such drivel should not be allowed to pass yet shamefully many who style themselves as science correspondents and experts promote this nonsense. Global Warming is a deceitful political game.
The UN IPCC must be called to account and integrity in science and politics must be restored”
Magnus Hagelstam
Weather Action
Yeh
This wasn’t a fair and reasonable analysis. I am no supporter of the UKMet although I used to be.
They did say that this summer would be nothing like last (2007) which turned out to be inaccurate but then it wasn’t a technical analysis. True, temps were above normal as they predicted but only because night temps were so high.
Day max temps were below the long term ave, but their prediction wasn’t that detailed and never is. They always have a great deal of wiggle room in their press releases, just in case I suppose.
Sadly they appear to have become enthralled by the amount of money available for Climate Studies as opposed to their old job of weather forecasting. They did claim that their new high resolution models for climate and rainfall would allow to give accurate forecasts 12 hours ahead for heavy rainfall and 10 years ahead for climate parameters but I see no evidence of them achieving either at this moment.
Can I point out that the abbreviated version is usually rendered as the “Met Office”. In the UK “The Met” refers to the Metropolitan Police, mind you they are probably both equally adept at long – range weather forecasting!
Patrick Hadley (11:46:53)
That would be my post at the CA message board, which you commented on a while back.
http://www.climateaudit.org/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=119
Here’s an update (I’ve corrected an error I made for 1999 and added the forecast and the average anomaly for the first 7 months 2008.
year….mean forecast …actual …..next year hottest?
1999 …….0.38 …………0.33 …………..No
2000……..0.41………0.32-0.33………..No
2001……..0.47………0.42-0.44………No(2nd)
2002……..0.47………….0.49………….No(2nd)
2003……..0.55………….0.45……………Yes
2004……..0.50………….0.44………….No(2nd)
2005……..0.51………….0.48………….No(2nd)
2006…0.45(0.37?)…….0.42…………….No
2007……..0.54………….0.40……………Yes
2008……..0.37………….0.28…………….No
For those who don’t want to look back at the original post, the last column is whether UKMet predicted the coming year would be the “warmest ever”. Also note that the “actuals” are as presented in their yearly summary. Their master database has had several adjustments, and currently has slightly different values. For 2006, their forecast differs from what they state was their forecast in the following year, perhaps because they converted their previous forecast to an adjusted dataset (real clear huh?).
Note: I’m still interested in tracking down past claims of “next year will be warmest EVER!”
It is off the subject, but I just created a plot of the raw Mann data without the weighting or preferential sorting he applies to make his hockey stick. You might find it interesting.
http://noconsensus.wordpress.com/2008/09/06/a-summation-of-the-mann-data-on-global-warming/
Here’s a Met Office report for central England 2008, with a nice graph
comparing this year with highs and lows 1772 -2007.
http://hadobs.metoffice.com/hadcet/cet_info_mean.html
From my “10 inches of partly cloudy” folder…
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/corporate/pressoffice/2007/pr20070104.html
News release
4 January 2007
2007 – forecast to be the warmest year yet
2007 is likely to be the warmest year on record globally, beating the current record set in 1998, say climate-change experts at the Met Office.
[…deletia…]
Met Office global forecast for 2007
* Global temperature for 2007 is expected to be 0.54 °C above the long-term (1961-1990) average of 14.0 °C;
* There is a 60% probability that 2007 will be as warm or warmer than the current warmest year (1998 was +0.52 °C above the long-term 1961-1990 average).
[Note; 2007 was actually the 8th warmest year in the Hadley dataset]
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/corporate/pressoffice/2008/pr20080103.html
Global temperature 2008: Another top-ten year
3 January 2008
2008 is set to be cooler globally than recent years say Met Office and University of East Anglia climate scientists, but is still forecast to be one of the top-ten warmest years.
Each January the Met Office, in conjunction with the University of East Anglia, issues a forecast of the global surface temperature for the coming year. The forecast takes into account known contributing factors, such as El Niño and La Niña, increasing greenhouse gas concentrations, the cooling influences of industrial aerosol particles, solar effects and natural variations of the oceans.
Met Office forecast for global temperature for 2008
Global temperature for 2008 is expected to be 0.37 °C above the long-term (1961-1990) average of 14.0 °C, the coolest year since 2000, when the value was 0.24 °C.
[Note; The current 12-month running mean to end of July 2008 is 0.299, which is (just barely) number 10. Another few cooler-than-last-year months, and we’ll dip below 1999 (0.296), 1995 (0.275) and 2000 (0.270).]
Possible Monty Python script material about German invasion forces crossing the English Channel. They smash through the first line of defenses, and are advancing on London, which is defended only by the Home Guard, composed of older men and young boys, ineligible for duty as regulars. The Home Guard are handed hastily scribbled German translations of the current Met Office forecast and ordered to read them out loud through megaphones at the approaching Germans. In the next scene, thousands of German soldiers are rolling on the fields in paroxysms of laughter, and dying with a laugh on their face.