There’s quite a row developing after a scathing article in the Australian, some news clips follow. h/t to Dr. Benny Peiser at The GWPF
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The [Australian] Bureau of Meteorology has been accused of manipulating historic temperature records to fit a predetermined view of global warming. Researcher Jennifer Marohasy claims the adjusted records resemble “propaganda” rather than science. Dr Marohasy has analysed the raw data from dozens of locations across Australia and matched it against the new data used by BOM showing that temperatures were progressively warming. In many cases, Dr Marohasy said, temperature trends had changed from slight cooling to dramatic warming over 100 years. –Graham Lloyd, The Australian, 23 August 2014
The escalating row goes to heart of the climate change debate — in particular, whether computer models are better than real data and whether temperature records are being manipulated in a bid to make each year hotter than the last. Marohasy’s research has put her in dispute with BoM over a paper she published with John Abbot at Central Queensland University in the journal Atmospheric Research concerning the best data to use for rainfall forecasting. BoM challenged the findings of the Marohasy-Abbot paper, but the international journal rejected the BoM rebuttal, which had been prepared by some of the bureau’s top scientists. This has led to an escalating dispute over the way in which Australia’s historical temperature records are “improved” through homogenisation, which is proving more difficult to resolve. –Graham Lloyd, The Australian, 23 August 2014
When I first sent Graham Lloyd some examples of the remodeling of the temperature series I think he may have been somewhat skeptical. I know he on-forwarded this information to the Bureau for comment, including three charts showing the homogenization of the minimum temperature series for Amberley. Mr Lloyd is the Environment Editor for The Australian newspaper and he may have been concerned I got the numbers wrong. He sought comment and clarification from the Bureau. I understand that by way of response to Mr Lloyd, the Bureau has not disputed these calculations. What the Bureau has done, however, is try and justify the changes. In particular, for Amberley the Bureau is claiming to Mr Lloyd that there is very little available documentation for Amberley before 1990 and that information before this time may be “classified”: as in top secret. —Jennifer Marohasy, 23 August 2014
Congratulations to The Australian again for taking the hard road and reporting controversial, hot, documented problems, that few in the Australian media dare to investigate.
How accurate are our national climate datasets when some adjustments turn entire long stable records from cooling trends to warming ones (or visa versa)? Do the headlines of “hottest ever record” (reported to a tenth of a degree) mean much if thermometer data sometimes needs to be dramatically changed 60 years after being recorded?
One of the most extreme examples is a thermometer station in Amberley, Queensland where a cooling trend in minima of 1C per century has been homogenized and become a warming trend of 2.5C per century. This is a station at an airforce base that has no recorded move since 1941, nor had a change in instrumentation. It is a well-maintained site near a perimeter fence, yet the homogenisation process produces a remarkable transformation of the original records, and rather begs the question of how accurately we know Australian trends at all when the thermometers are seemingly so bad at recording the real temperature of an area. Ken Stewart was the first to notice this anomaly and many others when he compared the raw data to the new, adjusted ACORN data set. Jennifer Marohasy picked it up, and investigated it and 30 or so other stations. In Rutherglen in Victoria, a cooling trend of -0.35C became a warming trend of +1.73C. She raised her concerns (repeatedly) with Minister Greg Hunt.
Now the Australian Bureau of Meteorology has been forced to try to explain the large adjustments. Australians may finally gain a better understanding of what “record” temperatures mean, and the certainty ascribed to national trends. There is both a feature and a news piece today in The Weekend Australian. – Jo Nova The heat is on. Bureau of Meteorology ‘altering climate figures’ — The Australian
Once more we see Australia leading the way in debunking the swindle. Genuine thanks to you guys for being the first to say with conviction the Emperor has no clothes. I hold Australians in high regard anyway and this just cements it. Cheers from a Brit!
Its the corrupted FN WMO behind this adjustment fakery world wide!
temperature trends had changed from slight cooling to dramatic warming over 100 years….
It’s perfectly acceptable….thermometers were not accurate back then, people reading them were idiots, the readings were taken at the wrong time of the day, and they are having to make allowances for the heat hiding in the deep oceans……
…but assuming they are right…..it proves that no one noticed the 2.5 degree increase
I think i d i o t s, is a banned word!…………LOL
If anyone cares to remember I did that analysis some four years ago. Back when the raw data could still be had over the web. Data has gone. I never thought that BoM would be so crooked as to cook data and then delete the real stuff. The images are still here.
http://www.addinall.net/climate/ausclimate/100yrural/
Cheers.
They are deleting the original pre-1910 data. Likewise Mann won’t give his raw data to researchers. ‘He who controls the present controls the past’.–Orwell
I like the comment on that site, that CAGW actually stands for: Criminally Adjusted Global Warming. It succinctly sums up this incredible scam.
Ralph
I like the comment on that site, that CAGW actually stands for: Cr!m!nally Adjusted Global Warming. It succinctly sums up this incredible scam.
Ralph
” I hold Australians in high regard anyway and this just cements it. Cheers from a Brit!”
Andy: for extra points it should say “Cheers from a POM” When is the next Ashes?
This is germane to the brief discussion I had with Leif. He asks to be pointed to a temperature record data set used for research purposes that is valid and reliable. My response was that there were none to my knowledge. Not even HenryP’s reconstruction can be used since he too engages in nontransparent practices (either through ignorance or willfulness related to duplicating his research) such as refusing to release the station names connected to the data he uses.
According to Einstein it should be enough to show one inconsistency to question or debunk a method/theory. Apparantly that is not sufficient in climate science.
I would like to see an independent review of these homogenizations, because it is disturbing that they somehow allways increases the trend.
Have anybody anywhere seen some examples of areas where the homogenization has resulted in a lower trend? I would really like to see someone like MacIntyre analyze the methods.
….who tha’ hell woulda thunk it
“If the permit is approved, then this “solar” plant will produce about 35 percent of its electricity from fossil fuels.”
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2014/08/23/liberals-darling-2-2-billion-solar-plant-suddenly-needs-more-of-the-one-thing-you-would-never-expect/
Thai Rogue says:
August 23, 2014 at 9:49 am
”…………..When is the next Ashes?”
From Bárðarbunga in the next week or so!
Are there any raw temperature data which has not been fiddled with?
Why are climate scientists not in court for their actions?
David Schofield says:
August 23, 2014 at 10:05 am
“From Bárðarbunga in the next week or so!”
Well that should cool the expectations. Bring back Geoff! He’d thrive.
This may be the time to invest in companies that make stronger replacement fan motors that have burnout protection. Governments will probably have a run on them, so as to deal with the global warming fallout.
My respect to Jennifer Marohasy for picking up on the issue and carrying it forward in the Australian MSM . . .
GISS’ Gavin Schmidt is probably closely watching these MSM discussions of serious issues with the Australian Met Office surface temp time series dataset. GISS may be next on the MSM hot seat about the GISS datasets.
John
Surely a simple validation test can be run. Take a trusted station perhaps an automated station that reports hourly and is known to be absolutely correct for a long period. Then in the database remove that station and run the ‘homogenization’ software, If that homogenization generates a value that is outside the ‘tenth of a degree’ reported accuracy of the whole system then the homogenization algorithm has failed validation and should be discarded.
This should be a standard validation test with the homogenization runs with known accurate stations removed from the set and regenerated by homogenization. Any failures and the homogenization must be disregarded
If this simple validation testing is not done then one has to question the veracity of everything output by the groups involved. I doubt that any of these ‘climate science’ software tools have passed any kind of formal testing and are developed without a formal QMS. Hence ‘harry readme’ files.
This is why unvalidated systems without formally accredited QMS should never be allowed to provide output that is used to set policy,
I’m trying to imagine applying “homogenization” to other fields. Like… racial census data.
“I’m sorry, Mr. K. K. K. Hoodhead. Our data shows that you’re now 5% blacker than when you were born in the ’60s. Models indicate that you’ll qualify for NAACP membership by 2030.”
I suspect raw data “correction” and models would suddenly get a lot more attention.
Find some old people who have lived in the same place for 60 yrs and ask them if the weather has changed. Get people who hate TV, don’t read newspapers and have never been to college. They exist.
I want to know why they have waited until now to review the data. The raw data and all the statistical techniques haven’t changed over the years. I guess reworking the data is easier to explain away than reworking the models because reworking the models is an admission they don’t really know what is going on, despite all the claims of settled science.
Well the BOM did an “independent” audit of the New Zealand official temperature records and found?Not a smidgen of corruption?
But there is no longer an official temperature record for NZ.
The Court Case over these records went into la la land very quickly.
Criminally Adjusted Global Warming.. I like.
CAGW created by, promoted by and now protected by our bureaucrats.
The uncivil service, makes me so proud to pay taxes.
Now I know why in 2010 it was reported that Australia had just experienced the HOTTEST DECADE EVAAAAAH!
He asks to be pointed to a temperature record data set used for research purposes that is valid and reliable.
Well, Pamela, when we publish, we’ll have a set of 80 “clean” U.S. stations (out of over 1200) that contain what I refer to as the “true signal” from well sited USHCN station raw data (the other raw data has poor siting, moves, and TOBS trend changes, etc.). A slight (and perhaps legitimate) upward trend bump for MMTS conversion and there’s your story. (Perhaps one day it will actually be used “for research purposes”.)
Who is “We”, whats the name of the study, where can i get info. Like the idea…simple, logical.
“reported to a tenth of a degree”.
Where is the margin of error in all of this? To issue temperatures to a tenth of degree strikes me as rooted more in hubris than objective science — especially when the data has been fiddled with. Are they really meaning to suggest that their adjustments are accurate to within a 10th of a degree?