The picture above is of Conconully, Washington and comes to me courtesy of Josiah Mault, of the Washington State Climate Office. Mault has been surveying all of the Washington stations for that office, and has been regularly making contributions to www.surfacestations.org The picture illustrates how human activity can spring up around a station. The MMTS electronic temperature sensor is shown next to a lean-to used for rafting gear storage. I presume the life preserver is placed next to the sensor as a reminder that we may need it in case of catastrophic sea level rise. The metal ore cart full of stones is a nice touch, and makes a perfect high mass IR radiative heatsource to keep the overnight lows a bit more “comfy”. There are also stones directly under the sensor whic you can see in this photo.
But perhaps it is not the curator’s fault, but rather that of the NWS/NOAA employee that made the placement, as we see in the next photo:
more pictures available here on surfacetstations.org
Once again, we have a climate station of record in the middle of a parking area, near buildings, and directly in the middle of regular human activity. One of the downsides to the NWS COOP modernization program started in the 1980’s and continuing today is the MMTS unit itself. It requires a cable, and that cable has be be buried to be brought into the domicile containing the electronic readout.
As anyone knows, especially rabbits, digging short holes is far easier than digging long ones. So its far easier and less time consuming to dig a short trench and place the sensor nearer the building. This proximity bias seems to have been repeated regularly when the MMTS system has replaced the traditional Stevenson Screen and Mercury Max-min thermometers.
There’s a reason that NOAA specifies that temperature sensors should be a minimum of 100 feet away from buildings, concrete, and asphalt which may introduce biases into the reading. What we don’t know is why there has been such an apparent regular failure to adhere to such specifications.
TCO, I can’t speak for NOAA/NWS as to why they chose that number any more than any one of us could speak for why we obey speed limits on roads. It’s a spec, the spec is accepted, its followed.
If you don’t follow the spec, trouble follows. Operating outside of the spec has risks, be it a ticket or faulty data.
Last data dump
http://www.wmo.ch/pages/prog/www/IMOP/publications/IOM-94-TECO2006/PROGRAMME.HTML
Retired Spook, I’m sure it’s the former rather than the latter. In my experience, anytime you see a nice round number like 100 in a spec, its a WAG.
Jeff C., I was sorta jerking TCO’s chain. From Anthony’s latest post, it appears that it may actually have been the latter, and done with French tax dollars, no less — a twofer. It’s good to know that some thought went into the specs, even if so many stations are ignoring them.
Steve: thanks for your cogent statements and the supply of papers.
Anthony: Thanks for your statement. I understand your, “it’s the law, I didn’t write the law, but we should follow it” standpoint. That’s all well and good. It’s just when you make rhetorical flourishes, along the lines of “it’s the law and there’s a damn good reason for that law”. Well, then you need to show the damn good reason for it. Not just rever to “the law is the law”. (Not trying to be pedantic, but I’m still not clear if you track on this basic concept that both Mosh and myself have described.)
Bad news: Climate Science is closing up shop.
“Perhaps the supplier gives less than the required 100 plus feet!”
That may be, but if you look at the photos for Newberry MI, you’ll see they overcame it. That certainly appears to be close to the distance spec.
TCO,
I have not found anything directly explaining what I would call the 4D thermal plume from a heat storage device. Simply, how does the heat flow over space and time?
Being reasonable fellows we agree that asphalt, concrete and rock act like capacitors and store heat. And they store it differently than grass, dirt, and dead squirrels.
When these capacitor’s release we have heat flow Houston. The question is..
what the heck does that flow feild look like?
And what does it look like
over time?
I Suspect the answer is NOT 49. I suppose that answer is as hard as the chinese remainder thereom.
Now, the Mandelbrotian within me says this.
Understanding the Microsite problem IS NO DIFFERENT than understanding the Global Climate problem.
It’s turtles all the way down..
To other folks . You want someone like TCO pushing against you. He has never questioned my politics or motivation and has only put my belief under the microscope.
So, have a good yell at him if you must ( I did) but don’t disregard his prodding.
It’s not just a capacitor effect. It’s direct warming from radiation capture during the day (for instance a fresh-laid asphalt blacktop being near worst), versus reflection.
I have no idea how severe the problem is. Neither does Anthony. I’m not impressed by his gut though. For instance with the air conditioners, he was way to quick to assume very strong effects from distant, second story window units.
And I’m not impressed with TCO’s circular logic.
You used the words “very large effect” in describing my assessment of 2nd story a/c.
Now prove I said those exact words. I don’t believe I did.v
a/c units can have an effect based on wind conditions, local structure and foliage ducting of wind, eddies, and the a/c output. For example, Happy Camp CA 1st and 2nd story units can have such effects from SW winds.
But thats not the point, and you seem to keep missing it.
The point is this: stations used to monitor climate shouldn’t be in proximity with such heat sources in the first place, or be near buildings, or parking lots, etc because to disentangle all the potential biases, inevitable leads to attempts to quantify them. And it may not be possible.
Gavin says we need 60 good sites, we should identify them and see what trend they have compared to CONUS and ROW.
BTW TCO, how about a name? I don’t like debating phantoms….like Eli, BCL, Tamino, and Dano whom hide behind monikers. If yoiu believe enough in what you have to say, put you name to it…thats my world view.
Imagine how far Hansen would have gotten with a handle instead of a name.