A new story by Jonathan Leake in the Sunday Times puts the spotlight on surface temperature data.
Above: Rome’s airport weather station. Here is the interactive view
“The temperature records cannot be relied on as indicators of global change,” said John Christy, professor of atmospheric science at the University of Alabama in Huntsville, a former lead author on the IPCC.
The doubts of Christy and a number of other researchers focus on the thousands of weather stations around the world, which have been used to collect temperature data over the past 150 years.
These stations, they believe, have been seriously compromised by factors such as urbanisation, changes in land use and, in many cases, being moved from site to site.
Christy has published research papers looking at these effects in three different regions: east Africa, and the American states of California and Alabama.
“The story is the same for each one,” he said. “The popular data sets show a lot of warming but the apparent temperature rise was actually caused by local factors affecting the weather stations, such as land development.”
The IPCC faces similar criticisms from Ross McKitrick, professor of economics at the University of Guelph, Canada, who was invited by the panel to review its last report.
The experience turned him into a strong critic and he has since published a research paper questioning its methods.
“We concluded, with overwhelming statistical significance, that the IPCC’s climate data are contaminated with surface effects from industrialisation and data quality problems. These add up to a large warming bias,” he said.
….
I and the surfacestations project get a mention also.
Read the remainder in the Sunday Times
Well Harvey m’boy, if you’d posted an equivalent sceptical comment on Climate Progress or RC you wouldn’t even have made it through the mods. Think about it old son; think about how this blog deals with criticism and the way that differs from the fanatical suppression and denial (hah!) of dissent on warmist sites. And the real issue, as you’ve been repeatedly informed by now, is the positioning of the equipment, not any airplane as such. That kit shouldn’t be there at all. Time to get in touch with reality Harvey mate, welcome to the real planet Earth. The jig is up!
Jan,
Fascinating discovery about the CRU fabrication of temperature records for the Czech republic. Good work! It deserves wider notice and should play a part in the British inquiry into the CRUtape letters and CRU activities. Phantom data for phantom global warming. Cheers!
I live in a city that doubled in population over the last 20 years. The explosion of houses has been incredible never mind apartments and roads. The asphalt shingles, driveways , roads and landscape rocks have replaced what was a grass field. The urban island heat effect in full swing. One of the reasons I don’t believe in AGW is partly because of this and in the 70’s it was global cooling scare bogus! I live on the outskirts of the city and notice my outside temp guage cool down , especially in summer by 3-5 degrees C as I get in the ranch country, very consistantly and very quickly.
I’ve always wondered how they kept temperature records for the last hundred years or so and wondered how accurate they were. I can just imagine some drunk guy in 1899 going out in a drunken stupor and reading a thermometer and writing down the temperature , if he remembered . Never mind the accuracy of it or it’s placement.
Thank God for this site and Anthony’s audit of weather stations in the U.S.
It gives me sanity in the insanity of the political correct world of “The Science is Settled”crap. It’s all a money game with elitist polititions,scientists and UN officials.
Brent in Calgary
This is a Met office fact sheet on climate observations – You can see they prefer to use a 747 and not a 340 !
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/corporate/library/factsheets/factsheet17.pdf
Figure 4. Stevenson Screen at Heathrow Airport.
But note I don’t think Heathrow is used by Cru or Gistemp.
Ref – Harvey Puca (20:24:04) :
Harvey you’re too quick on the draw and only slightly correct: the jet probably isn’t taking off, that isn’t the runway it’s sitting on, it may be a Hanger Queen, but might light up and move on it’s own power also. I checked your comment and went to the link below (perhaps you already have too). The whole point of the article and blog is that the site for this “weather station” (and so many others) is pathetic. Again, that’s the whole point. Too many stations today are sited where they do the ‘least’ good and have to have computer generated “climatic and environmental corrections to the raw data” before the “data” can be sent off for inclusion in regional, continental, or global reports. Suggest that when you have a valid “point or observation” to make in future you don’t jump to the nuclear option and start calling people liars from the get-go.
http://maps.google.co.uk/maps/mm?hl=en&ie=UTF8&ll=41.808117,12.584952&spn=0.000834,0.001692&t=h&z=16
I located the station at Google Maps: http://maps.google.com/?ie=UTF8&ll=41.806749,12.587403&spn=0.004151,0.009023&t=h&z=17
It doesn’t look like planes would be taking off from there.
A pretty good article over all. However, the obligatory hat tip to AGW is in the last paragraph. Someone HAD to say it’s worse than we thought!
PS:
It is important to have “airport” weather data; people’s lives are at stake and it is a major ingredient to flight ops around the world. But to say that NWS/NOAA or any other agency should only have hot tarmack or runway data as the “best weather” information (or record) for New York City, Kansas City, or Los Angeles, etc., is insane. Weather is local. Weather safety is very local (airports). While something the size of Podunk Oregon may only need one weather station, something the size of Mexico City will need a hundred or more (besides the “one” at the airport).
Global Warming, it isn’t happening:
http://climaterealists.com/index.php?id=5148&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+ClimaterealistsNewsBlog+%28ClimateRealists+News+Blog%29
Well, it is an already known fact that THEY made the poisoning recipe by removing cold temperatures sites. Everybody knew about “Climate Gate” and so on, but such as all data point to not warming and no AGW, it is equally true that CO2 has been already considered a pollutant and Carbon Trade and UN’s Global Governance policies won’t be put aside…
What is it needed for you, up there in the “first world” to change things back to common sense?
Pascvaks, you forget that the food on your table depends on accurate weather forecasts in Podunk, Oregon. Climate zones have been mapped all over the world. These are where temperature sensors are needed (along with airport only sensors) in order to stay on top of plant hardiness. If you want people in Mexico City to know what kind of coat to wear or sunscreen to put on, let them have their own out the back door thermometer. Once agricultural purposes are satisfied within climate zones, the predictive forecasting models that will be generated will be more accurately tuned. The side benefit is of course, better prediction for folks in Mexico City. By focusing on agricultural climate zone areas first and foremost, we all benefit.
Well I would be happy to take off from that airport any time the pilot says it is OK. The Stevenson Screen location seems about perfect to me.
But don’t anyone go sending those readings to any climate researcher, who might decide to use the data to represent some place up in the Dolomites.
Can I point out that in the tail of that aircraft is an AUXILIARY POWER UNIT (APU), the APU is a single shaft gas turbine located in the unpressurized tailcone.
Average APU fuel consumption = 115 kg / h (ground) & 90 kg / h (flight)
aviation fuel heat of combustion = 43.5 MJ/kg
energy due to combustion of fuel = 5,000 Mj/hr.
What has happen to Harvey Puca ?
I hope that he’s realised alredy that gavin’s “method” does not work here
Ref – Pamela Gray (11:04:14) :
“Pascvaks, you forget…”
_________________
Been doing more of that (forgetting) lately. Fully agree! I believe there are just as many thermometers in NYC as in Mexico City — if not more.
Gee, ya think that might make temps seem warmer than they are?
Correct me if I’m wrong, but that isn’t Rome’s main airport. Note only one runway. Rome’s main airport is here:
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=rome+italy+airport&sll=37.0625,-95.677068&sspn=58.72842,114.433594&ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=Leonardo+da+Vinci-Fiumicino+Airport,+00054+Fiumicino+Rome,+Lazio,+Italy&ll=41.807449,12.585375&spn=0.001713,0.003492&t=h&z=19
Sorry for the long link.
Cardiff, Wales Airport is our local Met.Office station. Like Bridget H-S I’d be happy to participate in a UK station survey, as I posted some time ago. I’m retired with stacks of time and there is only so much golf I can play.
@Andy (12:41:40) :
Located at Roma Ciampino
Andy, just read the posts. There is at least 10 references to the location, with links to maps
Oh no –
for those of you who think the photo was photoshopped,
now it appears that Microsoft’s Bing Maps is in on the deception with Google:
http://tinyurl.com/yhu74fr
Well, OK, there isn’t an aircraft parked there, but the location of the equipment is the same.
Sorry, that link was bad. Rome’s airport is Leonardo da Vinci-Fiumicino Airport, and that’s not the airport talked about in this post.
@ML@13:21
Thanks for your input ML. I take comments in blogs with less than a grain of salt. My point had to do with the post. There is a distinction between “Rome’s airport” and an airport in Rome.
But, again, thanks for your input. You’ve reminded me that I need explain things in excruciating detail or someone will fail to see the obvious point.
Ron Dean (09:22:14) :
Yes, but Vicky missed some keywords. Like “Robust”.
Maybe getting nervous?
Counting sunspots, no doubt.
@ur momisugly Ron de Haan (09:48:33) :
“Global Warming, it isn’t happening:
http://climaterealists.com/index.php?id=5148&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+ClimaterealistsNewsBlog+%28ClimateRealists+Ne”
Congratulations to Mr Wakefield for this animation. He tried it out here last night. Excellent stuff. I shall show this to my warmist pals (but, of course, they’ll say it’s not peer reviewed, unlike the IPCC). The next step is how to get them through the cognitive dissonance.
I will hate myself for asking this, but in scientific inquiries the questions should be asked regardless.
The jets make for horizontal streams of hot gases. The hot gases rise, and the horizontal stream curves into a vertical column. The column then draws in surrounding air around it, as in at the bottom of the column. With moist ground (has water content), this flowing air will cause evaporation thus cooling of the ground (wind chill).
Therefore won’t jet exhaust directed at the weather station at a certain distance create a cooling effect and lower temperature readings? That should be when the column is roughly between the station and the jet engine, although the column could be some distance to the side of the station and still yield cooling.
There is the possibility that the horizontal stream becomes so diluted by surrounding air that whatever column effect is generated is negligible. But still, this seems a question worth considering.