NIWA is being sued by the NZ Climate Coalition, mainly due to the differences in data in this graph:
Niwa sued over data accuracy
The country’s state-owned weather and atmospheric research body is being taken to court in a challenge over the accuracy of its data used to calculate global warming.
The New Zealand Climate Science Coalition said it had lodged papers with the High Court asking the court to invalidate the official temperatures record of the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (Niwa).
The lobby of climate sceptics and ACT Party have long criticised Niwa over its temperature data, which Niwa says is mainstream science and not controversial, and the raw data publicly available.
The coalition said the New Zealand Temperature Records (NZTR) were the historical base of NIWA’s advice to the Government on issues relating to climate change.
Coalition spokesman Bryan Leyland said many scientists believed although the earth had been warming for 150 years, it had not heated as much as Government archives claimed.
He said the New Zealand Meteorological Service had shown no warming during the past century but Niwa had adjusted its records to show a warming trend of 1degC. The warming figure was high and almost 50 percent above the global average, said Mr Leyland.
Full story here:
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/4026330/Niwa-sued-over-data-accuracy
But it seems some think the challenge is “stupid”
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/4026553/Court-challenge-to-Niwa-stupid
The New Zealand Climate Science Education Trust, a newly registered arm of the Coalition, has filed a claim in the High Court seeking a declaration to invalidate the NZ Temperature Record, currently promoted by NIWA, and featured on its website. Media release, backgrounder and summary of claim here:
http://www.climatescience.org.nz/images/PDFs/niwa.ct.docs.pdf
Partial text below, more details in the PDF link above.
The New Zealand Climate Science Coalition
Hon Secretary, Terry Dunleavy MBE JP, 14A Bayview Road, Hauraki, North Shore City 0622
Phone (09) 486 3859 – Mobile 0274 836688
– Email – terry.dunleavy@nzclimatescience.org.nz
13 August 2010
High Court asked to invalidate NIWA’s official NZ temperature record
The High Court has been asked to invalidate the New Zealand official temperature record (NZTR) as promoted by the Crown Research Institute, NIWA. These records are the historical base of NIWA’s scientific advice to central and local government on issues relating to climate change. NIWA maintains temperature archives for the past
century, and also projects them forward for the next century.
The statement of claim filed on behalf of the New Zealand Climate Science Education Trust (NZCSET) asks the court for three rulings:
A: to set aside NIWA’s decisions to rely upon its Seven Station Series (7SS) and Eleven Station Series (11SS), and
to find the current NZTR to be invalid
B: to prevent NIWA from using the current NZTR (or information originally derived from it) for the purpose of
advice to any governmental authority or to the public
C: to require NIWA to produce a full and accurate NZTR.
”Twentieth-century temperature records are now being challenged all around the world” said Bryan Leyland, spokesman for the NZCSET. “But I think we are the first country where the issues are to be placed squarely before an independent judicial forum.”
“Many scientists believe that, although the earth has been in a natural warming phase for the past 150 years, it has not heated as much as Government archives claim. The precise trend figure is extremely important, as it forms the sole basis of the claim that human activities are the dominant cause of the warming.
“The New Zealand Met Service record shows no warming during the last century, but NIWA has adopted a series of invariably downward adjustments in the period prior to World War 2. Because these move the old temperature records downwards, the 7SS NZTR shows a huge bounce-back of over 1°C in the first half of the century” said Mr
Leyland. “Although this is out of line with dozens of other records, and has been the subject of sustained questioning by both the New Zealand Climate Science Coalition and the ACT party, NIWA refuses to accept that there are serious problems with the adjustments. In fact, no one has been able to explain exactly how they were
arrived at.”
The Court proceedings also allege bias and unethical conduct on the part of NIWA’s National Climate Centre. These are based partly on NIWA allegedly delegating the NZTR decision to a former employee, James Salinger, knowing that he had a vested interest in an untested theory put forward in his own 1981 thesis. NIWA also knew that the data and calculations for that theory had been lost, and, thus could not be replicated.
Another core criticism is NIWA’s constant reliance on an eleven-station series it produced last December. The flaws in this paper have been highlighted many times, including at
http://www.quadrant.org.au/blogs/doomed-planet/2010/06/nz-climate-crisis-gets-worse
“We find it hard to believe NIWA management just failed to notice that all the warming in the ‘eleven-station’ series was caused by the fact that it starts off with only three stations in 1931. From 1945 onwards there are between 9 and 11 stations” said Mr Leyland, “It’s astonishing how the increasing number of stations leads to greater warming, more alarm, and increased research grants.”
The Court will be asked to rule that NIWA has refused to repudiate the current NZTR in order to avoid political embarrassment, and feared loss of public confidence in the objectivity of its scientists. The proceedings were filed and served this week, and NIWA has up to a month to respond.
It is always with amazement I read comments by people such as Icarus. The policies put in place by governments supported by people like him/her are causing the very problems he complains about. Food shortages caused by the diversion of large parts of the US corn crop to ethanol production is beyond his ability to comprehend, as he comes here and pleads for more of the same. I really don’t know whether he and people like him can truly be as stupid as they appear, or whether they are tools in some nefarious plot. Perhaps their ability to think objectively has been educated out of them. Sad, really.
Climate Change in Germany has become a “loser” topic
http://notrickszone.com/2010/08/15/climate-change-in-germany-has-become-a-loser-topic/
We The People… are responsible for all we do and fail to do.
(aka – Freedom is not free!)
Interestingly, if the court does find in favor of the applicants, then surely the State of NZ has the obligation of prosecuting one of its own organizations. (under section ?? of the ?? act of 19??). This would be the whitewash part.
My friend lives in Wellington and she says it’s the coldest winter she’s known!
Icarus says:
August 16, 2010 at 4:30 am
Look at history. Most of the famines in the temperate regions have been due to cold, not warmth. We have had abundance in times of warmth. That is a matter of record, not conjecture.
The rest of your statement is pure unadulterated conjecture. There is no fast change of climate – climate changes all the time, as does weather. Get used to it – farmers do, and their yields are increasing right now.
Icarus says:
August 16, 2010 at 4:30 am
Surely this sort of dispute should be played out in the scientific literature rather than in the courts, should it not? If certain people think they have more accurate figures then they should publish a paper and let it be subject to scrutiny by their fellow scientists rather than by a court of law.
I am sure this post was just done in panic and concern for the welfare of the planet . . .
Now that you have had time to reflect I sure you want to know . . .
1. Is the record accurate ?
2. If it is accurate how does it relate to supposed increases in extreme weather events ( a very subjective concept I must say ).
3. How do these temperature and weather events connect with AGW and CO2?
4. What can or needs to be done to help the poor farmers and their output?
You see that before a course of action can be recommended we need to know the scale of the problem , if there is one. That’s what a full court trial is supposed to indicate.
When that is done we need some proper research into the effects of man’s activities on the climate should there be any need to do so. Your gut reaction is to assume that we shouldn’t research this issue because it’s almost too late already and instead we should just ignore facts, science, economics, sociology and everything else but just stick with the politics.
No way Jose.
I am sure your last experience with non-science in the form of sealing wax and feathers would indicate that scientific facts may be a better plan than emotional belief.
Moderator: When I made the obvious comparison on a another post on WUWT bewteen climate change “skeptics” and those who oppose the basis of modern biology, I got snipped. But when someone here calls for scientists “to be thrown under the bus,” that is acceptable. It is your blog, you can do as you like. But could explain the criteria for reasoned debate you are using?
[see the policy page ~mod]
Actually, it is funny. Whenever there is a pot on sea ice increasing, hockey sticks being debunked, or temperature records being shown to be fabricated, there are a bunch warbling “but that does not matter, we have to act now because !!!!”
Face the issue at hand. Try and defend what is being blown away, by all means. But please don’t bother grasping at the feeble straws of a different (and probably debunked elsewhere) argument.
This is exactly what is needed. Put the warmers on the witness stand and make them explain their adjustments, knowing that there is a penalty for perjury.
Well done Ian George, but isn’t it a shame the people paid to collect and maintain this data don’t do these things impartially themselves and stop hiding behind cherry picked “anomalies”?
When i first read this post i thought it was a sad day for science when the lawyers have to come in to find the truth. But then it occurred to me that maybe wider Science does still have some integrity and that is why climate science has had to invent itself and been largely unsuccessful in forging collaborations with the established disciplines. As this blog has regularly shown though, mainstream science hasn’t exactly showered itself in glory over all this.
If there was a completely independent and utterly transparent analysis of all the data, measured and proxy, and all the science, then, and only then, would I consider the outcome worthy of attention. I used to have more faith, but I’ve lost that these last couple of years.
J. Knight: Unfortunately the crops-to-liquid-fuel boondoggle profits the same kind of people who are determined to continue pumping billions of tons of global warming gases into the atmosphere without regard to the consequences. Both need to stop, and both are supported by politicians getting massive financial incentives to support big business – again, regardless of the consequences. Particularly in the US, politics is determined by who pays the politicians the most money to get what they want. It’s a scandalous way to run a country.
Whaleoil says:
August 16, 2010 at 1:05 am
“Another hypocrite of gore-like proportions”;
http://whaleoil.gotcha.co.nz/2010/08/15/n-i-w-a-taken-to-court-over-data-accuracy/
I like that! hoho!
Actually, shouldnt members of Greenpeace, WWF and the like be put on some sort of green-list? Sort of….if you are on this green-list you cannot buy such cars?
“But Prof Hunter told Radio New Zealand the courts could not determine whether or not the adjusted records had been adjusted properly.”
Sure they can. Show the courts the raw data. Show them the adjusted data. Then explain why the data was adjusted the way it was. If you can’t explain why the data was adjusted the way it was, then the case is clear.
Well, Icarus provided quite a quote above, but failed to mention two important points.
Point One being the ability of well developed societies with the resources to produce grain year after year. The intrinsic wealth in these countries allows for rapid adjustments in planting plans, use of modern equipment, fertilizer, herbicides, pesticides, storage and shipping facilities, and (in some places) large irrigation projects. Example:
Open a Google Earth window and enter these coordinates:
46.306, -119.412
Your view will settle on a large green circle from an “eye altitude” of 1000 meters. That circle is 1.13 km across and it is an irrigated field. Now begin to zoom out and at about 30 km the town of Richland, WA, USA will show up on the right side. This area receives about 200 mm (+/- 50) of precipitation per year classifying it as near-desert or steppe in the wetter parts.
Continue zooming out to about 154 km altitude view. Almost all the bright green represents grains, fruits, and vegetables grown as irrigated crops. To the NE the green color is lighter. This is mostly dry-land wheat.
Point Two is that central North America lies in a zone where the temperature patterns run north-to-south (generally) and the precipitation patterns run east-to west. As natural variation in either pattern occur there is only slight increase or decrease in the productivity of the combined Canadian and US agricultural sector. Grain seeding can shift from corn to wheat to barley (or others) to compensate for noticeable yearly or longer variations in weather and/or market demand.
Getting back to Icarus’ comments
“Famine has been a constant presence in human history, but we’ve forgotten about it in the last few generations”
The first part is true, the second part is complete nonsense.
“but with failing harvests around the world due to heatwaves, drought and flooding our food supply is looking increasingly perilous”
We have always had those problems, so nothing new there. The better developed the society is the better we can deal with the problems. Who in their right mind would want to put the world’s poor at increasing peril by reducing the ability of farmers to produce?
Icarus quotes Lester Brown as “We cannot continue to burn coal and oil with abandon and expect to have bumper harvests…”
This, I think, is invoking the CO2 induced CAGW idea but the whole point of the NZ Climate Coalition’s legal action is to say this whole idea is a fraud.
So it is well past time to start taking global warming fraud seriously and stop with all the crazy gloom and doom.
Funny how things work out. We show disdain for companies and people that lie in order to borrow money.
The carbon tax is worse than borrowed money. It is tax and we don’t get a penny back. But you feel getting money from people for an agenda is justified if we fudge on the numbers.
I think the drama should be limited to journalism and literature classes. it sure isn’t science.
Although not directly part of the suit, the part played by UHI thermometers is germane to recent increases in temperatures. An expert like Anthony Watts with his experience with the US T-record could be useful. I wonder if the plaintiff has thought about that.
Actually, NIWA has got its tail in a crack. Satellite records (for an unknown reason) keep them honest after 1979. So all of their adjustments have to occur further and further into the past. So they get a greater trend. But the problem arises that as a result, most of the warming occurs before CO2 becomes a significant factor!
So, despite desperate attempts, NIWA cannot have it both ways: They can’t very well blame the suspect for the murder if the murder occurred before the suspect was born.
Why do they have so many stations. Why not just put one thermometer somewhere near Mt Ruapehu, in the middle of the NI, and another one somewhere near Arthur’s Pass, in the SI.
After all they used to monitor the entire Arctic nofth of +60 deg, with just 12 Stations; so having 9 or 11 stations for NZ must surely be gross overkill. If the Dr Hanses says the Temperatures are good out to 1200 km from the thermometer, that you only need two for the whole of NZ.
Then there was that little fracas a short while ago about one of the NIWA stations somewhere near the Wellington-Hutt area that got move from essentially sea level to someplace else that was several hundred metres higher.
I’m not sure it’s a good idea having courts adjudicate scientific data; that after all is what got us the absolute absurdity of those nine “men in black” evidently disovering that somewhere in the US Constitution it must say that CO2 is a dangerous pollutant that the EPA must regulate.
Well way to go New Zealand; when you are that far flung; you have to create some major ruckus every now and then just so people will still notice you on the map. But it’s a bit much of a burden for us ex-pats to have to swallow to find out that you blokes are as looney as the Supremes.
” John T says:
August 16, 2010 at 8:27 am
“But Prof Hunter told Radio New Zealand the courts could not determine whether or not the adjusted records had been adjusted properly.”
Sure they can. Show the courts the raw data. Show them the adjusted data. Then explain why the data was adjusted the way it was. If you can’t explain why the data was adjusted the way it was, then the case is clear.”
Perhaps the case is already clear… since NIWA would apparently prefer the drama of being hauled through the court system over willingly providing people with the answers as to the reasons for their adjustments.
Kind of tells one all one needs to know, really.
Lobby your government to introduce fee-and-dividend – the more you reduce your carbon emissions, the better off you’ll be.
Peter Wilson @ur momisugly August 16, 2010 at 5:31 am
You should send hard copies of your email to the editors of several major AU and NZ newspapers and to the prime minister and direector of the NIWA.. If in your original email, you had added “Copies to:”, can you imagine the panic attacks in the NIWA and the prime minister’s office?
Since your email to Ms. Michelle Hollis will probably go right into the trash bin, you should send her another email and apologise for not using the proper form of address. In the second email you can mention and list to whom you have sent copies of your first email.
Send copies of your first email to opposition political parties and other groups opposed to the ETS.
The above is tedious and time consuming, but posting comments on blogs and sending emails to various goverment bureaucrats is not going to put an end to all this gobal warming gobblygook and climate change claptrap.
So this whole sordid affair is in fact appropriate for the courts to adjudicate:
1. bias and unethical conduct (do they have emails?)
2. vested interests
3. data lost
4. calculations lost
5. adjusted downward trend not accounted for
The data, calculations and adjustment methodology are not there, but the vested and conflicting interests, along with unethical conduct, are there. So I do not see this as any kind of a slippery slope for the courts to adjudicate in this case. Citizens of NZ should have legal recourse to stop NIWA from advising policy makers. It would be much worse to make state scientists immune from legal action.
The main finding about temperature increases over the last century
has come from NIWA’s “seven key stations”. When you look at where
these stations are on the map, it is quite apparent that 95% of the NZ
land mass is not represented in the derived temperature records.
And that’s irrespective of and additional to any data fiddling.