Ever wonder why NASA’s Jim Hansen (and many others) see red at high northern latitudes?
Above 2011 Temperature Anomaly. Source: NASA GISS interactive plotter
With all that red up north, you’d think Jimbo, Gore, and Trenberth would want to get a look at that firsthand, instead of making a fossil fueled boat trip to Antarctica during peak of the southern summer melt season so they could give us grand proclamations about the melting there.
All the “hot action” is up north according the the latitude plot that accompanies the GISS anomaly map:
Funny how in the anomaly map above, with the great Texas Heat Wave this year, Texas is not red. WUWT? (The way it was portrayed in media, you’d think it was a permanent condition).
It seems to be all in the adjustments. Cooling the past helps the slope of the trend:
How GISS Has Totally Corrupted Reykjavik’s Temperatures
Guest post By Paul Homewood
GISS Surface Temperature Analysis
Now that GHCN have created a false warming trend in Iceland and Greenland , and GISS have amended every single temperature record on their database for Reykjavik going back to 1901 (except for 2010 and 2011), we should have a look at the overall effect.
The red line reflects the actual temperature records provided by the Iceland Met Office and shows quite clearly a period around 1940, followed by another 20 years later, which were much warmer than the 1970’s. GISS, as the blue line shows, have magically made this warm period disappear, by reducing the real temperatures by up to nearly 2 degrees.
Meanwhile the Iceland Met Office say that “The GHCN “corrections” are grossly in error in the case of Reykjavik”.
=================================================================
Just for completeness, here is the GISS trend map and latitude plot for the start of the GISS baseline (1951) to 2011.
UPDATE: 1/26/2012 10:30AM
I added (The way it was portrayed in media, you’d think it was a permanent condition) to the body of this post. since my intent with that statement about Texas wasn’t clear. I got distracted by phone calls and other business in the middle of writing this post and lost my train of thought (and I haven’t been following comments on it either). It is one of the pitfalls of trying to run a business and family while trying to keep up with the demands of this venue. Apologies to anyone who thought I was suggesting Texas summer temp data would show up in December data. Such transient events are just one more indication of the synoptic scale blocking high which caused that event, not any long term climate issue.
Paul Homewood sends his email correspondence and supporting data from the Icelandic Met Office. Here is a PDF file containing the data (referenced in the emails): Reykjavik-1871_Akureyri-1881_Stykkisholmur-1845
From: Trausti Jónsson
To: paul homewood
Cc: Halldór Björnsson
Sent: Monday, 23 January 2012, 17:40
Subject: Re: monthly temperatures
We have sent a questions to the GHCN database regarding this and they will look into the problem. Regarding your questions:
No we were not aware of this.
No, but we are asking for the reasons
GHCN are both valid and of the correct value? If so, why?
The GHCN “corrections” are grossly in error in the case of Reykjavik but not quite as bad for the other stations. But we will have a better look. We do not accept these “corrections”.
No.
No changes have been made in the Stykkisholmur series since about 1970, the Reykjavík and Akureyri series that I sent you have been slightly adjusted for major relocations and changes in observing hours. Because of the observing hour changes, values that where published before 1924 in Reykjavík and before 1928 in Akureyri are not compatible with the later calculation practices. For other stations in Iceland values published before 1956 are incompatible with later values except at stations that observed 8 times per day (but the differences are usually small). The linked paper outlines these problems (in English):
Click to access Climatological1960.pdf
The monthly publication Vedrattan 1924 to 1997 (in Icelandic) is available at:
http://timarit.is/view_page_init.jsp?pubId=278&lang=is&navsel=666
and earlier data (in Icelandic and Danish – with a summary in French) at:
http://timarit.is/view_page_init.jsp?pubId=240&lang=is&navsel=666
http://timarit.is/view_page_init.jsp?pubId=241&lang=is&navsel=666
Monthly data from all stations from 1961 onwards :
http://www.vedur.is/Medaltalstoflur-txt/Manadargildi.html
Best wishes,
Trausti J.
Til: “Trausti Jónsson”
Sent: Mánudagur, 23. Janúar, 2012 17:09:30
Efni: Re: monthly temperatures
From: Trausti Jónsson
To: phomewooduk
Cc: Guðrún Þórunn Gísladóttir
Sent: Tuesday, 17 January 2012, 11:19
Subject: monthly temperatures
I attach a table including the monthly temperature averages for Reykjavik (1871), Akureyri (1881) and Stykkisholmur (1845).
Best wishes,
Trausti J.
Lýsing: Could you please send me, or let me know where I can access, annual mean temperatures for Reykjavik and Akureyri, back to 1900,(or when records are available from).. Many thanks Paul Homewood –
slow to follow says: January 26, 2012 at 5:54 pm
“This begs the question why adjust? Also are any of the sets you linked at the Blackboard raw data only?”
I believe all the “amateur” indices at least use GHCN unadjusted. I certainly do. Here is a more recent post at the Blackboard which includes BEST. It has ,a href=”http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j237/hausfath/Fig2.png”>this plot comparing NOAA with some indices not using homogenization.
Why adjust? Good question – it doesn’t make much difference. But you can bet that if they didn’t adjust, there would be posts at WUWT that found some station that had moved, or some such, and commenters wanting charges laid because no adjustment had been performed.
Nick Stokes says:
January 26, 2012 at 6:50 pm
The link that you posted on to the Blackboard proves nothing as it doesn’t even go back to 1900. Only goes back to the 1970’s. The time frame we are talking about here is the late 30’s and early 40’s….20th Century.
As far as the validity of adjustment to this posts questions, it seems that Icelandic Met has already done so, thus baring the need for further adjustment.
The results of adjusting an adjustment from a basic statistical sense is that the derived results will have expanded error bars.
I will await the response from GHCN as to the reasons they have adjusted the adjustment.
My posts are not indicateing any malfeaseance on GHCN’s part, nor GISSTEMP’s part.
Camburn, to see the effect of the GISS adjustments over the last century, see this page:
http://clearclimatecode.org/gistemp-urban-adjustment/
and especially, this graph (sorry for the large URL)::
http://chart.apis.google.com/chart?cht=lc&chds=-100,100&chtt=ccc-gistemp:+global+land+index&chdlp=t&chdl=old+adjustment+(r344)|new+adjustment+(r345)|no+adjustment&chd=t:-9,-13,2,-4,-40,-21,-25,-44,-23,8,-20,-50,-35,-36,-28,-29,-23,-12,-15,-21,-3,-1,-26,-34,-39,-23,-13,-39,-29,-30,-19,-24,-32,-27,-1,6,-20,-46,-33,-8,-17,-3,-9,-15,-11,-15,5,-5,-1,-22,-3,3,4,-11,2,-8,2,12,15,-2,14,12,11,6,11,-1,1,12,-3,-9,-17,-2,3,11,-9,-8,-18,8,9,5,-1,10,5,3,-25,-15,-8,-2,-9,1,4,-10,-5,18,-6,-2,-21,16,7,14,28,40,9,34,15,12,19,35,42,28,49,44,14,18,31,44,36,39,70,44,39,55,67,65,59,76,63,71,53,70,-999%7C-24,-19,-14,-19,-45,-32,-42,-54,-23,-4,-40,-47,-38,-41,-29,-20,-10,-3,-21,-13,2,2,-17,-26,-37,-17,-7,-36,-22,-25,-17,-20,-22,-19,2,4,-20,-39,-32,-7,-13,-6,-14,-17,-12,-13,6,-6,-1,-21,-3,3,1,-12,5,-9,0,11,15,-1,14,11,10,4,9,-1,0,12,-3,-9,-17,-2,4,12,-8,-7,-17,8,10,5,-1,9,5,3,-25,-15,-7,-1,-9,0,5,-10,-6,19,-7,-2,-23,15,6,13,27,39,7,33,13,12,18,34,41,27,47,42,13,17,30,44,36,38,69,43,40,56,67,65,59,77,65,73,55,71,-999%7C-23,-24,-29,-35,-60,-37,-36,-51,-29,-10,-43,-44,-41,-50,-38,-34,-21,-15,-32,-21,-5,-8,-26,-35,-45,-26,-15,-44,-31,-32,-26,-28,-26,-22,1,1,-22,-40,-33,-11,-16,-6,-12,-15,-11,-13,7,-6,-2,-22,-6,3,1,-13,3,-9,0,10,15,-2,13,11,9,3,9,-2,0,11,-3,-10,-18,-2,3,12,-8,-8,-17,8,9,5,-1,9,4,3,-26,-15,-7,-2,-9,1,4,-10,-5,18,-6,-2,-22,16,7,14,28,40,9,34,15,12,19,35,42,28,49,44,15,18,31,45,38,41,72,46,42,58,69,67,61,79,67,75,57,73,-999&chxt=x,y,r&chxl=0:%7C1880%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C1890%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C1900%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C1910%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C1920%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C1930%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C1940%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C1950%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C1960%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C1970%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C1980%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C1990%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C2000%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C%7C2010%7C1:%7C%7C-0.5%7C+0.0%7C+0.5%7C%7C2:%7C%7C-0.5%7C+0.0%7C+0.5%7C&chco=ff0000,0000ff,000000&chs=440×330
I don’t know, I find it a bit alarming that the warmists all point to arctic warming as being the canary in the coal mine then find that it is the polar (or near polar) records that have these upward trend changes (Greenland and Iceland). I am not ready to say fraud, but definitely would stretch to confirmation bias.
Tom Curtis,
Your first link is bogus, and your second link is worthless.
Hansen/GISS constantly and deviously “adjust” the temperature record to show either cooler past temperatures [making natural warming appear alarming], or artificially raising current temperatures. GISS never adjusts the temperature record to show moderating temperatures:
http://zapruder.nl/images/uploads/screenhunter3qk7.gif
http://i44.tinypic.com/295sp37.gif
http://img.umweltluege.de/fudging0809.jpg
http://i31.tinypic.com/5vov3p.jpg
http://icecap.us/images/uploads/RevisionismSPPI.jpg
http://www.klimadebat.dk/images/articles/lansner/f9.jpg
http://icecap.us/images/uploads/NASACHANGES.jpg
http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2011/01/gw-us-1999-2011-hansen.gif
http://i54.tinypic.com/fylq2w.jpg
No GISS doesn’t do anything dishonest…… they’re just wrong 1/2 the time. WELL, WHICH IS IT? [snip]
The first is the original based on “After GHCN adj” (version 2)
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/gistemp/gistemp_station.py?id=620040300000&data_set=1&num_neighbors=1
Then the new Version 3.
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/gistemp/gistemp_station.py?id=620040300000&data_set=12&num_neighbors=1
==========================================================
This is all that should need to be stated, but, we’ve still a bunch of scumbags on this earth pretending that a dynamic history is OK. It is not OK. You don’t get to alter history because it doesn’t fit your world view.
It is laughable that there are people here who assume GISS and GHCN and whoever else knows the real temps more than the people of Iceland. Well, it would be laughable if their unwarranted arrogance wasn’t so odoriferous. But, it is. The stench of a rotting mind is worse than rotting flesh.
One or anyone, or all of you a$$bags, please justify how you believe Iceland doesn’t know how to adjust their temps properly. DEMONSTRATE IT!
Tom Curtis says:
January 26, 2012 at 10:47 am
“So, rather than rushing to judgement again, you would do well to wait on a detailed examination of the case. Where there, for example, significant changes in the siting or locale of the site in Reykjavik in 1939 and 1941? Was there any sudden change in traffic at Reykjavik Airport that might have resulted in biasing the reading due to warming from engines and prop wash? Or was there some well defined climate event that would explain the large shifts in temperature over that period? Without enquiry, you do not know, and your simply assuming the algorithm is wrong in its application shows your “skepticism” is non-existent.”
I disagree. Assuming that a classifier like the Menne-Williams algorithm is perfect shows a lack of experience and extreme gullibility. Assuming that it creates false positives or false negatives in a certain number of cases is the ONLY acceptable position; and it has NOTHING to do with skepticism.
DirkH, nice strawman, but I have consistently argued that the issue should be looked at from both sides, ie, from both the IMO and from the GHCN/GISS. I have also clearly stated that I have no opinion, nor any preference as to the result. It is possible that NOAA needs to readjust the Reykjavik data back towards the IMO product, possibly all the way. It is also possible that NOAA has found a genuine problem with the Reykjavik data, that IMO will be able to confirm by studying the historical records of the station. It is that possibility, which most regulars are excluding a priori that also needs to be considered.
But YOU do not get to pretend that I am accepting the accuracy of the Menne/Williams algorithm a priori as a substitute for actually proving that is were the actual error lies. It is certainly a safe assumption that the algorithm produces false positives and negatives. IT IS NOT a safe assumption that in any particular case it is a false positive or negative without actually examining the details of the case. Making that assumption is simply avoiding skepticism in favour of ideologically driven dogmatism.
Two things I’m struggling with here. The first is that several commenters say that adjustments to temperature series zero out globally, i.e. they do not matter. I can understand the rationale for wanting to make corrections, but if experience shows they cancel out in the ende why continue doing them? We can then just as easily do without the adjustments and use the raw series, because the only thing we are after is the deviation from a defined normal.
The second thing I do not understand is how the Menne et.al. algorithm works when it is is basically using uncertain timeseries in a pairwise comparison in order to make adjustments. It is somewhat akin to the problem of using redundant temperature measurements in a process. That may, on the face of it, seem to be a robust strategy since when one indicator fails you can still use the other. For those of us more interested in the state of the temperature sensor than the actual temperature the issue is a bit more complex. If one sensor starts to drift, how do you figure out which is correct? If one says constant temp, the other varies up and down, can you safely conclude that the constant one is in failure? If there is a constant difference between the two, but else they act similarly, which is showing the correct temperature? And so on….
I need to read the paper more closelsy as I have still to find how they make sure they do the right corrections.
James Sexton says: January 26, 2012 at 9:40 pm
“You don’t get to alter history because it doesn’t fit your world view.”
No one is altering history. The history is to be found on the GHCN qcu file. That contains the data just as reported by the Iceland Met. It hasn’t changed.
If you’re in the business of compiling a global index, you’ll want a value that is representative of SW Iceland. So GHCN offers you a homogenized value, with papers to explain why they think their homogenization is better. Read the papers, and use it if you think it is better for that purpose. Some do.
I checked with Trausti Jonsson about Reykjavik station moves.
It moved in 1931 and 1945 but not between those dates, so station moves cannot explain the drastic adjustments introduced by GHCN in 1939-41.
Agreeing with Caleb, I thought Nome had record ice that prevent the fuel oil arriving but it is shown as having record highs. Not a missing “-” sign again is it?
Luther implies in his reply to Caleb that there isn’t a link between ice formation and temperature. That may need further explanation.
The other interesting point is GISS baseline warming map shows no warming for the Antarcic Peninsula. What happened to Larsen B?
Alaska is shown as deep red. Yet Alaska had a ‘surprise’ early onset of cold and sea ice such that Nome has had to work hard to get an icebreaker to bring in needed fuel…
I think the good folks of Alaska would not think they were red hot in December…
As the “QA process” tosses out any data that are a number of degrees ‘too low’ (and not a percentage or fraction of normal range), it preferentially tosses out extreme cold data from high volatility places (like the cold arctic north) and the replaces them with an average of surrounding ASOS airport data. BY DEFINITION, an average will be less volatile, so clips downgoing peaks.
As each run of GIStemp does a new re-imagining of the data with now homogenizing, there can be no individual explanation for each “adjustment” other than “the computer did it”…
IMHO, GIStemp is an automated nightmare fabricator that depends on mathematical artifacts to find warming even where their is none. There simply can not be a ‘global temperature’ (based on fundamental physics – an average of intensive variables is meaningless) and the way missing data are ‘re-imagined’ fabricates warmth where there is no data.
Glenn draws attention to the gaps in the graph at 1926, 1946 and 1966. There is also a gap at 2008. He describes these as a ‘red flag’.
If he had looked at the graphs of the unadjusted and adjusted data, which several people have linked to on this thread, he would have seen that there are no gaps in unadjusted data.
The gaps in the data are introduced by the GHCN ‘adjustment’ algorithm itself!
The reason for this may be ‘duplicate data’ – Jan and Feb 2008 both have the same monthly average of -0.2, and Oct and Nov are both 2.8. The GHCN algorithm may (incorrectly) assume this is an error and delete a chunk of data (though I don’t know why that would result in the deletion of two years of data).
In some cases, for example Stykkisholmur, there are gaps in the unadjusted GHCN data. But this is just because GHCN have failed to collect the data. The ‘missing’ data for Stykkisholmur 2001-2007 can be found at the website given by Trausti Jonsson.
I have just received the following mail.
Our discussions regarding temperatures in Iceland are discussed on page 8 in the newsletter (see below):
Regards
Agust
— — —
Dear all.
Please find below a link which will take you directly to a short newsletter (ca. 1.5 MB) with meteorological information summarised for the year 2011:
http://www.climate4you.com/Text/Climate4you_Year_2011.pdf
All temperatures in this newsletter are shown in degrees Celsius.
Previous issues of the newsletter, diagrams and additional material are available on http://www.climate4you.com/
I apologize for any double mailing. If you do not want to receive further mails of this type, please mail me to that effect.
All the best, yours sincerely,
Ole Humlum
Ole Humlum, Professor of Physical Geography
Department of Physical Geography, Institute of Geosciences
University of Oslo, Box 1042 Blindern
N-0316 Oslo, Norway
following mail:
— — —
From page 8:
“”Note:
Please note that as the GHCN v2 database is no longer being updated, and since late November 2011 the GISS surface temperature analysis is based on the adjusted GHCN version 3 data. Graphs comparing results of the GISS analysis using GHCN v2 and v3 are available on the GISS homepage for comparison. Apparently this change also resulted in some surprising effects for several individual station data series available from the GISS database, which raises a number of concerns, see, e.g., http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/01/25/another-giss-miss-this-time-in-iceland/#more-55440
In general, the corrections associated with taking the adjusted GHCN v3 database into use are apparently quite substantial for years before 1993, especially concerning the early 20th century warm period around 1925-45, as least for some stations. However, changes for the years following 1993 are small or absent. The maps shown on pages 1-2 in this newsletter are therefore not affected by these somewhat unanticipated changes of the original data”.”
@Agust – especially concerning the early 20th century warm period around 1925-45,
Warm period? Not according to GISS.
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/gistemp/gistemp_station.py?id=620040300000&data_set=13&num_neighbors=1
I have just received an email from Trausti Jonsson at the Iceland Met. He makes this very telling personal observation.
In 1965 there was a real and very sudden climatic change in Iceland (deterioration). It was larger in the north than in the south and affected both the agriculture and fishing – and therefore also the whole of society with soaring unemployment rates and a 50% devaluation of the local currency. In the questions above the year 1965 is mentioned twice. It is very sad if this significant climatic change is being interpreted as an observation error and adjusted out of existence.
I have been working for more than 25 years in the field of historical climatology and have been guilty of eager overadjustments in the past as well as other data handling crimes. But as I have lived through these sudden large climatic shifts I know that they are very real.
I guess he means this.
http://notalotofpeopleknowthat.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/image22.png
(I have forwarded this email to Anthony, if anybody needs verification)
Anders Valland says:
January 26, 2012 at 11:21 pm
Two things I’m struggling with here. The first is that several commenters say that adjustments to temperature series zero out globally
—————————————-
The point is that all the negative adjustments are done on the earlier periods and all the positive adjustments are done to the recent periods.
They do not balance out to Zero over “time”. The histograms shown above do not show time in them.
NCDC, GISS and CRU started adjusting the temperature record in the late 1980s. Since then, every month, they add in a little 0.01C there and a 0.01C there. Subtle enough so that it not noticeable for that month. After 2.5 decades, 300 monthly opportunities to adjust 1572 months of historical temperatures records in 5000 stations, dropping the cooling ones, adding new warming ones and, viola, one has an increasing trend of 0.7C.
Someone needs to check how much the Raw unadjusted GHCN database has actually been changed itself.
Nick Stokes says:
January 26, 2012 at 12:41 am
It was also shown that the size distribution of the Darwin adjustments was a red herring. The issue was the order in which the adjustments were made, which, very conveniently for the alarmists, increased the warming trend.
Bil Illis,
I also believe that these corrections do not cancel each other if you consider area as well. It seems the corrections made in the Arctic have more impact, possibly because of the relative scarcity of measuring sites.
Paul Homewood, that’s a very interesting comment from Trausti about 1965.
Looking at the unadjusted data you can see the sharp cooling around 1965 in all 8 of the data sets, so there can be no doubt that it is real.
And in the adjusted data, you can see that the GHCN algorithm puts in an adjustment at 1965 to get rid of or greatly reduce that cooling in all but one of them (the exception being Vestmannaeyjar).
Another indication that the GHCN adjustment process is flawed.
It is excellent that the discrepency has been noted. This is how science is suppose to work.
I will await the answers of why, as I am sure that the methodology will also be explained.
We may end up going back to the original raw data, as the revisions to such may have removed the accuracy by replication.
Or the methodology may be sound.
More information is required, that is a certainty.
Paul, (January 27, 2012 at 3:50 am) Re the mail from Trausti:
I remember this year very well. I was 20 then. This was the start of an unusually cold period that lasted more than a decade, maybe about 15 years. Almost all Icelanders remember them as “hafísárin” meaning “the sea ice years”. Sea Ice was quite common in fjords in north Iceland, potato crops were damaged because of late summer frosts, etc.
What Trausti wrote to you about this period is true. Probably no Icelander knows climate history for Iceland better than him.
I find it also strange that the cold year 1918 is not visible in the adjusted graph. Every Icelander knows “frostaveturinn mikli” or the “the great winter of frost” . This year was unusually cold.
This “correction” can be seen in this graph ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/ghcn/v3/products/stnplots/6/62004030000.gif
In my opinion this is not simple data correction, but someone has been falsifying the data.
Nick Stokes says:
January 26, 2012 at 11:33 pm
James Sexton says: January 26, 2012 at 9:40 pm
“You don’t get to alter history because it doesn’t fit your world view.”
No one is altering history……..
=================================================
Yes, they are, written rationalizations for history revision doesn’t mean the revision isn’t occurring. One only needs to look at HadCrut, to know this is history revision.
I think Agust says it as well as anyone, http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/01/25/another-giss-miss-this-time-in-iceland/#comment-877021
In my opinion this is not simple data correction, but someone has been falsifying the data.