Note: I’m reposting this excellent essay from Jo Nova to give it a wide as an audience as possible. Be sure to bookmark her site if you have not already. – Anthony
300,000 dollars and three years to produce a paper that lasted three weeks: Gergis
The paper might have been scientifically invalid, but it was a box-office success. The headlines were everywhere
“1000 years of climate data confirms Australia’s warming” said the press release from University of Melbourne. It was picked up by The Guardian: “Australasia has hottest 60 years in a millennium, scientists find”; The Age and The Australian led with “Warming since 1950 ‘unprecedented’. The story was on ABC 24 and ABC news where Gergis proclaimed:” there are no other warm periods in the last 1000 years that match the warming experienced in Australasia since 1950.” It was all over the ABC including ABC Radio National, and they were “95% certain“! On ABC AM, “the last five decades years in Australia have been the warmest. ” Plus there were pages in Science Alert, Campus Daily Eco news, The Conversation, Real Climate and Think Progress.
Blog review is where the real science gets tested
Skeptics have been looking through the paper, and three weeks after it was published a team at Climate Audit uncovered a problem so significant that the authors announced that this paper is “on hold”. It has been withdrawn from the American Meteorological Society website. Bishop Hill has probably the best summary of what this means, and how it unfolded.
When Steve McIntyre asked for the full data, she refused. Gergis has an activist past which she has recently tried to hide. She was proud to mention in her biography that her data has been requested from 16 nations: So requests from Tunisia, Cuba, and Brazil are OK; but Canada — not so much. Apparently she didn’t appreciate his expertise with statistics and told him to get the data himself from the original authors, and added ” This is commonly referred to as ‘research’. We will not be entertaining any further correspondence on the matter. “
Will any of these media outlets update their news?
(The Uni Melb news feed is here).
On AM, David Karoly raved about how the study was strong because it relied more on observations not modeling (it is getting to them that skeptics keep pointing out they have no empirical evidence), and claimed he had “high confidence” in the results. (Is that the same kind of high confidence he has in future predictions of warming?)
MATTHEW CARNEY: Professor Karoly says the strength of the study is that it’s relied more on direct observations and measurements than climate modelling.
DAVID KAROLY: Nothing is absolutely certain in science but we say with very high confidence because we have repeated the analysis alone for the uncertainties that the warming in the last 50 years is very unusual and cannot, very likely cannot be explained by natural climate variability alone.
How concerned are they with accuracy? Are all these media outlets happy to leave their readers or viewers with the impression that these results are robust, reliable, and strong? In truth, even before this paper was withdrawn, before it was promoted, investigative reporters had plenty to wonder about.
Did any journalist really ask any hard questions to start with?
Let’s not bother to get into the point that the results of crunching the data 3000 different ways means their “confidence” came from models, not from the 27 proxies, most of which didn’t cover the full 1000 years, or the Australian mainland either.
The litany, the message went on and on and on in the media and apart from Adam Morton in The Age, most investigative journalists never thought to ask the question “How much warmer are we now than 1000 years ago” because if they had, Gergis would have had to say “by a tenth of a degree”. (That much eh?) Technically it was 0.09C.
The certainty of Australia being 0.09 of a degree cooler 1000 years ago comes down to observations from a batch of trees in Tasmania and New Zealand. (If we can calculate the regional temperature so accurately that way, why do we bother with a network of 100 thermometers? We could pop a max-min gauge next to those trees and “interpolate” the rest, No?)
Why not skip the thermometers and just go with the trees? They’re accurate to one hundredth of a degree across a continent and sea.
Funding?
Funding apparently ran to $340,ooo but may have been nearly a million dollars (at least that’s what Gergis thought in 2009, I can find no official record of it):
“The project, funded by the Australian Research Council’s Linkage scheme, is worth a total of $950K and will run from mid-2009 to mid-2012″. [Source: Joelle Gergis has deleted her blog. Cached copy here. Webcite copy]
Is this how policies are promoted now? The government finds b-grade activist scientists, funds them to produce papers that may or may not stand the test of …a few weeks, and the media rush to rubber stamp and repeat the story without asking hard questions, and in the end the government gets “third party” policy promotion — seemingly independent endorsement of the purest kind. At $340,000, it’s returned decent value some would say.
———————————————————————-
REFERENCES
Cook, E. R., Buckley, B. M., Palmer, J. G., Fenwick, P., Peterson, M. J., Boswijk, G. and Fowler, A. 2006. Millennia-long tree-ring records from Tasmania and New Zealand: a basis for modelling climate variability and forcing, past, present and future. J. Quaternary Sci., Vol. 21 pp. 689–699. ISSN 0267-8179. [abstract]
J. Gergis, R. Neukom, S.J. Phipps, A.J.E. Gallant, and D.J. Karoly, “Evidence of unusual late 20th century warming from an Australasian temperature reconstruction spanning the last millennium”, Journal of Climate, 2012, pp. 120518103842003-. DOI. [ Paper (PDF)]
ARC Funding: ARC Linkage Project Funding Outcomes
[It’s hard to find the original grants, this is one, which doesn’t add up to $950k could be part of the funding, or extra funding, or perhaps the original offer of $950k didn’t come through?…]
2606 ATMOSPHERIC SCIENCES
LP0990151 Dr JL Gergis; Prof DJ Karoly; Prof N Nicholls; A/Prof DS Garden; Prof CS Turney; Dr AM Lorrey; Dr K Braganza; Dr RJ Allan; Miss G Skelly; Ms RJ Moran; Dr K Tan; Mr RA Neville; Dr NR Lomb
Approved Project Title Reconstructing pre-20th century rainfall, temperature and pressure for south-eastern Australia using palaeoclimate, documentary and early weather station data.
2009 : $ 65,000
2010 : $ 117,500
2011 : $ 105,000
2012 : $ 52,500
APA(I) Award(s): 1
APDI Dr JL Gergis, Collaborating/Partner Organisation(s), Australian Bureau of Meteorology, Met Office Hadley Centre, Murray-Darling Basin Commission, Department of Sustainability and Environment,
Melbourne Water , National & State Libraries Australasia, National Library of Australia,
State Library of Victoria , State Library of New South Wales, Powerhouse Museum, Administering Organisation The University of Melbourne,
Summary of Linkage Projects Proposals by Primary Class Code for Funding to Commence in 2009
Updated 13 August 2009 Page 14
Project Summary
South-eastern Australia is in the grip of a severe water crisis due to the worst drought in recorded history and increasing temperatures. This landmark project brings together a team of Australia’s leading climate scientists, water managers and historians with the common goal of reconstructing south-eastern Australia’s climate history. The greatly extended record of annual rainfall and temperature variability will allow better planning for water storage and use, and improved testing of climate model simulations. Improving our understanding of the historical impacts of climate extremes on society will assist with planning for life in a hotter and drier future.
Thanks to Geoff Derrick for tadvice.
Somebody said “Gergis is a climate activist posing as a scientist.”
Tbh, Gergis is a climate change fundamentalist, posing as a scientist. These self selected climate scientists are harming economies and the environment with their preconceived cultism beliefs and are destroying the good name of science. Her rebuke toward Steve McIntyre was both cowardly and mind-numbingly childish.
Climate scientists are doing as much damage to the economy than any corrupt bankers. They are out of control.
Australian Research Council Little infromation here, but interesting to look at categories of grants under subject 1 & subject 2 filters.
http://www.arc.gov.au/search/default.asp?qu=LP0990151&search=Search
Download excel
Choose RFCD tab
Use filters to search by ‘last year of funding’ and ‘subject 1’ (climate change in paleo)
David Ball (them) says:
June 9, 2012 at 3:57 pm
Stephen Richards says:
Good morning David. And yes I have admired your father and indeed supported in a minor way. He is a very brave and principled man. Sadly, there are few others around the world except those who have retired. When they speak out the press ignores thems or derides them but the vast, vast majority of so called scientists stay dumb and who can blame them when their careers are on the line.
June 9, 2012 at 1:44 pm
Blog review has come of age – but only because Steve McIntyre’s efforts have resulted in the data proxies being published online at the time of publication in the journal. Not like the decade that it took to get the Yamal data.
Several years ago there was discussion on Climate Audit about the many factors other than temperature that cause changes in seasonal tree growth. Also there was discussion on the variability of tree ring width around the circumference of trees. Dendrochronologists may have found ways to reduce such uncertainties but it would be very helpful if one of them would educate us on how they got the uncertainty to less than a tenth of a degree over a thousand years. Just a citation to a good reference would be nice.
I do understand that you are all busy, but I ask, without sarcasm, if a real dendrochronologist would be kind enough to help us out here.
juanslayton says:
June 9, 2012 at 8:57 pm
Gail Combs:
Gail, your Wasco link is busted…
________________________________________
The link’s OK now it is NOAA/GISS that was busted last night. It acted weird on several links. Some times they worked and sometimes they did not.
Trees as temperature proxies…??
As I have said before, I have two trees in the yard – one gets the run-off from the chickens, while the other gets the run-off from the garage. The first tree says this is the hottest couple of decades on record, while the other says it is the coldest couple of decades since the last ice-age.
Likewise the chestnut trees in central London, which have succumed to some blight or weavil, and only have 20% of their normal leaf cover.
In a couple of decades, a London tringologist (tree ring ologist) will be able to prove that 2012 was the coldest year on record – indeed, the coldest for the entire world, because of some narrow rings on London chestnuts caused by an infection.
And in a similar fashion, a dendrochronologist will be able to prove that these same London chestnuts actually grew in the late 17th century, because this 2012 ‘cold snap’ mirrors the narrow rings of the late 17th century.
You can manipulate tree rings any which way you want.
“Did any journalist really ask any hard questions to start with?”
Did any sceptics tell the journalists?
Come on folks. Greenspin NGOs send our probably a couple dozen press releases each week. Each University has a press department. The media have more than enough stories given to them on a plate – they don't go and look for them.
So did any sceptics tell the press?
Well yes. It was a long shot. After all the Scottish Climate and Energy Forum had nothing to do with the story, it wasn’t Scottish, but we did our bit and sent out a press release to around 40 Scottish and major UK news newspapers.
We did our bit … did anyone else? And if not why are we complaining at the press for not covering it if no one tells them?
It’s not difficult to tell the press: Our Press Release
Paul Coppin.
Trees are barely proxies for other trees of the same species in a forest, let alone anything else.
———————————————-
And surely the Yamal trees proved this, as every tree appeared to have different tree ring growths for the same years. That what the whole point of the cherry picking with Yad 061 – you cannot cherry pick if all the trees are telling the same temperature story, you can only do this is there are large differences between individual trees.
Has anyone done a statistical analysis, to determine the variability in tree ring widths:
a. In the same forrest.
b. In the same region/country.
c. In the same continent.
It would be interesting to see if there were any reliable continuity within the data, orwhether the result was simply random growth noise, dependent purely on local conditions.
.
” This is commonly referred to as ‘research’. We will not be entertaining any further correspondence on the matter. “
Pride comes before a fall.
I’ve recently sent this to another climate blog. In the hope that it will have a presence on WUWT I won’t say which blog except to say it is ardently followed by those supporting CAGW
What writers of and posters to, xxxx, do not acknowledge is that the MSM seizes on papers such as that of Gergis et al to promulgate the position of the proponents of anthropogenic climate change/global warming but do not run subsequent stories announcing that the results may not be entirely as initially presented. Consequently although scientists and possibly even auditors, may be aware that there could be a modification of the results, this is not made clear to the general public and could generate a bias in public opinion. That said, I agree entirely with one of the writers of this blog that “giving different sides ammunition” is not the way forward. I wish it were possible for both sides to discus their differences without rancour which, unfortunately, stems more from posters to rather than writers of blogs addressing climate science
Latimer Alder says:
June 10, 2012 at 12:01 am
@Andrew greenfield
This may sound a bit tough but I think most people here do not realize that the warmists won this one hands down .
Ummm…isn’t there an opposition in Australia? All they need to do is calmly and thoughtfully draw attention to the fact that severe flaws have been found in the paper – by the bloggers, not the climate establishment
Latimer, if this result had been found by a University, they would have immediately issued a press release to all their contacts they had developed in the media. The press release would be an almost press-ready story that a journalist could just take and print with a few minor alternations to an audience that have very little interest in the technical details (unlike sceptics).
They would have then spent a few days pursuing any journalists that did not print to “encourage” them to print it and ensure that it got out as prominent a placing as possible.
They would have a press officer ready to handle any questions, a spokesperson ready to go live on TV, etc. etc.
Now let’s compare that to sceptics
No press release has gone out from the key players.
Far from having a press officer with an open door, some sceptic sites don’t even have a contact email address, telephone or even an address to write to.
No one has attempted to write this up for a readership that has little knowledge of the subject (last time I looked into a story- as someone with a keen interest and a lot of knowledge, it took me 3 hours to work out what the story was about).
Let me entirely frank THIS IS NOT GOING TO BE TAKEN UP BY THE MEDIA AND IT WILL NOT BE THE MEDIA’S FAULT, BUT OURS.
Only in very exceptional cases will the media come looking for a story and do any investigation. And only then after the story has already reached the public by other means.
Ninderthana says:
June 9, 2012 at 7:22 pm
[A lot of] Latitude said:
======================================
You can not get temps from trees or corals…..period
What you can get is the length of growing seasons………..period
Take your optimum growing temp……there is no way to know if that range occurred in a cool temp phase…..or a warm one
Ex: mid range/optimum temp ……. 50 – 80 F
Did temps range from -20F to 80F?
…or did temps range from 50F – 120F?
“”If your statement was universally correct. Latitude, then it would impossible for the tree-ring widths in hemlock tree rings along the coast of Alaska to know about the SST around the island of Rarotonga in the South Pacific!””
They don’t do it now….what makes you thing they did it back then?
davidmhoffer,
There is a simple physical reason why the tree rings of mountain hemlock along the coast of the Gulf of Alaska closely correlate with the adjacent sea-surface temperatures. The reason is that amount of growth that a mountain Hemlock has in any one season is severely limited by temperature. The reason for this is that these trees grow right along the tree-line along the coastal Canadian/Alaskan Rockies. This means that it only takes a slight change in the nearby mean seas surface temperature for the growth period to expand or contract. And no, this relation ship is not something that has been established by proxy but a scientific fact that has been established by direct observations over many decades.
The second linkage in this relation, i.e. anti-correlation between the sea-surface temperatures in Rarotonga and those in the Alaskan Gulf, has been established from direct temperature measurements over last 100 years. The anti-correlation is part of the well known sea-surface signature due to the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO).
And …. guys, if you want to know how to write a press release, this is a superb place to start:
How to write a killer press release by Friends of the Earth
Don’t laugh! Who’s has completely annihilated us in the media war on global warming? These are really professional people who know exactly what works and know how to encourage complete amateurs to make an impact with the press. Just remember the key points.
Just learn the key points
1. Human interest stories are very popular (make someone a hero!!! … not just a name, but who they are, where they live … “Prof Jones is a family man who is deeply passionate” )
2. Controversy or scandal is always of interest. (at least suggest there is something wrong)
3.Quirky, unusual or unexpected events and activities are also newsworthy. (Man bites dog … blogger proves the scientists wrong)
4. local celebrity, Local Angle ….I’ve already tried to find out if McIntyre is Scottish?
Like politicans-these people will do anything for money. Money is what it is about and until governments stop funding these type projects the “Gergiseses” will keep reporting.
John F. Hultquist,
I am ardent climate skeptic who believes that natural climate cycles are far more influential than any contributions by anthropomorphic CO2 to changes in the Earth’s global climate. I have spent much of the last decade conducting climate research on shoe-string budget [called my bank account] and putting up with a virtual tidal wave of disrespect and abuse.However, the one guiding principle for all of my efforts has been to build my views and ideas upon verifiable observations and scientific logic.
This does not mean that my views are always are right, however, it does mean that i am forced to call a spade a spade, when it is warranted. This is such an occasion. You are correct in pointing out the use of tree-ring widths as a temperature proxy is a dubious enterprise in most cases. However, there are specific cases when it can be scientifically verified that such a link does indeed exist. Mountain Hemlock along the coast of the Gulf of Alaska is one of these [rare] cases [please see my post to davidmhoffer above].
Normally, the results that are obtained form tree ring widths are only applicable locally. It is only by good circumstance that this particular temperature dependence can extended further afield. This results from the fact that variation in mean sea-surface temperatures in the Gulf of Alaska are intimately tied into variations of the PDO (Pacific Decadal Oscillation).
Anyone who dismisses all tree ring widths as proxies for variations in average temperature is doing so out of pure ignorance. I have to assume that you are intelligent enough to realize that there are cases were tree-ring widths are reasonable proxies for the average air-temperatures. Otherwise, there is little to discuss.
Scots Skeptic
Let me entirely frank THIS IS NOT GOING TO BE TAKEN UP BY THE MEDIA AND IT WILL NOT BE THE MEDIA’S FAULT, BUT OURS.
———————————————————-
Correct (in part). Then we need an appointed media spokesperson who is familiar with the format of sending out media press releases in a clear and concise format. All they then need is a list of the main media email addresses, which is not difficult to compile.
However, there is still the problem of whether any media outlet will use the information. I have been noting all press stories in the UK for about ten years, and it is evident that there are some stories that are ‘off message’ and will simply not be taken up by the media, no matter how newsworthy they are. And I am not simply talking about the Grauniad and the BBC, who can be relied upon to loose any skeptic point of view in the office paperwork. No, there are certain topics that even the ‘rebellious’ or ‘right wing’ media will also not touch.
AGW is one of those topics. I remember the Daily Mail’s science correspondent being anti AGW, and then came out with a huge article about how he had changed his mind. But subsequent articles demonstrate he has not really – he had been ‘lent upon’.
If the MSM in the UK will not give Lord Monckton a platform upon which he can preach, why would they ever listen to a WUWT blog representative? The only thing the MSN respect and bend to is political pressure and public opinion. Political pressure will not allow a skeptic voice to be aired. But if every time they write an AGW article, the newspaper recieved 50,000 complaints, they WILL begin to modify their views. It works, I have seen it done.
So don’t just write to WUWT, write a letter of complaint to the media (all the media outlets) each and every time you see an AGW story. Have a stock of contrary facts, and give them a couple each time (like Antarctic sea ice increasing and Antarctic temperatures decreasing etc etc). Keep writing, because nothing upsets a news editor more than the feeling he/she is loosing touch with his/her readership.
.
Jo Nova has a lot of very good postings on her blog, it is really great for WUWT to enable her even greater reach in the community. One of my favourites lately was the plea for free speach, especially bloggers which are targeted by new legislation:
http://joannenova.com.au/2012/06/the-forbidden-history-of-unpopular-people/
“It’s about arrogance, it’s about powerful people here in Australia who believe that they are smarter than you, that their opinion is worth more than your opinion, and that their thinking is better than your thinking, and if you think they’re wrong, you should just shut up.”
If a tree can measure temperature accurately to 1/10th of a degree why do we need a network of weather stations? Jo Nova puts it well.
Her reference to the ‘Bishop Hill site’ is also well worth reading in order to understand what went wrong here. In studies of this kind it is always necessary to reduce the data by filtering out unrepresentative samples. As bishop Hill puts it “Temperature reconstructions rely on “sorting” or filtering the data in some way, either choosing only proxy series that correlate well with their local temperature or alternatively weighting them according to how well they correlate. On the face of it, this is a reasonable approach, as the argument might well be made that if there is no correlation then the series is clearly not a proxy for temperature. However, the problem with this approach is that it amounts to a circular argument,,,,”
The main credit for unravelling this nonsense is of course due to master statistician Steve McIntyre, in spite of the fact that when he asked Gregis for the original data she refused. As stated in the article, she responded with “We will not be entertaining any further correspondence on the matter”. But it appears that credit is also due, Anthony, to your warmist contributor Nick Stokes, who confirmed Steve’s analysis and subsequently led to a withdrawal of the paper. Because when a warmist and a sceptic both agree that a paper is flawed – it is flawed. So credit where credit is due.
The really sad thing is that most of the news outlets that presented the original story as unconvertible proof of man-made global warming didn’t bother to print a subsequent correction when the story was revealed to be unsound.
Why is it that so many climate scientists are allergic to math and statistics? Seriously, do other fields suffer from this, and we just don’t hear about it? Or are they dishonest; I.E., they can do the math but they know they’re doing it wrong?
What really freaks me out is this. Before the blogosphere, how much B.S. got pumped out unchallenged as scientific fact into the world by similar shoddy methodology?
Kudos to Nick Stokes BTW; give me an honest man who disagrees with me any day instead of these other charlatans. We can disagree but so long as we’ve got integrity we’ll figure out the truth in the end.
Silver Ralph says:
June 10, 2012 at 6:04 am
The only thing the MSN respect and bend to is political pressure and public opinion. Political pressure will not allow a skeptic voice to be aired. But if every time they write an AGW article, the newspaper recieved 50,000 complaints, they WILL begin to modify their views. It works, I have seen it done.
So don’t just write to WUWT, write a letter of complaint to the media (all the media outlets) each and every time you see an AGW story. Have a stock of contrary facts, and give them a couple each time (like Antarctic sea ice increasing and Antarctic temperatures decreasing etc etc). Keep writing, because nothing upsets a news editor more than the feeling he/she is loosing touch with his/her readership.
Absolutely. Every time I’ve sent a letter to the editor of our local fishwrapper, he’s either printed it or replied that another correspondent covered the same ground. The paper is still a fishwrapper, but at least its editorial stance has moved from “we’ll all burn to death while we’re surrounded by drowning polar bears” to “actually, the temperature hasn’t risen all that much”…
Jo Nova says:June 9, 2012 at 8:44 pm
Second swipe at your question Jo, little in way of $$ though……..
6. Acknowledgments
We are grateful to all Aus2K working group members for data contributions and helpful discussions that clarified the study. Ed Cook is thanked for providing access to the signal-free tree ring standardisation program and Shayne McGregor is acknowledged for use of the modified version of the Unified ENSO Proxy used in this analysis. We acknowledge funding support from the Australian Department of Energy Efficiency and Environment, the Australian Research Council Projects LP0990151, FF0668679 and DP1092945, and Past Global Changes. SJP acknowledges the NCI National Facility at the Australian National University. We are indebted to all NOAA WDC data contributors who make multi-proxy research possible. P29/74
source: http://static.stuff.co.nz/files/melbourne.pdf
(1) Aus2K project member data
Aus2K steering committee members and data managers
Joelle Gergis (University of Melbourne), Andrew Lorrey (NZ National Institute of Water & Atmospheric Research NIWA), Steven Phipps (University of New South Wales), Raphael Neukom (University of Melbourne, University of Bern)
http://www.pages-igbp.org/workinggroups/aus2k
(2) Searched for and got this Australian Department of Energy Efficiency and Environment
1x academic reference in media release http://www.climatechange.gov.au/
(3) DP1092945 Untangling the links between El Nino and the changing global climate
University of Wollongong
DP1092945 Dr HV McGregor; Prof CD Woodroffe; Dr SJ Phipps; Dr A Timmermann; Dr AW Tudhope; Dr JN Brown; Dr D Fink; A/Prof A Fedorov
Approved Untangling the links between El Nino and the changing global climate
Project Title
2010 : $ 130,000
2011 : $ 130,000
2012 : $ 90,000
Administering Organisation University of Wollongong
Project Summary
Australia is a country of ‘drought and flooding rain’, and a key factor governing these cycles is the El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO). Our project will provide the following benefits to the nation (i) increased understanding of ENSO variability; (ii) increased knowledge of the extremes of ENSO; (iii) insights into what causes ENSO to vary; and (iv) improved ability to forecast ENSO. Understanding ENSO is essential for anticipating changes in drought and rain in the future. This understanding will help us to adapt Australia’s valuable agricultural and farming industries to climate change, and to manage our precious water resources.
FF0668679 Improving understanding of climate change and its impacts in Australia through detection and attribution of climate change
Listed under these 3 RFCD Codes……………
1.260502 Surface Water Hydrology
2. 260602 Climatology (incl. Palaeoclimatology)
3 . 260601 Meteorology
Organisational Unit(s)
Faculty of Science – University of Melbourne
Name of Funding Source or Scheme
ARC Federation Fellowship
http://www.arc.gov.au/pdf/FedFellow_bios_06.pdf
Synopsis:
Climate change is an important scientific, economic, environmental and social issue for Australia and the world. Professor Karoly aims to develop improved projections for climate changes in Australia through evaluation of the performance climate models in simulating global and regional climate variation over the past century and quantifying the contributions of different climate-forcing factors, such as greenhouse gases and stratospheric ozone depletion. Professor Karoly will collaborate with the CSIRO and the Bureau of Meteorology to improve the understanding of the causes and impacts of Australian climate variability. Their work will help to build a capability for modelling new Australian climate scenarios and investigate the impacts on Australia of stratospheric ozone depletion. Professor Karoly’s research will assist policymakers considering issues such as emission reductions and adaptation to climate change caused by greenhouse gases.
People
Prof David Karoly (Staff)
School of Earth Sciences – University of Melbourne
(Collaborator)
Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO)
(Collaborator)
Bureau of Meteorology
Timeline
2006-2011
Code
SCI_15
Source: http://www.lowcarboncities.unimelb.edu.au/improving-understanding-climate-change-and-its-impacts-australia-through-detection-and-attribution-c
Selection Report for Fellowships http://www.arc.gov.au/ncgp/fedfellows/FF08_SelRpt.htm
Overall ARC expenditure in these Fellowships
http://www.arc.gov.au/ncgp/futurefel/FT09_selection_rep.htm
ARC source: http://www.arc.gov.au/ncgp/fedfellows/ff_outcomes.htm
LP0990151 Reconstructing pre-20th century rainfall, temperature and pressure for south-eastern Australia using palaeoclimate, documentary and early weather station data (already mentioned in previous post)
Other funding?
Summary of Discovery Projects Proposals for Funding to Commence in 2010 (word doc)
DP1096309 Dr PJ Rayner; Prof DJ Karoly
Approved Assimilation of trace atmospheric constituents for climate (ATACC): Linking chemical
Project Title weather and climate
2010 : $ 210,000
2011 : $ 180,000
2012 : $ 180,000
2013 : $ 200,000
2014 : $ 170,000
Primary RFCD 2606 ATMOSPHERIC SCIENCES
APF Dr PJ Rayner
Administering Organisation The University of Melbourne
Project Summary Changes in atmospheric ozone and carbon dioxide affect many aspects of surface climate from changes in ultraviolet radiation (ozone) to long term changes in temperature (carbon dioxide). Better mapping of these gases will help us understand, predict and manage these changes. For ozone, it will clarify the link between ozone and surface weather. For carbon dioxide, improved knowledge of the impact of tropical deforestation, land clearing and changes in the southern ocean on atmospheric CO2 will support sustainable development in Australia and our region. The project hence addresses the priority goal ‘Responding to climate change and variability` under the National Research Priority ‘An Environmentally Sustainable Australia`.
Additionally a page by conscious.com writes of funding received in the vicinity of $1,900,000 by Karoly, tabled in Senate Parliamentary record 2009.
http://www.conscious.com.au/__documents/additional%20material/Australian%20Academic.pdf
Use of Australian government staff employed or put on as temporary employees in various departments for research, data, etc? Often l[not] listed as in-kind
If I may cross-post this from BH, I think this is very important (links below), especially for people (like me) who only began following these issues recently. This may be a good time to turn up the pressure on a variety of scientific journals and societies which have been allowing confirmation bias, pal review, careless stats, and worse to blight the scientific and public debates. As a newbie I have occasionally seen a reference to a discredited Steig et al (2009) on Antarctic warming, but had not tracked down some references until now.
I strongly urge all to acquaint or re-acquaint themselves with this history (I remember the scary cover of “Nature” magazine on this, and remember later hearing that Steig et al (2009) was over-hyped or worse, but I did not know this sordid tale until now):
WUWT on Steig et al (2009) rebuttal
CA on O’Donnell et al (2010) refutes Steig et al (2009)
Jeff Id on “Doing It Ourselves”