I’m a bit burnt out, so this is a just a few notes to quench some speculations about Steve McIntyre’s role and to help everyone understand what this week has been like.
- Evan and I have been working on this since June 2011, complete redo of all station ratings…huge amount of work. Evan deserves a huge a amount of credit. After Muller could not find strong signal that we knew must be there by physics of heat sinks…and neither could we in Fall et al 2011, we went looking, and discovered the new Leroy 2010 classification system and WMO ISO approval. We knew it would take a lot of work to get old metadatabase into shape. And so it began.
- Started on paper in Spring 2012, but some of the team of people onboard had no vested interest, and with their academic burdens and no budget to pay them anything they could only devote small bits of time for reviews and writings. No fault of theirs, but like herding cats when there’s no funding and all is pro bono.
- Evan and I decided to go ahead anyways and I started writing, steep learning curve as this was my first stint as lead author.
- About a week ago I learned Muller was going to release and do the media blitz, thought he’d be at EPW Senate hearing on August 1st too. (turns out he was passed over, John Christy will be there though.). IPCC deadline coming up too. Added anxiety.
- Tried to get stats guy to the stars Matt Briggs onboard early last week (he was on list of original authors) to help with significance tests, last big hurdle. Most graphs and analysis was done.
- Turns out Briggs was on vacation camping, no fault of his, it is summer…so I figured only way I was going to get this done was to shut down WUWT and stay home from short vacation with wife and kids in Yellowstone. They went on with grandparents and I went on authoring blitz with Evan and with Dr. Pielke Sr. helping edits. Christy provided support too and I helped him craft his EPW section on this.
- So made announcement Friday. Figured on Sunday at noon so WUWT could provide peer review, and dumped my plane tickets in trash. Admittedly I was a bit overwrought when I wrote it. I’m truly sorry if anyone was mislead. Dialed it back. Went on crash self taught stats diet…not my thing, but capable of learning. and being a broadcaster, deadline pressure is a huge motivator. You learn to get it done. On-air waits for nobody. Careers die when you miss deadlines.
- In his post Friday, Steve McIntyre truly didn’t know what this was about. He was out of the loop.
- Steve McIntyre, being the classic gentleman he is, emailed me and said “anything I can do to help, I’m here”. I took him up on the offer and he did all the stats tests from Friday afternoon to Saturday night, then polished last bit of text/graphs early Sunday morning. I owe him a huge debt of gratitude. He is a true gentleman and a scholar.
- Joe D’Aleo and Willis helped with editing/proofing too. Gary Boden solved an Excel map issue for us. Evan came up with powerpoints and helped editing. He was a machine. Pielke Sr. helped with edits and citations. Bob Phelan helped with some PR language. Thanks to all.
- And the result is what you see in the press release today.
- Finally got to take a shower today about 2PM. Prior to that, Kenji was offended.
- Now on to final polish thanks to WUWT peer review and submission.
Thanks everyone for your support and patience! – Anthony
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Whether this will stand up to peer review, be published in a mainstream journal and cause a change in thinking for the IPCC, MSM and politicians remains to be seen. At first reading it looks to be a rigorous piece of work on an issue that 97% of climate scientists have chosen to overlook. That it took an ‘amateur’ scientist to pull this together is shameful (H/T to Evan and the other contributors).
I suggest every poster on this thread contributes $50 (or whatever amount you can afford) to the site so that, hopefully, Anthony can at least get away with his family for a few days. Just consider what your time is worth and whether you would have had the initiative and stamina to do this work.
[REPLY: Thank you RMS. Any amount of support is greatly appreciated. -REP]
Tip jar hit to help fund your next vacation – well earned. Come on people, lets show some appreciation for the Surfacestations team!
[REPLY: Your support, Varco, is greatly appreciated. -REP]
Thank you, Anthony. My buttons are busting with pride….. and all I had to do was read.
The backstory is quite lovely. Separate the fascinating and intense particulars, this is a story about why the pompous old ….guys? who bluster and sputter at each other about nonsense that would make Alice in Wonderland blush in feigned confusion are not — and will not — do honest science. They chase the funding and they’ve ceased with the scientific integrity schtick long long ago.
This is a wonderful back story and many folk are very proud.
My best to Kenji, for his support, also. I hope he wears his laminated Union of Concerned Scientists membership card around his neck at all times, just in case he needs to get out of a tough scrape with some idiot. ….Lady in Red
Anthony,
I’ve been following your site since you started questioning the Stevenson Screens. I followed your surfacestations reports and said to myself “sheesh – no way there’s no bias has crept into the data, particularly from UHI”. Then a few years ago I was on a hill and could see Boston on a bright, clear blue cloudless day. Except that there was a cloud lens over the downtown urban area, and nowhere else. (I didn’t have a camera, dammit!) That, plus surfacestation, proved that UHI/siting issues were real and distorted the data. So when I read about Muller’s report, I thought stick that horse hockey!
For what it’s worth, it appears that (NOAA?) has distributed about 114 new temperature stations equidistant across the U.S. in the last few years. They appear to be all located in ideal Category 1 locations. Their website says they hope to get truly accurate American measurements so that in about 30 years they can do reliable analyses of the temperature trends. I believe that they did this in response to Anthony’s critiques on station siting. Kudos, Anthony!
Most of my browsing is performed on an iPod while sitting in Starbucks. I looked for a tip jar but only found “tips” in the menu! I have donated to two other “non-charitable” entities in my life and I would like to make you the third. Anthony et al are heros! Now, where is you tip jar on my iPod?
[REPLY: I don’t use an iPod and have no idea what you are actually seeing. Perhaps one of our commenters can help. On dinosaur PCs the tip button is labeled “donate” and is part way down the right of the screen just under the “World Climate Widget”. If you scroll down to the blog roll you’ve scrolled down too far. -REP]
The periodic table had several holes filled in with elements only theory said existed. It was up to dedicated scientists to find them. Good job Anthony.
What the Watts paper actually means, is that a lot of people have spent a lot of our taxpayer money and came up with a number that’s wrong by +100%.
http://thepointman.wordpress.com/2012/07/30/whats-the-watts-paper-actually-mean-dude/
Pointman
Anthony writes:
“REPLY: Understood, but please think about the physics of heat sinks, specifically when it comes to Tmin and I think yuo’ll see where we were coming from. Confirmation bias is a huge problem in AGW science, and if this new ratings system had not revealed the solution, I would have had to accede there was no effect. Persistence paid off. – Anthony”
It seems to me that many people are missing the importance of Leroy’s work and Anthony’s use of it. By the “physics of heat sinks,” what is meant is that temperature stations are rated according to physical characteristics of their individual sites. Specifically, temperature stations are rated according to the predictable behavior of concrete, asphalt, or whatever is found on site that influences temperature readings. For the precise details, you have to read Leroy.
The huge importance of Leroy’s work and Anthony’s use of it is that now we have an empirical measure over temperature sites that allows comparison and grouping among them. This innovation in scientific study of the data is a far cry from the strategy employed by the Warmistas who have always been happy to compare any two temperature measurements with total disregard for the facts on the ground. (Yes, Warmistas use Urban, semi-Urban, and Rural but with total disregard for the facts on the ground.)
Perhaps more important is the fact that Warmistas have stonewalled (against) this kind of empirical research since the phrase “global warming” was first uttered. Leroy’s work and Anthony’s use of it are total game changers. There will be no going back.
I remember when you started in on the Stevenson shelters at CA. I had some thoughts then. But this is way beyond that. Kudos. Most of my time these days is spent on electronics and politics so I have not been a regular contributor to the climate debates for a while. Thanks for all you do and continue to do. And tell Willis – “a long way from Olema eh?” 😉
Superb, just superb.
Kudos to Steve M. for his help in pushing the ball over the goal line, and keeping the stats pristine. He’s certainly eminently qualified for the job! A potent shield against inevitable attempts to disparage your fine work.
Glad your family got to get the vacation in; at least you get some close-to-home vicarious benefit!
Donation made — well earned. Hopefully this work will lead to (a) correcting much of the warming bias in the official record, and (b) improved siting and selection for those stations used to compile the official surface temperature records.
[REPLY: Thank you for your support. -REP]
Warm says:
July 30, 2012 at 12:33 am
Constant temperature bias does not modify trends: I understand well that a poorly sited station with a lot of heat sources would be biased (physics of heat sinks ?), but if the bias is constant, there is no influence on decadal trend…
The problem is that the bias of a poorly sited station is not constant. Think of a small increase (say 1%) in the number of sunny days over a year. In a perfect station, that would give a small increase of yearly averaged temperature (say 0.1°C). In a poorly sited station, the temperature on a rainy or clouded day is about the same as in a good station, but the temperature on a sunny day is getting much higher (think of a station on an asphalted parking…). Thus instead of a trend of 0.1°C, the trend of a poorly sited station gets 0.2°C or 0.3°C, only by a small increase in number of (even partly) sunny days…
Good work! Thanks for your dedication.
I doubt Kenji was offended. Dogs and UCS member seem to be attracted to things that stink.
Link to tip jar for those so inclined.
http://www.surfacestations.org/donate.htm
[REPLY: Thank you. I should have thought of that. -REP]
“The problem is that the bias of a poorly sited station is not constant. Think of a small increase (say 1%) in the number of sunny days over a year. In a perfect station, that would give a small increase of yearly averaged temperature (say 0.1°C). In a poorly sited station, the temperature on a rainy or clouded day is about the same as in a good station, but the temperature on a sunny day is getting much higher (think of a station on an asphalted parking…). Thus instead of a trend of 0.1°C, the trend of a poorly sited station gets 0.2°C or 0.3°C, only by a small increase in number of (even partly) sunny days…”
Nice SciFi story, I can wrote almost the same:
“a poorly sited station, the temperature on a rainy or clouded day is about the same as in a good station, but the temperature on a sunny day is getting much lower (think of a station with a lot of shadows from surrounding vegetation or buildings, or a lot a water that uptake heat from the sun).”
Microsite influence from shadows, water and asphalte are taken into account with the Leroy’s ranking:
Class 4 (non-compliant, additional estimated uncertainty added by siting up to 2°C) Close, artificial heat sources and reflective surfaces (buildings, concrete surfaces, car parks, etc.) or expanse of water (unless significant of the region, occupying: o Less than 50% of the surface within a circular area of 10 m around the screen o Less than 30% of the surface within a circular area of 3 m around the screen Away from all projected shade when the Sun is higher than 20°.
Okay, Anthony. Confession time. When you made your initial announcement, I got all excited, speculating with everyone else in the blogosphere. Then when you dialled back, I felt peeved and got a bit annoyed with you. But then, when you finally posted, I realised that the work you’d done really was important–quite possibly moreso than anything I’d like to have imagined.
I suppose this paper might contain flaws (I really wouldn’t know), but you have some heavy guns on board and your data is out there for replication and critique, which is as it should be. I’m genuinely proud for you, and can see why, for you, (and as it turned out, everyone else) it was so significant–so please forgive me for doubting you.
Glad I got that off my chest–glad to report you’re as much one of my heroes as ever! 🙂
Warm says:
July 30, 2012 at 10:44 am
think of a station with a lot of shadows from surrounding vegetation or buildings, or a lot a water that uptake heat from the sun
That still gives:
“The problem is that the bias of a poorly sited station is not constant.”, no matter if the bias is positive or negative. That is what makes the difference in trend with good stations. Positive or negative, but the figures show in average quite a lot more positive than negative bias for the poorly sited stations…
Anthony/Evan–
I understand the point about deadline pressure, so don’t take this as criticism of what has been done up to now.
I would, however, have liked to have seen a few “poster child” examples, with pictures, and associated station trends, in the .ppt, of stations that were re-classified with the new standards.
Will something like that be forthcoming?
[REPLY: Good wishes are noted and gratefully accepted. Help takes many forms, not just monetary. Informed commentary both here and at other sites, including in the MSM, is assistance beyond price. -REP]
************************
I do what I can to spread the word, irony is if not running that server I could afford to help ROTFLMAO
http://www.theconservativevoices.com/forums/forum/99-energy-environmental-and-transportation/
Just to make an obvious point — stations that are badly sited now may not have been badly sited (or as badly sited) before. Stuff keeps getting built. Also, airports are busier now than they were a few decades ago and lots more asphalt has been laid. The trend from concrete to asphalt may be important (and grass runways — which were once common — are now virtually a thing of the past).
Watts et. al. have now given us a priceless look at how significant all this is.
I do think posting first in this venue will prove appropriate and may so greatly improve the paper that it sets a new standard, especially due to contributions from experts like Leif.
[SNIP: Policy -REP]
+1. Leif’s version is the way it should be done.
Next edition of the paper should attempt to anticipate and counter objections by Mosher.
This has been answered half a dozen times in comments on the preceding thread.
rogerknights says:
July 30, 2012 at 2:35 pm
Next edition of the paper should attempt to anticipate and counter objections by Mosher.
the usual [and effective] strategy in writing a controversial paper is to anticipate [and counter or at least mention] objections from the ‘usual suspects’. In many cases that stops the objections from being even brought forth.