WUWT readers may recall that I wrote about this experiment being performed at Oak Ridge national Laboratory to test the issues related to station siting that I have long written about.
This effort promises to be greatly useful to understanding climate quality temperature measurements and how they can be influenced by the station site environment.
From the USCRN Annual Report: http://www1.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/uscrn/publications/annual_reports/FY11_USCRN_Annual_Report.pdf
Texas State Climatologist John Nielsen-Gammon writes about the the first results of this experiment presented at the recent AMS meeting in Austin, TX. The early results confirm what we have learned from the Surface Stations project. Nighttime temperatures are affected the most.
Two talks that caught my eye were on the land surface temperature record. They attacked the problem of land surface temperature accuracy in two completely different, but complementary ways.
One, by John Kochendorfer of NOAA at Oak Ridge, Tennessee, is a direct test of the importance of siting. They’ve installed four temperature sensors at varying distances across a field from the laboratory complex. The experiment has only been running since October, but already they’ve found out a couple of interesting things. First, the nighttime temperatures are indeed higher closer to the laboratory. Second, this is true whether the wind is blowing toward or away from the laboratory.
It’ll take a lot more data to sort out the various temperature effects. One way the buildings might affect the nighttime temperature even when the sensor is upwind of the buildings is infrared radiation: the heated buildings emit radiation that’s stronger than what would be emitted by the open sky or nearby hills.
More here: http://blog.chron.com/climateabyss/2013/01/dispatch-from-ams-looking-at-land-surface-temperatures/
Biases Associated with Air Temperature Measurements near Roadways and Buildings
Wednesday, 9 January 2013: 9:15 AM Room 15 (Austin Convention Center)
John Kochendorfer, NOAA, Oak Ridge, TN; and C. B. Baker, E. J. Dumas Jr., D. L. Senn, M. Heuer, M. E. Hall, and T. P. Meyers
Abstract
Proximity to buildings and paved surfaces can affect the measured air temperature. When buildings and roadways are constructed near an existing meteorological site, this can affect the long-term temperature trend. Homogenization of the national temperature records is required to account for the effects of urbanization and changes in sensor technology. Homogenization is largely based on statistical techniques, however, and contributes to uncertainty in the measured U.S. surface-temperature record. To provide some physical basis for the ongoing controversy focused on the U.S. surface temperature record, an experiment is being performed to evaluate the effects of artificial heat sources such as buildings and parking lots on air temperature. Air temperature measurements within a grassy field, located at varying distances from artificial heat sources at the edge of the field, are being recorded using both the NOAA US Climate Reference Network methodology and the National Weather Service Maximum Minimum Temperature Sensor system. The effects of the roadways and buildings are quantified by comparing the air temperature measured close to the artificial heat sources to the air temperature measured well-within the grassy field, over 200 m downwind of the artificial heat sources.
==============================================================
Early results of what has been learned in the surface stations project can be seen here:
New study shows half of the global warming in the USA is artificial
h/t to Dr. Roger Pielke Sr.
I would have thought that they would site them at uniform distances from the building. Say at 50m 100m 150m etc. They seem to be bunched up.
Being serious for a moment, I notice that the five weather stations are more or less in a line northeast of the buildings. Seems to me this brings into play two significant factors:
1. The station closest to the buildings, and I am guessing the second closest as well, will most likely be in shadow during the late part of the day while the others will be exposed to direct sunlight in the evening.
2. Given that the stations are northeast of the buildings, I think the result is they will exhibit less temperature differential than if they were on the south side. Were they on the south, the south facing wall would heat up significantly more during the day and hence have that much more energy to radiate back out toward the sensors.
Seems to me that they have incorporated at least one effect that they should have tried to exclude, and they have excluded a rather important effect that they should have been including.
If the thermometer is moved closer to the building in order for a cable to be connected to it, or a paved path is laid down to the thermometer, or a birdbath is installed nearby, or a shed or sauna or garage is installed, or the owner goes from having one car parked nearby to two, or buys a larger car like a pickup or SUV, or installs metal roofing, or builds a patio, or paves his driveway, or puts on aluminum siding, etc,., etc., etc., none of which will have been documented, then even an unmoved rural site will exhibit a warming trend. And it is likely that some of these developments have occurred at most “rural” stations. (If they’re airports they will have had increased traffic and hangers and fencing.)
KevinK says:
>>NZ Willy wrote: “The individual photons bearing the heat energy, in their own frame, simply
>> step across from source to target without any passage of time in between — time does not
>> elapse at the speed of light.”
>Well, that is sort of correct.
The key phrase which you overlooked was “in their own frame”. I showed that radiation is akin to conduction because, in the photon’s frame (where time does not exist) they are the same. Cheers.
mpainter says:
January 20, 2013 at 1:17 pm
“A worthy study but, does it not confirm what we already know? Somebody please explain if this study adds anything new.”
We aready knew it they have been denying it for decades.
highflight56433 says:
January 20, 2013 at 7:03 pm
“In Russia the snow is too deep . . . ”
The link below shows what to do. Generally speaking the idea is to note the maximum known snow depth and then put the thermometer slightly higher on top of a pole.
http://gallery.surfacestations.org/main.php?g2_itemId=81670
I can’t believe this sort of study is ‘revolutionary’ in 2013. This kind of study should of taken place decades or centuries ago.
This is the sort of ‘data’ that is intuative to the common observer and, as shown, is easy to confirm.
PS: Or if he adds solid fencing or a brick barbeque setup or a compost heap or . . .
Geoff Sherrington says:
January 20, 2013 at 9:52 pm
“Obtain figures of daily fuel consumption from the airport operators.”
#1. In the USA just showing up at an airport and asking such a question would trigger a visit from “friendly” government anti-terrorists agents – with guns.
#2. Besides, you would need to know the fuel consumed within that space and that would depend on plane, motor, taxi time, and so on. If you try to get all that information for a day or two – see item #1.
PPS: Here’s a science project for Boy Scout groups around the country: Interview the persons maintaining nearby temperature reporting stations to get an idea how many of the local-site add-ons I listed above have been done over the years. Photos of the site from decades past would help. Some jurisdictions may have photos in the files of one of their departments. (I was able to obtain a photo of my house in Seattle in the 1930s, for instance.) Or insurance companies may have such photos. With a little encouragement, such a high-school level or college level project could get off the ground, because it might obtain significant findings. If the first pioneers did so, and got publicity and praise, then others would quickly follow without encouragement.
What would be needed would be for a skeptic site to post a draft questionnaire (asking if the site add-ons I mentioned had been installed), a list of contact info for temperature stations (they needn’t be official stations in order for the survey to have widely applicable results), and a set of suggested procedures for how to locate and check official and/or insurance company photo archives. Call it “Surface Stations Project 2,” maybe. Maybe a WUWTer who’s a scoutmaster or a high school or college science teacher could pioneer this.
These are some of the craziest ship trails I have ever seen off the NW Pacific coast in new NASA image. See at 0:30 in this video;
3MIN News January 20, 2013
I rather deplored your original heading to this story – Janus, and two-faced. I think they’re to be commended for re-examining the validity of their methods, and all should encourage such actions as good practice. (Sorry to be the Tart at the christening!)
Theo Goodwin says:
January 20, 2013 at 6:28 pm
Not having been to the US, I don’t know about the scale of your building, But I don’t doubt your words. Everyone knows full well that urban night time minimum temps are warmer than rural, and I know the climate boys have tried to play down UHI as ‘insignificant’ – but I think it is very significant, and I reckon this confirms my long held thoughts, that all stations need individual analysis and that the majority of urban stations should probably be discarded, or perhaps just treated as their own separate dataset.
The UHI issue is probably quite complex to resolve and requires a lot of human reasoning and analysis, not just computer ‘adjustment’. In the 60’s here, central heating was a rarity, and even the first house I bought in 1981, in Birmingham had no central heating. The provision of Natural gas in the early 70’s allowed more folks to get onto cheap energy and install central heating, but it wasn’t just the main cities (which had town gas beforehand) towns. I always remember our houses being cold in the winter mornings, and staying in one room next to the fire to keep warm! Contrast to today, when we swan about the whole house, enjoying 20degC whilst its cold outside! This has to have generated a significant amount of extra UHI over those years of gradual installation? So in order to correct temp readings for UHI, you have to gradually ramp up the correction according to a number of different factors. Then, in the 80’s and 90’s, we had government grants to install roof insulation, etc – so houses got warmer, but did the net UHI stay the same? At the same time, we had double glazing becoming the new ‘thing’. But a warmer house emits more radiation, does it not?
In practise I just can’t see how a realistic correction to measured urban temperatures is possible without an awful lot of heavy analysis – and even then it is likely to be a best estimate. So, instead of using the urban temps (which we know are affected by UHI) within a global dataset, for my money, they should only be used on their own – or completely ignored.
Anthony, typo on Figure 7 description. Furthest should be farthest.
REPLY: Tell it to NOAA, that is a screen cap of their publication – Anthony
There is a very interesting explanation for past global temperature using glaciers as the proxy in John Kehr’s book The Inconvenient Skeptic. http://theinconvenientskeptic.com/the-book/
It seems most current glaciers between the Arctic Circle and the equator did not exist until some 4,000 years ago. Same for the SH. What more proof for a warmer past even if the present glaciers are showing some signs of minor melting.
wshofact says:
January 20, 2013 at 7:20 pm
I have just found this case of BoM claiming an all-time hot day record at Leonora, West Australia – in a Post Office yard where solid fences have progressively enclosed the instruments since 1998 and in the last half decade a junk yard has evolved less than 10m from the instruments.
And, as I have noted at Warick’s blog the Stephenson’s screen is about 3 meters from irrigated grass, in the middle of what is close to a desert. Any reduction in irrigation frequency (likely in the current environment here) will increase temperatures.
Without any evidence or peer review papers to my credit the analysis of the temperature record is purely subjective on my part, however I have noticed as no doubt have many others the strange fact that our predecessors obviously could not read thermometers. Thus they have incrementally been adjusted in a downward way. Conversely the modern temperatures seem to rise with every passing year.
This experiment dwells in the realm of very naughty and not of advantage to the cause, I would thus be a little careful if I were these people, they may need a new job soon.
Thus the conclusion can only be, put back the real temperatures from the past, correct the modern temperatures correctly and we have been cooling. This is not a good thing but most probably true.
Pas à pas ils s’approchent la verity.
Step by step they approach the truth. Just a bit slow and with too many diversions on the way.
That’s why the satellites don’t see the warming!
davidmhoffer says: @ur momisugly January 20, 2013 at 9:52 pm
I take umbrage with this remark. Hockey is a shining example of just how far we have come in just two millennium.
…. thousands of spectators gather to watch as paid athletes do combat with sticks with blades attached because nowadays the blades have little variety and must be within a narrowly defined standard. When the paid athletes do engage in combat,, and one favoured combatant appears to gain the upper hand, the crowd leaps to its feet and shouts “kill ‘im! kill ‘im!”
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
And those thousands of spectators are couch potatoes who sit on their rears pushing keys/pencils all day, most of whom would fall flat on their faces within the first few minutes if they tied on skates and tried to compete.
I classified several weather stations with Météo France. The classification in this experience is not the same in the french network, with the interpretation of Michel Leroy in France.
In the picture USCRN, the class 4 of the experience is probably class 2 in France (for a class 4 in France, the artificial heat sources must be > 31 m2 in the radius of 10 m or > 4 m2 in the radius of 5 m (and/or the shadows, …), for classe 3 it must be > 283 m2 in the radius of 30 m, > 1 m2 in the radius of 5 m or > 12 m2 between the radius of 5 and 10 m) , the classes 3 , 2 of this experience are class 1 in France (there are not enough the artificial heat surfaces in the radius of 100 m, the thresholds are, > 3142 m2 , 3 m2 in the radius of 10 m, 126 m2 in the radius between 10 and 30 m)
You can see all the thresholds of the artificial heat surfaces in the tables in my old web page of the classification 1999 (The classification of 1999 give also the same heat surfaces as M Leroy 2010 ):
http://meteo.besse83.free.fr/Divers/Classite.htm
The original paper ML 1999 is here : http://entreprise.meteofrance.com/publications/collections/techniques_d_observations_et_de_prevision/techniques_d_observations_et_de_prevision?page_id=2912&document_id=4071&portlet_id=18736
The main differences between ML 1999 and ML 2010, are the angulars for solar masks and the definition of representative reliefs (for shadow due to natural relief) . Example, ML 2010 in class 4 : Away from all projected shade when the sun is higher than 20 ° ( for ML 1999 : 5° )
The cynic in me says the only reason they’ve “found” it now, is because … they are desperately looking for a way to explain the total inability of their models to predict the climate. And to be able to point to the temperature record as the culprit now suits them fine.
I am reminded of a program about melting glaciers in Greenland. It showed the sea ate away at the base of the ice slowly but surely undermining it until all of a sudden the whole ice-front would collapse.
Is there any point in using surface station records to calculate global temperatures post 1979 when the satellite records started?
This is going to be interesting for different seasons. Night or day.
One of the things my old High School Physics teacher taught us was about trucks, and ‘drafting’. It was that BOTH the lead and the following truck got better gas mileage. Why? The lead truck clearly “makes a hole” for the follow truck… but the follow truck also pushes air forward to help reduce drag on the lead truck…
For a building, down wind gets a turbulent area as the wind over the building is off the ground for a ways. But on the upwind side, you get a stagnation pocket for some distance out as the wind has to ramp up over and go around the building. BOTH sides get lower wind speeds…
So more radiation, more “reflected sunshine” off the building onto the dirt all day long, and less wind to cool the dirt. On both upwind and downwind sides…