People send me stuff. Today I got this email from Scott Stolnitz who sent an unsolicited email to NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center. He writes:
Anthony,
In response to your post of the monthly, “hey, it ain’t getting’ any warmer for the last 17 years and 11 months”… (see WUWT here) I thought I’d email a NOAA representative with your link and see what they had to say?
Here’s their response:
Dear Scott Stolnitz,
To answer your question, we generally recommend that rather than looking at only one metric of how our planet’s climate is changing (in this case satellite-derived temperature of the lower troposphere) and for only a limited time period (such as starting on or just before the remarkably strong 1997-98 el Nino event), one should look at many different metrics of how our climate is changing and examine long enough time series that one can focus in on a wide variety of different time periods, including short periods.
The most up to date and comprehensive source of this information is on page 3 (technically page S3 as it is a supplement to the peer-reviewed Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society) of the annual State of the Climate which was published in July and is available via this
http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/pdf/10.1175/2014BAMSStateoftheClimate.1
link. This remarkable document is a world wide effort of several hundred authors and experts in a wide variety of climate disciplines and I’m proud to say is led by colleagues here at NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center.
Regards,
Tom Peterson
Scott adds a follow up conversation:
From: Scott StolnitzSubject: Re: How does NOAA explain this?Date: September 5, 2014 at 4:50:47 PM EDTTo: Thomas Peterson – NOAA FederalTom,
Again thank you for your response.From some personal research I’ve done, it seems that the Atlantic and Pacific Decadal Oscillations are both in or going into a cooling phase?If so, that heat may not continue to build up in the ocean data as we have seen in the recent past. As I’m sure you know better than most, the ocean lags regarding temperature. As such, we might see this “pause” extended. Do I know that? Of course not. But given that these cycles seem to have shown this in the past, it is likely in the future. Add this to higher than average aerosol particulate due volcanic activity and we may truly be in for a longer “pause”. The Atlantic is now having it’s second well below seasonal named storms average. I watch the SST’s in the equatorial Atlantic (as I’m currently in Ft. Lauderdale).My personal interest in this is that I have been sailing around the world on my own boat for the last 7+ years so I watch and study climatic events closely; most especially ENSO cycles.I have come up with a rule of thumb for long distance sailors looking to stay in the Eastern South Pacific Hurricane belt over the cyclone season. It’s anecdotal. I say this despite my own backtesting the data. It seemed to be valid in the El Nino of 2009-10. I subscribe to the monthly ENSO report that NOAA publishes which is where I get my data.I’ll stop asking too many questions now as I’m sure you get a lot of emails.Thanks,Scott StolnitzOn Sep 5, 2014, at 4:22 PM, Thomas Peterson – NOAA Federal wrote:
A reasonable question, Scott.
One of the figures I find insightful is:http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/service/global/enso-global-temp-anom/201213.png
which is from thisWhen el Ninos hit they release a lot of heat to the atmosphere and global temperatures are above the non el Nino and la Nina years.When la Ninas hit global temperatures are lower than other years around those times in part because increased upwelling of cold water in the eastern tropical Pacific.So for a fair comparison, it could be argued that one should really draw three trend lines: through el Nino years, la Nina years and neutral years to eliminate the impact of changing mixes of ENSO. If you do that over the last 15-20 years you will tend to see increases in temperature. But given the changing mix of el Nino and la Nina events, the surface temperature is not rising rapidly as it did in the 1980s and ’90s.So if the surface temperature and the upper air temperatures are not rising, the question could be: has the earth’s temperature stopped rising or is the heat going somewhere other than the surface. If you look at that link I provided you, you’ll see that ocean heat content (top right of page S3) has risen fairly steadily throughout this period in question.As a side bar, I thought you might enjoy the attached little paper that looks at the energy in the atmosphere.Regards,TomThomas C. Peterson, Ph.D.
President, WMO Commission for Climatology
Principal Scientist, NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center
Voice: +1-828-271-4287
On Fri, Sep 5, 2014 at 1:56 PM, Scott Stolnitz wrote:
Mr. Peterson,
I realize you’re most likely quite busy and don’t have too much time to answer lots of questions. I will link you to the Wall St. Journal article that was also published today.If you cannot get through that link, I also found it here in more detail:A highlight of the story is the eighth paragraph (on the link above).It states that according to NOAA:“If the pause lasted 15 years, they conceded, then it would be so significant that it would invalidate the climate-change models upon which policy was being built. A report from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) written in 2008 made this clear: “The simulations rule out (at the 95% level) zero trends for intervals of 15 yr or more.”How does this statement align with the paper you linked me too? Has NOAA revised the above statement since 2008?
Is the fact that temperatures have been flat for 15-20 years (depending on the source one uses) not made the above statement carry even more weight?
Thanks for your time,
Scott Stolnitz
On Sep 5, 2014, at 12:31 PM, Thomas Peterson – NOAA Federal wrote:Dear Scott Stolnitz,
To answer your question, we generally recommend that rather than looking at only one metric of how our planet’s climate is changing (in this case satellite-derived temperature of the lower troposphere) and for only a limited time period (such as starting on or just before the remarkably strong 1997-98 el Nino event), one should look at many different metrics of how our climate is changing and examine long enough time series that one can focus in on a wide variety of different time periods, including short periods.The most up to date and comprehensive source of this information is on page 3 (technically page S3 as it is a supplement to the peer-reviewed Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society) of the annual State of the Climate which was published in July and is available via thislink. This remarkable document is a world wide effort of several hundred authors and experts in a wide variety of climate disciplines and I’m proud to say is led by colleagues here at NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center.Regards,Tom Peterson
Thomas C. Peterson, Ph.D.
President, WMO Commission for Climatology
Principal Scientist, NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center
Voice: +1-828-271-4287
<Atmospheric-Surface-Energy-GRL-2011-Peterson-Willett-Thorne.pdf>
===================================================================
From Anthony:
I’ve always considered Dr. Tom Peterson to be a cordial guy, our exchanges have always been pleasant, except when he wrote a ghost talking points memo about the surfacestations project. Climategate revealed him to be a bit of a political cartooning prankster, but then so am I.
In case you don’t recognize the people being spoofed, they are top left, Dr. John Christy, Dr. Roger Pielke Senior, Dr. Pat Michaels, Dr. Richard Lindzen, bottom left: Senator Inhofe, and Dr. Fred Singer.
He does have his moments though:
File 0755.txt
date: Tue, 19 Jun 2007 14:56:55 -0400
from: Thomas C Peterson <Thomas.C.Peterson@xxxx>
subject: Re: Lots about USHCN on Climate Audit
to: Phil Jones <p.jones@xxxx>
<x-flowed>
FYI, the radio interview seemed to go well. I must say in fairness
that, considering the photographs of how not to observe temperature on
Anthony Watts’ blog, http://www.norcalblogs.com/watts/weather_stations/
, Mr. Watts gave a well reasoned position. For example, when asked if
the stations with poor siting were removed from the analysis would it
show less warming, Mr. Watts said we won’t know until the analysis is
complete.
-Tom
More here: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/11/22/ncdc-mr-watts-gave-a-well-reasoned-position/
Despite his cordial persona, I think he may harbor one of the worst cases of confirmation bias I have ever seen in a scientist. This is particularly dangerous because he is the gatekeeper for the GHCN surface temperature data set, which is used by GISS, CRU, and BEST. I believe that dataset contains the built-in bias of Dr. Peterson. By saying a document you co-authored is a “remarkable document” we can see a window into this sort of bias.
[note – I made a comment on the quote related to ‘the pause’ and got the attribution mixed up …a mistake entirely my own – I’ve removed that quote and attribution – Anthony]
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The only way to put real pressure on such consensus promoters is to show that you intend to expose their subfield of science to exposure of the corruption within it, of the fraud in it, and I do not mean amateur hour print outs of raw data, which remain unadjusted despite some urban myth that they are hidden away. I mean Steig’s fake red Antarctica, Mann’s enthusiastic support of both the latest fake hockey stick by Marcott and the fake 97% consensus by Cook.
You can’t effectively hammer on the so-called pause since it’s within the range of noise, and both scientists and policy makers have established psychological defense mechanisms against short period cherry picking coming from the exact same perceived Bible thumping creationist Republicans. But nobody with a moral compass, no real activist, has defense mechanisms against outright proven fraud.
The key word is proven, meaning undeniable. Temperature adjustments are not a case of that, sorry.
Anthony sat on his stations project so long, allowing mere anecdotal claims of incompetence to thrive using his project photographs that of coarse Peterson stepped in to put out that fire, by the honest act of using a sample population of stations to demonstrate little bad station influence after all. It doesn’t matter who is right here culturally, since Tom won that debate in public, quite fairly, because Anthony and Joanne Nova kept releasing brochures and blog posts implicating Tom in quackery minus any solid proof of overall bias. Years later, the topic was old news when Anthony finally discovered official station ratings and found done real urban bias, at least in the high growth US.
Arguing the pause is arguing against authority but you have little authority to pull that off with. But exposing proven fraud is all powerful and always has been. Goddard’s mistakes and maverick raw data claims, and Tom’s scoop of Anthony mean that temperature adjustments are a dead horse.
They waged an entire campaign based on a temperature increase within the range of noise on longer timescales, that proved to be not an unprecedented increase, leading to not an unprecedented high temperature plateau. Hammering away on the pause has proven effective and continues to be effective.
We have seen alarmist “scientists” and policy makers be very adept at short period cherrypicking, especially the late 20th century warming period. Saying “scientists and policy makers” have guarded themselves against “perceived Bible thumping creationist Republicans” implies the “scientists and policy makers” are anti-Bible evolutionist Democrats. Since obviously all “scientists and policy makers” are not anti-Bible evolutionist Democrats, with “Bible thumping”, “creationist”, and “Republicans” belonging to distinct sets that may intersect together but also with other sets, reveals bias.
Tawana Brawley. Rev. Al Sharpton’s penalty for defamation, his share of the judgment against him, her, and her lawyers, was paid for “by supporters“.
Al has never apologized, refuses to. He now has his Keepin’ It Real daily national talk radio show and his PoliticsNation with Al Sharpton daily MSNBC political talk radio show.
Power, prestige, and political positioning are effective defense mechanisms against outright proven fraud. Someone is too important to do it, people won’t believe they could do it, and if you don’t want those in charge destroying your career and personal life then you won’t mention that they did it. When was the last time someone in the media mentioned Rev. Al’s culpability and said it was time for him to come clean?
Typo: done urban bias = some urban bias.
“We generally recommend …”. Uh huh. You generally recommend looking at multiple metrics now, because your former practice of generally recommending that people look at one and only one metric (surface temp) and only for a limited time period (such as ending on or just before the remarkably strong 1997-98 el Nino event), has gone bust on you.
Problem is, there is no point in anyone looking at many different metrics of how our climate is changing, because all that tells them is that climate is changing. Climate is always changing. Big deal.
You liars pushing the “global warming” political movement claimed that the climate was changing in a very particular way – surface temps were going through the roof. That is why you called it “global warming”. And on the basis of that particular scary story, you demanded that everyone turn over their money and personal sovereignty to your left wing statist desires. Screw you.
Second problem is, there is no point in anyone looking at many different metrics, because you clowns don’t have a singular criterion of interpretation for any of those many different metrics.
We could look at snowfall, for example. No matter what we see when we look at snowfall, you will concoct an ad hoc fairystory that blames “global warming”. Is it snowing less? That’s because of “global warming”! Why, a few years from now this warmer world will cause snow to be a distant memory. Is it snowing more? That’s because of “global warming”. You see, when it’s warmer it puts more moisture in the air and that makes more snow. Raining less? “Global warming”! Raining more? “Global warming”! Less sea ice? “Global warming”! More sea ice? “Global warming”!
You have no coherent theory of climate. All you have are a bunch of “just so” stories that all have the same made up ending. The closest thing you had to a theory of climate was the one about unrelenting increases in surface temperature driven by growing radiation imbalance and strongly positive feedbacks. And that was wrong. Time for you clowns to admit that you are making it up as you go along, get off the public dole, and then STFU.
Oh boy. I’m going to enjoy the raft of “there is early snow and frost because of global warming!!!” stories coming down the pipeline.
Tom Peterson is no scientist, he is a quack. He’s so blinded by his theories of global warming he can’t see reality – there isn’t any warming. It’s a shame we have incompetent people like this running things.
I do find it interesting how, whenever a skeptic uses the hiatus as a factor disproving the models (truthfully so),they are told by “scientists” that using the “STRONG EL NINO EVENT” of 1998 creates the incorrect impression of a lack of warming but if you were to then FACTOR OUT the Strong El Nino event of 1998 from the Warming Trends, the rate of warming over the latter half of the 20th century decreases in severity. If the event can’t be used to disprove the “theory” then it shouldn’t be used to prove increased rates of warming either.
It sounds like NOAA is still clinging to the 97/98 El Nino temperature spike and its presumed distortion of a slope measure from an unreasonable starting point as part of its diversion from the current question and the record. Perhaps they themselves had a hand in the PR misinformation campaign that said skeptics were using that obviously wrong approach with a starting spike. I’m sure there is some debate strategy somewhere that describes the approach of painting a false premise on the opponent paired with the reasoned response to show off the righteousness of the presenter. It works best on the uneducated and the distracted society.
Grays paper on the MOC explains the hows and whys of the changes in the oceans at various depths due to a cycle that is centuries in the making. That being said, How were they measuring all this warming 40 years, ago , 50 70 etc. Answer: They werent, so even if true it means nothing since we could have easily have had that at another time
As far as the PDO, the MEI explains perfectly the nature of the La ninas. The stupefying lack of the super nino to these people is laughable, they were exposed back in spring as I took them apart based on the cyclical nature of the Pacific.. D Aleos study on this explain why the enso events behave the way they do in the different cycles, and that they choose to ignore physical realities speaks volumes about how blind they really are.
Amazing , they see the MEI and how the enso events, cold and warm occur, yet still make up story after story to hide the obvious. ITS CYCLICAL AND MANS CONTRIBUTION IS ALMOST IMPOSSIBLE TO DISCERN
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