Heartland's International Conference on Climate Change is on again. I can't help but be impressed by the number of Australian organizations co-sponsoring the conference. Sponsors don't pay any money -- instead they get free admission to all meals and sessions for up to 20 people. And with 58 sponsors and 800 people registered to attend, that means they are giving away more admissions than people registered to attend. It's likely that almost everyone attending got free admission.
There are seven Australian organizations signed up as sponsors. As well as the obvious ones like Lavoisier and the IPA there are some unfamiliar ones, so let's look at the whole list.
The Lavoisier Group. John Quiggin on Lavoisier:
This body is devoted to the proposition that basic principles of physics, discovered by among others, the famous French scientist Antoine Lavoisier, cease to apply when they come into conflict with the interests of the Australian coal industry.
The Institute of Public Affairs. Australia's leading anti-science think tank, with staff including Alan Moran, Sinclair Davidson, Jennifer Marohasy and Tom Switzer (opinion editor at The Australian for much of their war on science).
The Institute for Private Enterprise. This seems to be a one-man operation by Des Moore.
Mannkal Economic Education Foundation. Their postal address is at "Hayek House", so you can probably guess where they are coming from. Their global warming denial page is a bunch of links to other people's stuff -- they don't seem to produce much on those lines themselves.
Climate Sceptics Party. Only launched last month. According to their platform:
We are ordinary but proud Australians who are gravely concerned with the unfounded environmental alarmism infiltrating all forms of Australian Government (Federal, State & Local), threatening our way of life and hard fought freedoms
I believe proud and ordinary cohenite is a member.
is a voluntary group of people concerned about the extent to which carbon is wrongly vilified in Western societies, particularly in government, the media, and in business circles.
they seem to be focused on opposition to policies that reduce net emissions from agriculture (in Australia that refers mainly to land clearing in Queensland).
Australian Libertarian Society. Basically this is John Humphreys, whose response to any disagreement is to accuse you of lying. He announced his sponsorship with whoppers like this
In 2008 we have seen the coldest year since 1994 and the current temperature is nearly exactly the same as the average over the 1970s.
True to form, when I commented on his post, Humphreys accused me of lying, though this time he also deleted most of my comments as well.
Update: Kevin Grandia:
what really strikes me so far is that it's the same people attending and talking about the same things they did last year.
- Log in to post comments
The schedule of speakers and the panel topics are almost a carbon copy of last year.
Well, at least they're not releasing any new carbon. I thought that's what you wanted.
a one-man operation by Des Moore
I always think Des should start a blog to parallel Anthony Watts' "Watts Up with That". He could call it "But Wait ... Des Moore".
His links are good, though. He says that The Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine has never asked government for a cent. Unfortunately, he doesn't say which one.
(Actually though, given the Institute's ground-breaking research into the structure of water and the effects of elevated levels of carbon dioxide on the health and longevity of mice, I think it would be entirely justified in asking the Government for a cent.)
If the schedule of speakers and topics is the same as last year this suggests a rather moribund research effort on the part of all attending - has their been no progress in their ideas?
Oh wait. . .
Not that surprising since Australia cannot dig the country up and sell it quick enough.
Are David Archibald (we need 1000ppm) and Bob Carter (the Ice Age commeth) attending this year?
And say that I became treated as "Spammeur" by a stupid bastard of a site of Al Gore in Quebec, because I had said the truth under its hundred of mensongés articles of "science" !!
Congratulations on "Mannkal". Finally they are going to be reimbursed for taxes !
Et dire que je me suis fait traité de "spammeur" par un connard d'un site d'Al Gore au Quebec, parce que j'avais dit la vérité sous ses centaines d'articles mensongés de "science" !!
Félicitations pour "Mannkal". Enfin on va être remboursés pour les taxes
Just another way in which climate science denialism is like evolutionary biology denialism. Creationists have been making the same anti-evolution arguments for a century and a half ...you expect climate science denialists to be different? :)
Skeptico has a post too and the comments are pretty funny.
Re: Carbon Sense Coalition
I'd seen them before, but their site is worth reading. I especially liked:
"Mr Viv Forbes Chairman
Grandfather, Sheep and Cattle Grazier, Soil Scientist and
Mining Consultant, Rosevale, Qld, Australia."
My favourite ride at Disney Climate is the Groundhog. Viscount Munchhausen World is good,too.
Meanwhile in Spain: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/mar/06/spain-wind-power
I think it was this time last year that I got into a spat on Jennifer Morohasy's blog because I asked for the list of papers that were going to be presented at the conference. These are normally published ahead of time so I wanted to see the list for this "conference".
Needless to say that there was no list of papers however there was lot of ducking and weaving from the IPA about why this "conference" with such scientific luminaries attending does not present papers like normal scientific conferences.
Ender:
You may have better luck getting the proceedings of this other conference. :)
(thanks Steve Bloom)
>We are ordinary but proud Australians who are gravely concerned with the unfounded environmental alarmism infiltrating all forms of Australian Government (Federal, State & Local), threatening our way of life and hard fought freedoms.
What about other peoples hard fought freedoms?
What about the freedom to have a liveable and sustainable environment?
Eat the rich:
>Meanwhile in Spain: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/mar/06/spain-wind-power
You might be interested in this:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/02/090223083344.htm
eg. Increased wind turbine use would require a dip in power output from power stations and no storage would be required.
"John Humphreys, whose response to any disagreement is to accuse you of lying."
You are thinking of Graeme Bird.
As far as I can tell, the only substantive difference between last year's and this year's is that Fred Singer is going to try getting all of the septics to start singing from the same pseudo-scientific hymnal. (See Andy Revkin's NYT article.) Among other things, this will mean deprogramming sun-worshippers like Anthony Watts. Kevin Grandia of Desmogblog is attending and reporting, so hopefully we'll be hearing more about this.
Also note that the Onion has a very well-done parody of the conference.
Steve Bloom:
> the only substantive difference between last year's and this year's is that Fred Singer is going to try getting all of the septics to start singing from the same pseudo-scientific hymnal.
Maybe it's also time for them to decide which one of the numerous climate conspiracy theories they'd like to propagate. :)
Steve Bloom, Bi: Isn't there a proper word for this? Something like "message discipline"?
I note that Lindzen's criticizing the denialists promoting solar causes. I'd love to see which solar proponents still tend to cite Lindzen's skepticism and credentials as if it helps their cause.
According to Revkin, Christy isn't attending again this year. Revkin cites it as "wanting to avoid 'guilt by association'" (latter Christy's words). Hmmm.
Does anyone know if the Heartland catering is up to the standard of the Heritage Victory Tours of yore? One also wonders whether the "conference" "papers" are of similar quality stature timbre as the oldschool Heritage papers. Will Baliunas and Soon reveal another paleo "paper"?! Will we see some Sally cleavage on the red carpet? Will WaPo have a slideshow so we can see the latest fashions? My mind reels.
Ah, well. At least the bogusphere and denialosphere will have few ululating posts the next few days, seeing as they are all gorging themselves.
Best,
D
Really funny thing about the conference is how warm its been in New York. It got to 17C on Sunday for start of the conference which is very hot for this time of year (just 3C shy of a record for the day). It would seem that we now have the anti-Gore effect ;-)
If you think about it the best place and time to hold a "sceptic" conference is in a cold place at the end of winter. You don't have to be a rocket scientist to know why they don't hold it in Arizona in summer (noting that the Australian Climate Science Coalition, NZ Climate Science Coalition and International Climate Science Coalition websites are all hosted in that state).
I notice that Revkin mentions the report "Nature, Not Human Activity, Rules the Planet". All I have ever seen was that "Summary for Policymakers of the Report of the
Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change", just as it is downloadable from Heartland. It clearly says "SPM of the report", I guess in an attempt to match the IPCC naming convention as closely as possible. Has ever anyone bothered to go into nitpicking mode and nail them down on this by asking to see the full report? It amazes me again and again, how uncritical the self-proclaimed skeptics are, when it comes to material supporting their own point of view.
bluegrue, to my knowledge, the report itself doesn't exist, though the summary does. IIRC, Eli Rabett had more on that.
On an unrelated note, Tim, there's a great foot-in-mouth moment stemming out of that conference. One of the things they're promoting is a new anti-Gore film, "Not Evil, Just Wrong". The filmmakers were recently interviewed and played the CEI's "CO2 is life" card, which is nothing new, but also brought up the DDT myth, through a direct comparison: "CO2 is the new DDT."
Here's SnM on "why doesn't Gavin attend ?":
"..... it's my understanding that the Gavin Schmidts of the world have refused to attend such venues in the past. I don't understand the purpose of such refusals. I don't understand what harm could possibly be done by preaching to the heathen. Maybe some of them would be convinced by Gavin."
Y'know, I'd almost be prepared to take up a collection to pay for Graeme Bird to attend as a guest speaker. Almost.
As a Australian, please allow me to apologise about Queensland. There's something about white people that means that whenever we settle in the tropics, we turn it into a fascist hole. Queensland is Australia's Texas.
A blogger at the Australian Libertarian Society [has responded](http://blog.libertarian.org.au/2009/03/10/true-lies-and-tim-lambert/) to this part of my post:
>John Humphreys, whose response to any disagreement is to accuse you of lying.
Naturally, he accuses me of lying. He also claims that Humphreys deleted my comments because I was "unnecessarily abusive" and I've been banned from commenting there.
Fortunately I saved a copy of my deleted comments. Judge for yourself if I was "unnecessarily abusive".
-----
Your very [first comment](http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2006/12/zombie_alert.php#comment-286285) on the post began with abuse: "Because you did lie Tim". Some more examples of your civility from that thread: "intellectually dishonest" ... "your group-think" ... "you're a fringe alarmist who makes up the embarassing part of the GW activists" ... "peanut gallary" ... "obnoxious Greenie trying to lecture me on economics" ... "fear-mongering" ... "Super Jeff" ...
You then put up a post of your own where you accused me of fear-mongering, equated me to LDP candidate Graeme Bird and falsely claimed that I called you a zombie. How very civil of you.
-----
Yes I criticised you, but my post was accurate, while you misrepresented Oreskes again and again and again.
-----
Nice trick John, linking to a post written months later. In the post you wrote the same day we find:
Are you still going to deny that you called me a fear-monger? And what did I write in my post that was mongering of fear?
-----
John, as far as I can tell, you think that if you accuse someone of lying, you are being civil, but if they return the favour they are being uncivil and you will complain about this. Yes, some commenters were rude to you in that thread, but you started the incivility with the first words of the first comment in the thread: "Because you did lie Tim". You think this is a civil response.
And you did misrepresent Oreskes with out-of-context quotes. Other commenters in that discussion called you on this and provided the context. Here's another quote from Oreskes (from her reply to a letter from Pielke about her Science piece):
A blogger at the Australian Libertarian Society has responded to this part of my post
JC's post at ALS is stunningly stupid, given that he is one of the more abusive people in the Australian blogosphere and has spent more time than anybody else agreeing with Birdie, for him to not even notice the hypocrisy is just amusing.
I notice that The Climate Sceptics Party lists former NSW Treasurer Michael Costa as one of their 'Australian and NZ scientists against global warming'. A man of many hats...
For an experiment, I posted this to a recent thread at John Humphreys' blog (I left the typo as I blundered it).
------------------------------------------------------------
John Humphreys,
I note that on the page you announced your co-sponsorship of the Heartland Instituteâs Conference on Climate Change, you put it that the global temperature for 2008 is the coldest since 1994. This is incorrect.
The web page where you oroginally made this claim:
http://australianlibertarian.wordpress.com/history/activities/kyoto-cam…
On this page, the global temperature for 2008 is marked â(updated 26 November 2008)â, which means that you presented the temperature for the year before it was complete.
It was a simple matter to follow the link from that page to the UAH temperature data page (monthly), and do some simple math.
The temperature for 2008 (now with data for every month) is warmer than 1999 and 2000. Here is the link to the satellite data you provided if you wish to confirm.
http://www.nsstc.uah.edu/data/msu/t2lt/tltglhmam_5.2
My methodology was very simple. I added up the months for 1999, 2000 and 2008 respectively and divided by 12 to get the average global temperature. This is the typical procedure done by the various temperature record institutes.
I hope you will correct your statements accordingly on the pages where they appear.
http://blog.libertarian.org.au/2008/11/26/2009-conference-on-climate-ch…
http://australianlibertarian.wordpress.com/history/activities/kyoto-cam…
And any others. Thank you in advance.
------------------------------------------------------------
The post is at #77 this thread:
http://blog.libertarian.org.au/2009/02/04/final-reminder/#comment-62133
We'll see how that goes.
Tim Lambert, I visit your site frequently. Thank you for the interesting, clear analyses.
Brian D:
> > > the only substantive difference between last year's and this year's is that Fred Singer is going to try getting all of the septics to start singing from the same pseudo-scientific hymnal.
> > Maybe it's also time for them to decide which one of the numerous climate conspiracy theories they'd like to propagate. :)
> Steve Bloom, Bi: Isn't there a proper word for this? Something like "message discipline"?
Dunno. Me, I'll call it "harmonization". Wikipedia (!) lists this as one of the definitions of the word:
> The apocryphal act of removing discrepancies between different Gospels. This was done in the past in many ways (see, for example, Diatessaron), although finally Christianity accepted the Gospels with all their discrepancies.
Thanks for the hint, Brian D.
I guess Anthony Watts had a narrow escape at this conference. He has announced at his blog that 75% of coverage in his surface stations project would be enough to look into evaluating the US temperature record. He's slightly below that threshold, but above 70%. Let's see, for what reason he will not replicate JohnV's work next year.
P.S.: The above comment #30 by raivo pommer looks like spam, it is reporting on devaluation of the Romanian currency; curiously it is in German.
Yes! Send Graeme!
Re #28: Barry, I think you need to weight for the varying month lengths; i.e. multiply each monthly figure by that month's number of days, add them up and then divide by 365 or 366. I don't think your basic result will be affected.
For those with the stomach for it, Bob Carter is doing fairly detailed daily posts at Quadrant. There are several inadvertently amusing passages.
Re #29: This is a long-standing Republican technique, developed decades ago to help a party with inherently minority views gain and hold power. It'll be interesting to see if Fred gets any traction, as so many of the objects of his efforts are just plain cranks.
Barry #28 -- I have responded to your comment. My post of November 2008 used information available at November 2008. But I congratulate you on your expert knowledge of how to average.
Tim -- The comments you reproduce in these comments do not include my full responses (perhaps because you do not have them available as I removed them as well) and consequently do not provide the full story. As I explained (in patient detail) at the time, I removed the discussion because it was off-topic.
The link attached to my surname is misleading.
The "whopper" that you refer to was true at the time of writing, and the source data was available through the links. I don't think it is reasonable or fair to expect me to include information that is not available at the time of writing. Consequently, I think it is inappropriate for you to accuse me of telling a "whopper" (which I believe is an accusation of lying).
I very rarely accuse people of lying and I generally assume that most people (irrespective of their views) argue in good faith. It is misleading to say that my "form" is to accuse people of lying.
I note that sea level rise projections by 2100 have been revised upwards from 59 cm to include melting ice, and are now 1.2 m+. I seem to recall a fair bit of discussion as to why the melting ice wasn't included in the original 59cm and would appreciate a recap & update.
John, you claim that you deleted my comments because they were off-topic. But you did not delete a host of off-topic comments abusing me and my blog. Care to tell us the real reason?
In a post on your blog Joe Cambria claims that my deleted comments were "abusive". You know this to be false. Why haven't you corrected him?
I don't have a copy of your comments, but I think folks can work out what you were saying from my replies, but feel free to explain yourself -- I won't censor you.
Your claim that "the current temperature is nearly exactly the same as the average over the 1970s." wasn't remotely close to being true when you wrote it. Study the graph, which shows what the situation was when you wrote your post.
James, basically no one had a clue about how to model the ice sheet dynamics. This motivated much recent work, but there is still not a definitive answer. The 59 cm was 59 cm from stuff we know about plus whatever from the ice sheets, iow a lower limit.
Dicky Lindzen was there sounding the alarm about climate alarmism, explaining to the audience in clear terms how simpleminded are his opponents and how unambiguous the evidence that climate is ruled by negative feedbacks all the time, no matter what - you can trust him on it.
Lindzen was the serious scientist at the show.
Quoted from here btw.
Egads, is he still working the Iris Hypothesis? Zombies ahoy!
bi quotes the Wikipedia:
Well, once in a while partisans of one issue or another get their hooks into Wikipedia, and stuff like the above can remain a long time before somebody notices.
Tim -- if there is an off-topic discussion that you think is de-railing a discussion on the ALS blog and it is worrying you, feel free to tell me and I'll look at it when I have the time.
It is not "my" blog. It is a group blog available for Australian libertarians. Generally, each author is responsible for moderating the discussion on their own posts.
The 2008 temperature at the time of writing was +0.1 over the baseline. That is fairy close to the historical average, as determined in the 1970s. That's not exactly what I wrote... but the typo is not important to the point. It certainly doesn't justify an accusation of lying, nor the constant attacks.
Found this 'review' of the conference:
http://www.rferl.org/Content/GlobalWarming_Skeptics_Raise_A_Storm_In_Ne…
Quote Bast (refering to The Inconvenient Truth):
"There's simply no peer-reviewed scientific literature that would justify predictions of a 20-foot [6-meter] rise in sea level, and yet that's very prominent in his film."
My understanding is that the film doesn't state when this would happen. Also although the science states it will rise a metre or two in the next century or two, no scientist has ever stated it's going to suddenly stop after one or two metres and I doubt any sane person would think that.
BTW i haven't seen the movie.
"It is not 'my' blog. It is a group blog available for Australian libertarians".
Yikes, that's enough to put anyone off.
The 2008 temperature at the time of writing was +0.1 over the baseline. That is fairy close to the historical average, as determined in the 1970s. That's not exactly what I wrote... but the typo is not important to the point. It certainly doesn't justify an accusation of lying, nor the constant attacks.
hm. only if you take the lowest point in the 2008 year and compare it to the highest spike from the 70s.
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut3vgl/from:2008/plot/hadcrut3vgl…
BPL:
> Well, once in a while partisans of one issue or another get their hooks into Wikipedia, and stuff like the above can remain a long time before somebody notices.
Hmm... whatever. I still think "harmonization" is a good word to describe S. Fred Singer's attempt at an Official Climate Skeptic Theory.
John, the host of off-topic comments abusing me and my blog were on the very thread that you deleted my comments from. Both before and after. Would you care to explain the real reason why you deleted my comments?
Look at the graph on my post. The 2008 temperature *at the time you wrote your post* was 0.3 degrees above the base line, while the average for the 70s was 0.1 degrees below. these are not "nearly exactly the same".
Is George Will giving the plenary?
A trend of one data point? While not technically false, it is utter bullshit. A misrepresentation of fact with the intent to deceive.
You wouldn't win this one in court, John. Even with cohenite as your lawyer.
It's basically the abusive cherry-picking that distinguishes denial and skepticism.
Here we have a double whammy. Selecting the one data set out of all available data sets that supports a desired conclusion, and selecting a narrow subset of data points from the data stream that fortuitously, again, supports the desired result.
I'm so not impressed.
Tim -- I deleted plenty of comments aimed at you from that thread. And I moderated others to remove some personal abuse (including some aimed at you). I left individual comments that are off-topic, but removed a series of posts (from you and others) when it became clear that were a major distraction from the topic.
The average in 2008 at the time I was writing was +0.01 (not +0.1 which I wrote above, or +0.3 as you wrote) and that can be worked out from the underlying data that I linked to.
sod -- I wasn't taking the lowest point in 2008. I was taking the average of the monthly temps, excluding the data not available at the time. And I wasn't comparing to any one year, but the baseline -- which is an historical average.
LB -- I didn't suggest a trend of one data point. I simply pointed out that 2008 was cold relative to recent years. I didn't say there was any trend. Elsewhere I have said that while the pause in warming over the past seven years is interesting, it's too early to interpret what it means.
I note that "misrepresent with intention to deceive" seems quite similar to "lie".
So, exactly what did you intend to suggest by pointing out this statistically meaningless factoid, John?
sod -- I wasn't taking the lowest point in 2008. I was taking the average of the monthly temps, excluding the data not available at the time. And I wasn't comparing to any one year, but the baseline -- which is an historical average.
you write:
The debate about climate change is ongoing. In 2008 we have seen the coldest year since 1994 2000* and the current temperature is nearly exactly the same as the average over the 1970s baseline average taken in the 1970s.
and you link to a [site](http://australianlibertarian.wordpress.com/history/activities/kyoto-cam…), that is linking on to UAH satellite data.
your own data shows that you are wrong (even with the multiple corrections that you already made)
the UAH data does only start in 1979 (so obviously no "1970s baseline"), and the year 1979 isn t the baseline either, as can be seen from the data you linked to. (1979 has a NEGATIVE average. if it was the "baseline", it would be zero).
so to sum you up: you cherry picked a weird time period (first few months of 2008), you made multiple errors, while comparing that data, and you came to a completely meaningless conclusion.
"Egads, is he still working the Iris Hypothesis? Zombies ahoy!"
Er... isn't Mann still working the hockey stick ploy?
Fixed!
"So, exactly what did you intend to suggest by pointing out this statistically meaningless factoid, John?"
Cherry picking anyone?
John, I counted 14 off-topic attacks on my me or my blog. You had no problem with these, explicitly approving them when you deleted some of the abuse directed at me. How can you claim that my four comments were a greater distraction than those 14? Why won't you admit to the real reason why you deleted my comments?
The baseline for UAH is not the 70s, that is logically impossible since the first full year in the series is 1979. The UAH base line is 1979-1998. I do think it is interesting to compare 2008 with the average for the 70s. See the graph in my post (using Hadley data). Even a year that was unusually cold for the 2000s is way above the average for the 70s. A fact that you will never report.
"He's slightly below that threshold, but above 70%."
Anthony Watts' record is at 75.5% of all USHCN stations (over 80% of active stations) as of March 8th. His claims are accurate. He hit the 70% mark a month ago.
The last 200+ surveys are done with a deliberate "rural bias". (I know, the great majority having been done by me, c. 198 in all.)
Results are pending. It's difficult to compare, as only 11% of stations are in compliance with NOAA's own siting strictures, and only 3% of them rated "excellent".
To further complicate matters, a large percentage of the better sited stations are ASOS units in airports (a big problem in and of itself) and are subject to the severe HO-83 TMax bias.
That leaves very few good stations for a sample. There are also distribution issues. CRN4 stations (58% of total, NOAA's own estimates are a 2C or more warm bias) are disproportionately bunched in the southeast and Mississippi Valley, where there was considerable cooling over the 20th century. CRN 2 stations are mostly concentrated in the west, where there was considerable warming over that period of time. This has to be carefully quantified, and it is not easy to do.
In the case of John V, no account was made for ASOS or regional distribution concerns, and a far smaller sample was available, though he did make a good effort and I completely respect his honesty and openness.
As it is, the data is being assessed, and the chips will fall where the chips fall. And all data and methods will, of course, be open for independent review.
Just a firsthand report from the trenches.
So, Evan Jones, if your work in the trenches shows that the surface temp record is shit, how will you explain away the fact that the satellite record - Christy and Spencer are denialists, as you know - track it so closely?
Not enough satellite photos?
And also, Evan Jones, how will you explain away all the ecological, biological, glacial melting, and sea level rise data we're seeing?
"global cooling causes everything to melt?"
Is that it?
And, if you deny all of the above ...
How will you explain the basic physics? What implications will fall out from your overthrowing much of what we know of physics?
Will nuke plants cease to function? Solar panels?
Are you at the forefront of the debunking of the Newtonian/Einsteinian foundation of modern physics? What will you replace it with?
Of course, we know that this makes Evan Jones a liar, since NOAA's siting standards have been for new stations, not old stations.
This claim that somehow NOAA's negligent or incompetent, siting stations that don't meet it's own standards, is one of the most vile examples of crap from Watts and his science illiterate cohorts.
And, Evan Jones, before you became a Real Stud at WUWT, you proved yourself to be an incompetent in a variety of forums populated with people with technical backgrounds.
Your embracement of Watts, and his embracement of you, sort of symbolize the "dipshits of a feather embrace one another".
After you overturn science, what will you do? Go naked and suck worms for your living?
In the case of John V, no account was made for ASOS or regional distribution concerns, and a far smaller sample was available, though he did make a good effort and I completely respect his honesty and openness.
your claim about regional distribution is false.
John V did a [grid approach](http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=2061.#comment-137943), it was Steve McIntyre who didn t weight them:.
John V:Geographic Distribution:
The first image below shows the geographic distribution of the stations with different site quality ratings. There is a clear western bias in the worst stations (CRN=5) and a clear southern bias in the best stations (CRN=1). Since SteveMc's plots were generated using a simple arithmetic average of all station histories, they do not consider this geographic distribution. ... I calculated the 1-year and 5-year average temperatures for the continental USA. The calculations were done by overlaying a 0.5 x 0.5deg grid over the entire area and calculating average temperatures at each grid point for every month from 1880. The grid temperatures were calculated from surrounding stations with readings available for that month (if no reading for the month then the station was excluded for the month).
i hope that Anthony will be honest enough to publish the "real" results as well, and wont use those multiple problems as an excuse to manipulate the results.
a good idea to avoid "sceptic bias" would be, to replicate the John V approach as close as possible.
my real hope though is with John V, showing up again...
"So, Evan Jones, if your work in the trenches shows that the surface temp record is shit, how will you explain away the fact that the satellite record - Christy and Spencer are denialists, as you know - track it so closely"
You seem to be putting words in my mouth. The siting is obviously very poor. The effect this has on the offset is established by Leroy and confirmed by Yilmaz (but I would argue more study needs to be done).
What is really in question is the effect on the trend.
Maybe it is a lot, maybe it is a little. I didn't say what the result would be. I won't know what the result will be until it is released and reviewed.
As for satellites, one possible explanation is they measure lower troposphere by microwave proxy, not the surface. Lower trop is supposed to heat at 1.2 to 1.4 times the rate of the surface, depending on latitude. The data is given for lower troposphere and does not say it is converted to emulate surface measurements, so I am presuming it is not. I might well be wrong, but that is my understanding.
It is also interesting how RSS and UAH seem to be diverging from GISS as of late.
But my area of expertise, if you can call it that, centers on station siting itself, not satellite reconstructions.
Only one thing is established: the stations do not conform with NOAA standards. That we know. What this means will be examined.
One also needs to look at LaDochy et al (12/2007) and Yilmaz et al (2008). Those studies (particularly Yilmaz) certainly raises the question.
"And also, Evan Jones, how will you explain away all the ecological, biological, glacial melting, and sea level rise data we're seeing?"
Well, glaciers, on the whole, have been receding for centuries. NASA also reports dirty snow is a serious issue, accounting for 30% of Arctic melt (some estimates put it at over 90%). Coal soot acts like salt on a driveway and reduces albedo as well. This is anthropogenic, but not a direct result of CO2, and can be controlled by particulate reduction.
"And, if you deny all of the above ..."
I don't deny all of the above. I question extent and cause. I look for correlations (which may or may not turn out to be causation). I also fully accept that CO2 is a greenhouse gas and caused warming--but I do question the positive feedback estimates, which are essential to CO2 AGW theory.
"Of course, we know that this makes Evan Jones a liar, since NOAA's siting standards have been for new stations, not old stations." And other ad hominem remarks. Considering the source, to be expected.
You do realize how much worse you make yourself look than you make me look with such comments? Besides, judging by what I have read by you and of you, I wouldn't trade my rep for yours for a million bucks.
"your claim about regional distribution is false."
Hello, sod. You are right, and I stand corrected.
He makes no mention of the heavy CRN2 western bias. Perhaps that did not exist ant that much earlier time. CRN1 bias may have been southeastern earlier, but so far as I can see this is no longer so (and CRN1 stations are much cooler than the others and are adjusted much warmer). There aren't a whole lot of them, of course. CRN5 stations do still seem to have a westward bias, but CRN4 stations (far more numerous)appear to be concentrated in cooling areas.
None of the work is final, however, and it is being done by others. I don't know what gridding methods will be used (I'd be interested to know, actually).
"i hope that Anthony will be honest enough to publish the "real" results as well, and wont use those multiple problems as an excuse to manipulate the results."
Yes, there are a lot of problems. It is not as easy as might seem. There are also station moves involved, and it is very difficult if not impossible to determine the effects (other than by step changes in data). From what i can tell, MMS usually does not document local station moves earlier than the late 1950s. Take Chama, NM , for example. There is a whopping upward step change (in the late 1920s, IIRC), follwed by a downward step change. No records exist for that period. There is another downward step change in 1964, but that does not coincide with a station move. There is an upward step change, however, after 1998, when the station was moved from the surrounding woods to the grounds of the ranger station.
Poor records make it difficult to track back too far and in any case, the coordinates are only sufficient for mesoenvironment. Even today, given coordinates are very rarely sufficient to determine microenvironment. Photos or curator interviews are necessary for that. (Occasionally a curator knows the precise previous location of a station. More often not.)
Whatever methods or data Mr. Watts or his colleagues use will, of course, be open for purposes of independent review. And I assume there will be plenty of that.
sod -- Also note Mosh's followup on the John V thread:
Yes Jon, That's similar to what I've done in the past with sites like Marysville ( 5) and companion
sites like willows ( well its a 3) and Orland ( a 1) and Colusa and on a site by site comparison
I have never failed to see to a divergence betweens the 1s and the 5s.
Now that would be an interesting study!
This would appear to be a more directed method than gridding, assuming a uniform method is possible. CRN4 sites are common enough, though, for comparison in most areas.
Stripping out the ASOS sites would seem to be advisable, though, for obvious reasons.
All about temperature records:
http://cce.890m.com/temperature-record/
And I believe JohnV did with and without airports:
http://www.opentemp.org/_results/20071011_CRN123R/crn123r_crn12r_5yr.png
(CRN12R has 17 stations, CRN123R has >60)
Evan Jones, you wrote, "I don't deny all of the above. I question extent and cause".
Let me make it clear for you then. There is without any shadow of a doubt a link between the northward expsion of flora and fauna and climate change over the past 30 years in the northern hemipshere. This includes both plants and animals that are being forced to readjust their ranges in response to regional warming. Where species are not responding is perhaps due to such important factors as habitat loss in more northward ecosystems and the deleterious effects of agricultural intensification and urban expansion which act as physical barriers. Habitat generalists are tracking the warming more effectively than specialsits. Another important barrier to species adaptation is the fact that species do not exist indepenent of other environmental constraints and, most importantly, usually depend on interactions with other species (primary producers or consumers; mutualists or antagonists). Warming is unraveling trophic webs, that is for sure, and the result is that systems will be simplified, with consequences for a wide range of services that emerge from them.
So on this point you are not only out on a limb, you are totally incorrect to suggest that the biological evidence is limited or fragmentary. It is not: there is a wealth of data in a range of scientific journals supporting my arguments. To reiterate, the biological evidence for warming is overwhelming. The evidence for a human fingerprint on the current warming is also overwhelming. The science on these issues should be closed by now. That it apparently isn't shows how much influence powerful and well-funded vested interests have. The challenge is for the scientific community to determine what the effects of anthropogenic climate change will have on natural and managed systems, not to determine if it is happening or not and what the primary underlying causes are.
It is hardly surprising that very, very few of the sceptics are environmental scientists. If they were, they'd know how incorrect they are (perhaps those that are scientists in one form or another do, but then again some of these people are already bought-and-paid for). This is also a view from 'the trenches' - speaking as a senior population ecologist.
LB -- the factoid is fair to point out. It goes to the general point that we've had a pause in the warming over the past seven years. Given I was introducing a conference hosting heterodox climate change speakers, this unexpected deviation from trend is an appropirate enough hook to the conversation.
I think your original accusations against me were OTT.
This would appear to be a more directed method than gridding, assuming a uniform method is possible. CRN4 sites are common enough, though, for comparison in most areas.
i am pretty surprised to here this, from a person who claims:
But my area of expertise, if you can call it that, centers on station siting itself, not satellite reconstructions.
why would a person, who believes that micro sites issues will strongly effect the trend of a station, think that a comparison with another station, at "nearby" location" makes any sense?
Station A is a type 1 station, very close to the sea. station B is a type 5 station a couple of km away from the sea, sheltered by hills.
you think that a road has a serious (and long term) impact, but that a station at a completely different location will give a good comparison?
[Monckton](http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/03/10/iccc-conference-day-3/#comments) is using misleading claims:
âArctic sea ice is disappearingâ â in fact, there is no discernable trend in winter sea ice area over the last 30 years.
to come to wrong conclusions:
Lord Monckton concluded with some comments that will serve well as an epitaph for the entire Heartland-2 climate conference. âThere was no climate crisis, there is no climate crisis and there will be no climate crisisâ, he said. âThe correct solution to global warming is to have the courage to do nothingâ.
this unexpected deviation from trend is an appropirate enough hook to the conversation.
Any half decent analysis should have told you that you are probably mistaking noise for an "unexpected deviation from trend".
Seriously, stick to the economics, you're just embarrassing yourself whenever you blog on climate science.
Jeff harvey
>There is without any shadow of a doubt a link between the northward expsion of flora and fauna and climate change over the past 30 years in the northern hemipshere. This includes both plants and animals that are being forced to readjust their ranges in response to regional warming. Where species are not responding is perhaps due to such important factors as habitat loss in more northward ecosystems and the deleterious effects of agricultural intensification and urban expansion which act as physical barriers...
Paul.
I agree
I wonder if there is going to be a clash. Since the Northern hemisphere is where most developed fossil fuel burning nations are and humans using that technology can stay put (defying nature and the necessity migrate).
Whilst migration of 'wild' species heads North expecting to find sparsely populated landscapes, only to be confronted with humans determined to stay put.
I can only see even more extinctions and a lot more trouble.
Paul,
Many thanks. You make a number of very valid points. There is worry amongst many scientists not that species cannot adjust their ranges, but that there will be little in the way of optimal habitat left when they do. Although the current changes at regional scales are quite rapid, I don't doubt that many resident (less so migrant) species can adjust their 'thermal behavior' and move to higher latitudes (of course, plants are going to have a much harder time of it, as are soil biota). But over much of the northern hemisphere nature has already been simplified, and there is more to adaptation than being just able to migrate and relocate. I have written about this at more length on another thread.
As for Monkton, anyone who writes such blatant nonsense as *"The correct solution to global warming is to have the courage to do nothing"* should not be taken seriously. I am sure he would probably say the same thing about many other symptoms of the current predicament, as well: habitat loss, extinction, other forms of pollution etc. I believe that the Heartland 'ICCC' was a joke and nothing less.
John,
Supporting one statistically meaningless factoid with another statistically meaningless factoid as a rhetorical device to bind yourself to an audience that is prone to believe that meaningless factoid does in fact have some meaning somehow makes the assertion plausible? This appears on its face to be an ongoing exercise in prevarication, don't you think? You might even be fooling yourself, I suppose.
Unexpected by whom, exactly? This so-called deviation is well within the expected deviation of historical annual to multi-decadal variability.
John, you claim some expertise in economics, yet seem rather naive about trend analysis of stochastic time series, a subject of primary interest in economic analysis. It is hard to imagine you are repeating these falsehoods out of mere stupidity.
John, I counted 14 off-topic attacks on my me or my blog. You had no problem with these, explicitly approving them when you deleted some of the abuse directed at me. How can you claim that my four comments were a greater distraction than those 14? Why won't you admit to the real reason why you deleted my comments?
The baseline for UAH is not the 70s, that is logically impossible since the first full year in the series is 1979. The UAH base line is 1979-1998. I do think it is interesting to compare 2008 with the average for the 70s. See the graph in my post (using Hadley data). Even a year that was unusually cold for the 2000s is way above the average for the 70s. A fact that you will never report.
Tim corrects John H:
John H corrects his blog:
Maybe John H is that stupid.
"Let me make it clear for you then. There is without any shadow of a doubt a link between the northward expsion of flora and fauna and climate change over the past 30 years in the northern hemipshere. This includes both plants and animals that are being forced to readjust their ranges in response to regional warming."
That was never unclear to me. There was been a global warming trend from 1979 to 1998 and a continued warming in the Northern Hemisphere since then until the PDO flipped to cool phase in January 2007. Where it goes from here, quien sabe?
"So on this point you are not only out on a limb, you are totally incorrect to suggest that the biological evidence is limited or fragmentary."
I do not recall suggesting that the biological evidence was limited or fragmentary.
"The evidence for a human fingerprint on the current warming is also overwhelming."
I also agree with this. But I question the primary source of the anthropogenic cause. Besides, stipulating that the NOAA is correct (though they keep readjusting, so by definition one can't assume this), climate has warmed about 0.72C over the 20th century. The IPCC estimates much more warming the 21st century based on positive feedback loops. That is what I think is highly questionable.
The evidence for modest, direct CO2 warming is strong. But I suspect the positive feedback calculation is wrong, and it has also failed on the first cut: Instead of increase of ambient vapor in the middle & upper trop and strat, and high-level clouds, we see increasing low level cloud cover, which has increased albedo. That is a negative feedback, not a positive, at least at this stage of the game.
Posted by: John Humphreys | March 11, 2009 3:57 PM
Posted by: John Humphreys | March 12, 2009 9:41 AM
O, what a wicked web we weave...
why would a person, who believes that micro sites issues will strongly effect the trend of a station, think that a comparison with another station, at "nearby" location" makes any sense?
I said I do not know how strong the effect is. Neither did I say it was the only effect.
Three things definitely affect offset and -- may -- affect trends: Urban vs. Suburban vs. Rural, regional issues (warming in west, cooling in southeast, etc.) and microsite issues.
When you choose a nearby site, you control the last variable, at least. And it is fairly easy to discriminate on the second variable. That leaves one (relatively) free for direct comparison on the third.
For all we know, unadjusted station moves have an effect, too.
All we do know for sure is that the stations are not well sited and the effects (or lack thereof) need to be examined.
It is also important to note that after discounting the offset, a heat sink may well exaggerate a cooling trend as well, as the heat sink effect "undoes" itself on the way down. It is quite possible that the cooling over the last two years is exaggerated.
BTW, sod, I appreciate your civil discourse on this contentious issue.
They have been. By real scientists doing real science for a real long time now.
BTW, sod, I appreciate your civil discourse on this contentious issue.
hm, now that you say it, i notice as well. i am following the events in Winnenden (Germany) on TV, and mostly post during repetition. it isn t that far away..
They have been. By real scientists doing real science for a real long time now.
Mmmm. No.
The NOAA COOP system has a 100'/no suth shading rule. The NOAA/CRN parameters are more strict, but CRN 1 & 2 ratings conform well with the above.
The sites clearly do not conform with this. I recently observed a station in East Stroudburg, PA, that was converted to NOAA/Nimbus last year.
It was sited less than 4m from the residence, and was on a step slope, placing it above the heat rise of the house. The (non-standard) backup, less than 2 feet away, was actually mounted on the upper deck railing.
According to the curators, the original CRS was located further away from the house.
As I said, 89% of observed stations are within 30 m. of a heat source or sink and 69% are within 10 m. (or located directly atop or adjacent). The modern MMTS systems are more likely to be in worse violation than the old CRS units, which do not require cabling.
You need to check the actual data before making such bland assertions.
If you mean that they have been "examined", you are also wrong. No comprehensive microsite survey has ever been made before, by anyone, "real" scientists or no.
The closest we come to that is Yilmaz, et al (2008), not a warming study, but one looking into how to create more comfortable urban environments. Comparisons of sensors sited 2 m. off the ground showed around an 8C difference in offset between stations well away from asphalt sited over grass and stations sited over concrete or asphalt.
As the temperature rose, graphs clearly show that the sensors located over asphalt showed a higher heating trend than those over grass or dirt.
Obviously this is not conformed to NOAA siting standards and more experimentation clearly needs to be done to establish both offset and trend effects.
The data - which is what counts - has been. JohnV's work supports the notion that these real scientists doing real science for a real long time now have actually done a real good job.
My point stands.
Yes. The *actual* data. The temperature data, which is exactly what the real scientists doing real science have been doing for a real long time now.
And doing a real good job at it.
Really.
Hmmm. Then why the switch from USHCN-1 to USHCN-2? A rather radical departure in approach.
The stations are poorly sited. This has a very strong effect on offset and an unknown effect on trend. Station moves (poorly documented at least until recently) create step-changes in data that are not considered. Historical metadata is often readjusted. Therefore, by definition, its "realness" is at least somewhat limited.
This tells us, prima facie, that the climate is a difficult thing to measure and an even more difficult thing to track, regardless of how "good" the "real" scientists are. Appeal to authority will take one only so far.
Surely you do not object to further and closer study?
JohnV's work supports the notion that these real scientists doing real science for a real long time now have actually done a real good job.
John V is open and honest. But his work is based on far less complete data than is currently available. He also does not do a full side-by-side comparison (like what Jon and Mosh suggest and what Yilmaz actually does), which seems to me the logical way to proceed.
LaDochy (studying not on micro- but mesoenvironment) concludes that urban stations exaggerate the same warming trend compared with nearby rural and coastal stations. The percentage of surface stations in urban environments far exceeds the percentage of urban environment vs. rural.
John V's work is a very preliminary result based on an insufficient number of stations. Further work needs to be done. And is being done, for that matter. Why would you object?
It's useful when done by competent people. Neither you nor Watts fall into that category.
I don't object to you wasting your time. I only object to your claims that it's worth a rat's ass.
I am not a researcher. I am merely an assistant who collects data. And as long as the methods and data is open, I don't see what the problem is. And Watts has 25 years' experience as a TV weatherman and his business is weather measuring equipment and software, which means he has a very specific specific knowledge of that which he is measuring.
His findings are that the USHCN network is poorly sited. He does not go further than that in his conclusions. As this is documented by photographs (and to a lesser extent, virtual surveys and interviews with curators), this is clearly valuable research. For that matter, the NOAA invited Watts to their HQ for a conference and told him so.
So I would argue that you are incorrect in your assessment of its value.
I also find it counterintuitive, to say the least, that the NOAA adjusts the trend (sic) 0.3C warmer (closer to 0.42C with USHCN-2), though, I particularly question the fact that SHAP is a positive rather than negative adjustment: From what I have seen, it is typical that a CRS replaced by an MMTS that is sited worse than the original.
Yes, I know. His experience reading the weather is of a great help in overturning the work of a very large number of well-educated scientists.
Do you ever *listen* to yourself?
As to competency, how incompetent is a camera?
That's why he does this way: to dismiss claims of incompetence before they are even made. So unless you are claiming he is doctoring the photos, you have to admit the evidence is there. And the data is what the cameras say it is.
Do you ever listen to yourself?
I would suggest that people listen to you and listen to me and come to their own conclusions.
A well educated scientist who is working with questionable data might possibly be coming to the wrong or a skewed conclusion. We are actually quite surprised that the NOAA/NCDC has not done routine due diligence on their own -- critically important -- USHCN (or GHCN) network.
That's why he does this way: to dismiss claims of incompetence before they are even made. So unless you are claiming he is doctoring the photos, you have to admit the evidence is there. And the data is what the cameras say it is.
hm. the problem isn t just with the photos. http://www.surfacestations.org/ still claims, that a class 5 station has an "error>=5°C".
this is complete bogus, of course. as ladochy, whom you cited above shows, the error is closer to 0.5°C
http://ams.confex.com/ams/pdfpapers/119064.pdf
oh, and looking for him, i found this nice [poster](http://www.fs.fed.us/psw/cirmount/meetings/agu/pdf2007/kelly_goulden_po…):
was it microsite issues or UHI, that moved that vegetation up that hill?
I own several, and none of them are worth a damn for taking temperature data.
hm. the problem isn t just with the photos. http://www.surfacestations.org/ still claims, that a class 5 station has an "error>=5°C".
Well, that is what the NOAA itself claims (in the CRN handbook personally signed off on by Dr. Karl, himself), which is basically an English translation of the LeRoy (1999) study.
The idea is to use the same standards that the NOAA already acknowledges. Which seems only fair.
FWIW, Yilmaz (2008) shows that a sensor sited 2 m. over asphalt or concrete shows an 8C warm bias. This is autumn, but it is at relatively high altitude. Also, an NOAA sensor is 5' +/- 1', much closer to the ground, and that would increase the difference.
So is the >=5C number correct? I can't say that I know. But it is the official position of the NOAA/CRN and it has been more or less confirmed by the Yilmaz study.
But yes, I think a full year-round study at COOP sensor height is needed. It certainly would not cost very much to do such an experiment.
As for the photos, I see no problem with them.
I own several, and none of them are worth a damn for taking temperature data.
Hmm. Maybe you aiming them at the wrong places? #B^1
this is complete bogus, of course. as ladochy, whom you cited above shows, the error is closer to 0.5°C
As best as I can recall, LaDochy (in his December 2007 paper, not the earlier one) was not considering microsite, but mesosite issues. His comparisons were between urban/suburban/rural locations, not CRN1 vs. CRN5. And isn't the 0.5°C a 1980 - 2001 trend figure and not an offset figure (I don't quite recall)? No one is suggesting that the trend difference is anywhere near >=5°C. Just the offset.
It is possible that there is more error in UHI assessment than in the effects of microsite violations.
Ah. Your link is to the earlier paper (also interesting--and shorter).
The problem with the "park-like" setting site is that the mesoenvironment is green--but the microsite environment is depressingly gray! The equipment appears to be sited directly under either concrete or crushed rock. That would make it at best a CRN4 station, and possibly a 5.
Evan Jones posts:
It's not "unknown," it's "nonexistent." Here are some of the analyses that have been done:
Hansen, J., Ruedy, R., Sato, M., Imhoff, M., Lawrence, W., Easterling, D., Peterson, T., and Karl, T. 2001. "A closer look at United States and global surface temperature change." J. Geophys. Res. 106, 23947â23963.
Peterson, Thomas C. 2003. "Assessment of Urban Versus Rural In Situ Surface Temperatures in the Contiguous United States: No Difference Found." J. Clim. 16(18), 2941-2959.
Peterson T., Gallo K., Lawrimore J., Owen T., Huang A., McKittrick D. 1999. "Global rural temperature trends." Geophys. Res. Lett. 26(3), 329.
And remember Anthony Watts and surfacestations.org? They finally compiled a huge sample of "good" stations and "bad" stations, and... guess what? No significant difference in the trend. Gee, I guess the scientists knew what they were doing after all. Quelle surprise.
The problem with the "park-like" setting site is that the mesoenvironment is green--but the microsite environment is depressingly gray! The equipment appears to be sited directly under either concrete or crushed rock. That would make it at best a CRN4 station, and possibly a 5.
i see two very big problems here:
1. your analysis places those two stations in the same or similar classes. that is absurd.
2. you (and Anthony, btw) use the classification and its effect (error>=5°C) without knowing (or at least clarifying) the meaning of that term.
the meaning of the error, as i see it, is: some stations falling into this class have experienced a MAXIMUM error above 5°C.
it translates into: a class 5 station that is completely surrounded by concrete, with no shadow might show an error above 5°C on a very hot day.
this is an important information for meteorology. on an extreme day, this site may provide very false information. but it is pretty close to irrelevant for climate research.
using the message to scar people, and basing a huge project on information that isn t completely understood, makes me wonder about the honest purpose of those behind and supporting the project.
your analysis places those two stations in the same or similar classes. that is absurd.
I think you misunderstand me.
CRN rating is strictly microsite. The mesososite environment (more rural setting vs. more urban) is different and is a different calculation entirely.
The way the LeRoy paper reads is that it is an estimated or expected difference not a maximum difference. The Yilmaz paper tends to confirm this (an 8ºC+ difference during summer).
The LaDochy December 2007 study (not the one you cited) indicates the warming trend for California from 1980 - 2001 is overestimated by a factor of two.
My point is that more study is obviously required.
using the message to scar people, and basing a huge project on information that isn t completely understood, makes me wonder about the honest purpose of those behind and supporting the project.
I think that injunction would apply to both sides of the debate, no?
What "debate"? On the one hand we have science. On the other hand ... you and Watts.
You're saying scientists shouldn't warn people of the consequences of their actions? Science should be silent about the dangers of smoking? Of global warming?
CRN rating is strictly microsite. The mesososite environment (more rural setting vs. more urban) is different and is a different calculation entirely.
i agree, there is some misunderstanding. both stations in the LaDochy paper. ["WILL THE REAL LOS ANGELES STAND UP"](http://ams.confex.com/ams/pdfpapers/119064.pdf) are inside the LA city. one station is located in a park, the other one on a rooftop parking space.
The way the LeRoy paper reads is that it is an estimated or expected difference not a maximum difference.
this is obviously false. snow cover will remove most microsite effects. "error>=5°C" can not be an "expected" difference, it must be a maximum effect.
The Yilmaz paper tends to confirm this (an 8ºC+ difference during summer).
in [Turkey](http://www.ejournal.unam.mx/atm/Vol21-2/ATM002100202.pdf)., in summer. measured over a full concrete airport runway.
this are the most extreme conditions possible.
i am looking forward to a similar study, in Alaska, with a minor road close to the sensor and some tree shading on it.
The LaDochy December 2007 study (not the one you cited) indicates the warming trend for California from 1980 - 2001 is overestimated by a factor of two.
how do you come to that factor 2?
this LaDochy paper mentions a very important "meso" factor: irrigation might give a DOWNWARD trend to rural stations.
My point is that more study is obviously required.
my point is, that those most basic points, should have been the starting point of the surface stations project.
Hey,
Read between the lines of the recent NRC report from the US NAS and you will see that they don't believe current climate observations are adequate.
http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=12595
I should have added that the NRC comments relate to the US, which supposedly has the most sophisticated monitoring system in the world.
If that is not up to scratch how much reliability can be placed on a so-called GMST derived from 'dodgy' stations across the world?
You can find as many stations with problems that might lower the temperature as those that might raise it
You can find as many stations with problems that might lower the temperature as those that might raise it
Pfffft.
Not on denialist sites.
Wattscredulouswitdat?
Best,
D
Thank God we have satellite telemetry that tells the same story, and that ecological and geophysical data also tells the same story, eh?
We don't really need the surface station record to understand what's going on, but it's comforting that it correlates well with our other data, don't you think?
The right-wing talking heads are unleashing their attack dogs on Andrew Revkin.
Too true.
As I related to Radium Water Tim on another thread, I live in a rural region about a 15 minute drive from the CBD of our state capital. The daily city maxima that were reported each evening were so consistently 2-4°C below what neighbours were reporting for our area that I spent a few hundred on a weather station to get an accurate idea (+/- 0.1°C) of what our temperatures were.
And they are, almost without exception, 2-4°C below the city's maxima.
Heat island indeed.
Evan writes, *I think that injunction would apply to both sides of the debate, no?*
The problem is that this isn't a debate; its one extremely well funded side twisting, distorting and mangling science to promote a pre-determined worldview and political agenda, and the other side constantly having to defend a huge volume of empirical evidence.
The denialists are well-aware that science is not on their side, but they know they do not have to win the debate on these grounds. All they have to do is to shed enough doubt on the theory of AGW to render any meaningful action to tackle the problem mute. This is because the public and honest policymakers (not those bought-and-paid for by industry) will not push for regulations if the debate appears to be 'stuck somewhere in the middle'.
I suggest you check how the denialists have shifted their goalposts over the past 20 years. First, AGW was a 'doomsday myth'. Then, as evidence flowed in in support of climate change, the impetus shifted to 'it's natural, due to the sun and natural variability'. More recently, abusing long-term data sets and misunderstanding the concept of forces required to shift largely deterministic systems, they have shifted to the 'it hasn't warmed at all since 1998' - an exceptional year by any standards that was much warmer by far than any preceding years due to a potent El Nino event.
Mark my words: in 10-15 years, as the evidence accrues still further, they will shift to their last argument: 'Ok, humans are the primary culprit but it's too late to do anything so we will just have to adapt' (that is already being said in some denialist circles). Again, in every one of these scenarios there is a constant theme: *don't change anything and by all means do not cap carbon emissions*.
The political right are hijacking the science that they hate to ensure that the song remains the same. It is profit maiximization for the privileged few.
I am a Geologist who has had no formal training in climate science however have looked into the science behind the GW theory over the last 12 months and I have to say there are some issues that throw some doubt into my mind regarding the influence of human induced Co2 increases on global temperatures.
I do not have tunnel vision on either side of the debate however I do not want governments burdening economies with another tax on something that may not be real.
There is one question I have that you may be able to answer:
Why is it that the when Co2 vs temperature is plotted it shows a logrithmic relationship, that is most of the warming affect occurs for the first 20ppm and then tails off in a logrithmic plot. Going by this if Co2 is doubled or even tripled from current levels it will have a negligible effect on atmospheric temperatures. This is due to the fact that Co2 only absorbs certain wavelengths of energy so once it has done this adding more does nothing. Now to me this relationship seems feasible given that Co2 levels have been massivley higher in past geological times ie up 5000ppm but we didn't have a runaway greenhouse effect. Also Al Gore may have also inadvertenly comfirmed this in his ice core graphic when he got on the scissor lift and showed Co2 levels rocketing up recently however temperatures were not going up at the same rate as they were in relation to Co2 levels in the previuos spikes on the ice core graphic. Also over the last 10 years no significant warming has occurred (satellite data)however the Co2 levels have continued to rise, dosen't this cast doubt over the relationship between the two?
Ah, I wander over here looking for the dust-up with Tim Curtin about the Soloman et al travesty about emission rates and what do I find? Just the usual bloviators and some snideness about new political parties; so from this proud and ordinary citizen may I wish you all a Will Steffan reality. BTW, I thought the William Gray piece at the Heartland conference was pretty damn good; I wish I could think of an equivalent pro-AGW effort; perhaps the recent Steig et tu Mann revelations?
Stuart H:
Fair enough. It's good to have an inquiring mind.
I don't want to be told by anyone that they don't have tunnel vision. You would be wise to leave that judgement up to people reading you.
This is not how the logarithm function works. "Most" of the variation in the logarithm function does not occur over any finite range of input. The logarithm function varies from minus to plus infinity. Doubling the input causes the same increase in output for any original input, i.e. increasing the input from 2 units to 4 units causes the same increase in output as increasing the input from 1 unit to 2 units. Increasing the input from 4 units to 8 units causes the same increase in output again etc. Thus there is no such thing as an input range for which "most" of the variation in output occurs.
cohenite:
What a hypocrite.
Reply to Chris O'Neill
Your explanation doesn't make much sense to me. Are you saying that from 300ppm Co2 to 600ppm Co2 will cause the same temperature increase as 20-40ppm Co2? If you think it does then the relationship is linear not logrithmic
Stuart
Just to further explain myself, my understanding is that Co2 only absorbs certain wavelengths so once the existing Co2 does this then adding more has little effect, this physical property of Co2 causes the logrithmic relationship when plotted against atmospheric temperature changes, is this not the case?
Stuart
> Your explanation doesn't make much sense to me. Are you saying that from 300ppm Co2 to 600ppm Co2 will cause the same temperature increase as 20-40ppm Co2? If you think it does then the relationship is linear not logrithmic
Stuart H, you're either a liar or an idiot or both. You can fool the mathematically uninitiated, but you can't fool anyone who has at least a high school education in mathematics (and still remembers it).
Why the hostility? do you not agree that the relationship between Co2 concentration and atmospheric temperature is logrithmic?
See my previuos comment after the one you quoted where I provided my understanding of the science, if it's not correct then can you explain why the temperature increases 1.5 degrees within the first 20ppm and then only 0.3 degrees for the next 20ppm?
Stuart
Stuart H, you're still either a liar or an idiot or both. Now get out your calculator and compute the values of
ln 20.
ln 40.
ln 60.
This is the answer to your moronic question.
Can you find out the values by yourself? Or are you too busy waiting for your shillmasters to tell you what the answers are?
bi-IJI
I am simply requesting an answer to my question on whether you agree that Co2 concentration forms a logrithmic relationship with temperature. I assume you know what a logrithmic relationship looks like!
I have read articles that state the CO2 levels in the atmosphere are not saturated which doesn't seem to fit the graphs showing the physical properties of Co2.
If temperature is modelled to continue to rise with further CO2 concentrations without stopping then why did we not have a runaway greenhouse effect when atmospheric CO2 was between 3000-5000ppm 65 million years ago?
Do you understand?
I said:
> Stuart H, you're still either a liar or an idiot or both. Now get out your calculator and compute the values of
> ln 20.ln 40.ln 60.
> This is the answer to your moronic question.
> Can you find out the values by yourself? Or are you too busy waiting for your shillmasters to tell you what the answers are?
I'm betting on the latter.
So, Stuart H, have you yet figured out what the values of ln 20, ln 40, and ln 60 are?
Or are you trying to dodge the whole elitist venture of Actually Doing Sums, by throwing out yet another bunch of inactivist red herrings?
What the point of sitting here calculating log values?
My point is that for each additional molecule of CO2 added to the atmoshpere the temperature increase is smaller than the last. Do you dispute this?
Also you are so typical of someone who is in the GW extremist group who prefer to attack the man instead of having a rational debate about the science, it's pathetic really and doesn't help your cause
Stuart
> What the point of sitting here calculating log values?
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Spoken like a true "geologist" all right.
Someone introduce Stuart to Tim Curtin, please - it is clearly a preordained match.
Stuart, if you are going to claim that the logarithmic nature of heat absorption by [CO2] somehow casts doubt on the science of global temperature, you might bother not to speak utter idiocy about the nature of logarithmic relationships.
Hi Chris; it takes a thief to catch a thief, or bloviator as the case may be.
Stuart; stick around and gain a real education in human charity and kindness; in the meantime, before bi--IJI cracks what ever cyclinders he has left, here are the log values and an interesting graph; now I'll go and do my penance;
http://img511.imageshack.us/img511/1994/logwarmingillustratedeo8.png
Well what is the point? You don't seem willing or are unable to answer any of my questions
You do realise how stupid you sound by posting comments like the last one don't you?
Ah well I guess I'm not going to get an intelligent debate out of you so it's time to move on
Is there a person alive who thinks of themselves as having tunnel vision on either side of a debate? What an odd thing to say. It seems to be roughly equivalent to "hello everybody, I think more clearly than you do."
Maybe we have different definitions of the word. Wouldn't linear mean that 20-40ppm would be the same as 320-340ppm?
BTW, the hostility comes from people here having heard it all before. It's kind of like whack-a-mole, but without the hope of a prize at the end. There is a non-stop stream of people like you who happen along, saying "a-ha! I've managed to figure out that thousands of people are wrong about their field of study!" When you combine the ennui with your initial "I am so well-thinked" and then the "isn't logarithmic linear which makes it not logarithmic?", you get snark.
In case we're wrong about the relationship being logarithmic, what would a True Logarithmic look like? Does it have to be log 10 or can it be log 2?
cohenite, your graph contains multiple errors. The relationship is not logarithmic all the way down to a concentration of 0 (since log of 0 is negative infinity). And climate sensitivity is the equilibrium response to a forcng, not the immediate response.
Thanks cohenite
And Lee I am not saying I am right and since you have weighed in would you like to explain why I am so misguided about the effect of CO2 concentrations above 380ppm on climate, all I want is a rational explanation that is based in science and doesn't involve personal attacks which are pointless.
Stuart
As I am mentioned here I hope I can post this:
Stuart H and Chris OâNeill are spot on about the logarithmic nature of increases in temperature with respect to increases in [CO2] at the Monckton thread, and bi-ij is off the planet. Chris said: âDoubling the input causes the same increase in output for any original input, i.e. increasing the input from 2 units to 4 units causes the same increase in output as increasing the input from 1 unit to 2 units. Increasing the input from 4 units to 8 units causes the same increase in output again etc.â As my Quadrant article made the same point (citing Arrhenius), let me spell it out in Excel. It should be clear that for global mean temperature to reach the annual mean of 28oC in Dubai, atmospheric CO2 would have to rise from 385 ppm now by 52,428,800 ppm. To reach Brisbaneâs present annual average it would still have to rise by 25,600 ppm, to 25,985 ppm. Plotting the logN of the increases CO2 in ppm produces a perfect linear line, which is exactly parallel to the linear plot of changes in temperature against changes in [CO2]. DIY in Excel.
Increase in [CO2] ppmLogs dCO2Temp oC
100.00 4.6051714.7
200.00 5.29831715.4
400.00 5.99146516.1
800.00 6.68461216.8
1,600.00 7.37775917.5
3,200.00 8.07090618.2
6,400.00 8.76405318.9
12,800.00 9.457219.6
25,600.00 10.1503520.3
51,200.00 10.8434921
102,400.00 11.5366421.7
204,800.00 12.2297922.4
409,600.00 12.9229423.1
819,200.00 13.6160823.8
1,638,400.00 14.3092324.5
3,276,800.00 15.0023825.2
6,553,600.00 15.6955325.9
13,107,200.00 16.3886726.6
26,214,400.00 17.0818227.3
52,428,800.00 17.7749728
104,857,600.00 18.4681128.7
209,715,200.00 19.1612629.4
419,430,400.00 19.8544130.1
838,860,800.00 20.5475630.8
oh ... good ... grief.
TC you must have been a dire daily challenge for your teachers in school - are any of them known to have survived?
Stuart H:
> all I want is a rational explanation that is based in science and doesn't involve personal attacks which are pointless.
Why don't you (horrors) actually start Doing Some Sums? Oh, I forgot that doing sums is beneath you, because you're a "scientist". Or is that "geologist".
And what pough said:
> When you combine the ennui with your initial "I am so well-thinked" and then the "isn't logarithmic linear which makes it not logarithmic?", you get snark.
* * *
Tim Curtin:
> Increase in [CO2] ppm Logs dCO2
It's Î(log CO2), not log Î(CO2). You fail.
To see why: suppose we have two variables X and Y such that Y varies logarithmically with X. Thus
> Y = m ln X + c
for constants m, c. If we have two pairs of values (x1, y1) and (x2, y2) following this relationship, then we have
> y1 = m ln x1 + cy2 = m ln x2 + c
Subtracting the two equations gives
> y2 - y1 = m (ln x2 - ln x2)
Clearly, the change in Y as it goes from y1 to y2 is
> Îy = y2 - y1.
And as shown above, this change depends not on
> ln Îx = ln (x2 - x1);
instead it depends on
> Î(ln x) = ln x2 - ln x1.
None of this requires graduate-level maths, Tim Curtin. Why did you have to make such a dumb error?
(Erratum: 4th equation should be
> y2 - y1 = m (ln x2 - ln x1)
)
The y axis 'o' is 288K; and there is only an immediate response because the only 'pipeline' is in Hawaii;
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut3vgl/from:1994/to:2010/scale:0…
Bi: first, you attack me, instead of Chris OâNeill, whose spec. I followed absolutely faithfully (at #117: "Doubling the input causes the same increase in output for any original input, i.e. increasing the input from 2 units to 4 units causes the same increase in output as increasing the input from 1 unit to 2 units. Increasing the input from 4 units to 8 units causes the same increase in output again etc."). He like the IPCC Stern & Garnaut proposed log Î(CO2), and that is what I did, namely 0.7 observed change in T for each doubling of the INCREMENT in [CO2], i.e. observed 0.7 oC for 100 new ppm since 1900 and the same for the next 200 and then 0.7 again for the next 400. Chris OâNeillâs is the standard formulation. Your equation is your own until you specify m. For that you pays your money and makes your choice. I opt for Chris. Negotiate with him and only then get back to me.
Me:
Stuart H:
If you don't believe me then get a calculator or a spreadsheet and find the difference between log 2 and log 1, between log 4 and log 2, and between log 8 and log 4. The differences are always the same.
Tim Curtin:
> first, you attack me, instead of Chris OâNeill, whose spec. I followed absolutely faithfully
No.
You still fail.
Stuart H. posts:
The radiative forcing from carbon dioxide on present-day Earth is estimated by Myrhe et al. (1998) as:
RF = 5.35 ln (C / Co)
where RF is in watts per square meter and carbon dioxide concentration C and reference concentration Co are in parts per million by volume. Clearly doubling CO2 results in a forcing of 3.7 W m^-2, and with a climate sensitivity of 0.75 K W^-2 m^-2, this would mean doubling CO2 raises the mean global annual surface temperature of the Earth by 2.8 K.
For the reasons this "saturation argument" is wrong see here:
http://www.geocities.com/bpl1960/Saturation.html
No one is predicting a "runaway greenhouse effect" on Earth. Global warming of a few degrees will be enough to massively disrupt our agriculture and economy.
Your information is wrong. Check here:
http://www.geocities.com/bpl1960/Ball.html
http://www.geocities.com/bpl1960/Reber.html
cohenite:
There is only one person here that someone from both sides agrees is a bloviator.
Bi: you said âTo see why: suppose we have two variables X and Y such that Y[eg temp?] varies logarithmically with X [eg CO2?] Thus
Y = m ln X + c
for constants m, c. If we have two pairs of values (x1, y1) and (x2, y2) following this relationship, then we have
y1 = m ln x1 + c
y2 = m ln x2 + c
Subtracting the two equations gives
y2 - y1 = m (ln x2 - ln x2)â (1)
Fine, but that does not gives logs for y2 - y1
âClearly, the change in Y as it goes from y1 to y2 is
Îy = y2 - y1.â
Amazing! Who would have thought?
âAnd as shown above, this change depends not on
ln Îx = ln (x2 - x1);
instead it depends on
Î(ln x) = ln x2 - ln x1.â Amazing, a pure tautology. Hallelujuh!
âClearly, the change in Y as it goes from y1 to y2 is
Îy = y2 - y1.â
More amazing. The same great truth repeated. Truly a new Einstein.
And as shown above, this change depends not on
ln Îx = ln (x2 - x1);
instead it depends on
Î(ln x) = ln x2 - ln x1.
Another tautology.
Tim Lambert, if anyone deserves permanent banning it is bi for habitual unpleasantness and terminal nonsense not to mention complete math incompetence. He has his own largely unvisited blog, leave him there.
Let's see. Tim Curtin says,
> He [O'Neill] like the IPCC Stern & Garnaut proposed log Î(CO2), and that is what I did,
and then when I show using mathematics that it's really Î(ln CO2) and that he's talking complete nonsense, he claims that, since I'm right, therefore I'm wrong.
The great Curtin is merely pointing out the correction he made to Myrhe et al.'s radiation forcing formula which by coincidence BPL posted above:
RF = 5.35 ln (C / Co)
As Curtin showed, the correct formula is actually:
RF = 5.35 ln ( 380 (C-280) / 28000)
or in terms of temperature:
ÎT = 0.7 ln (2 (C-280) / 100) / ln (2)
thus leading to Curtin's progression above. This is Curtin's second law of atmospheric physics, following on from his first law of atmospheric physics which is Curtin's law of conservation of atmospheric mass. This was yet another great discovery by the genius physicist Curtin.
Posted by: cohenite | March 15, 2009 5:27 AM
Interesting fact: In cohenite's universe, water boils immediately upon putting the kettle on the stove.
"Book 'im, Dano."
Stuart H, it's logarithmic. You're going to have to brush up on your high school mathematics before you successfully overturn the work of a very large number of hard working climate scientists ...
All of your arguments are just cut-and-paste denialist tripe, BTW. That's why you're being met with hostility. You can easily find out they're wrong by doing a little scientific reading on the web. Why should people here do that work for you? (though Barton has kindly done so, you should read his links, thank him, and apologize for having posted crap).
Chris O'Neill:
I am ashamed of you. You forgot his most important contribution to mathematics, namely Tim Curtin's proof that polynomial = exponential, which of course implies the now trivial P=NP. I would imagine that even as we type, the Clay institute is cutting the check for our soon to be millionaire Curtin.
What a lot of huffing and puffing. This is what Chris O'Neill said: "Doubling the input causes the same increase in output for any original input, i.e. increasing the input from 2 units to 4 units causes the same increase in output as increasing the input from 1 unit to 2 units. Increasing the input from 4 units to 8 units causes the same increase in output again etc." This is what I did: I first took the observed increase in the "input", 100 ppm of [CO2] from 1900 to 2000, and the resulting increase in "output", a rise of 0.7 oC in global mean temperature over that period (GISS). Then I added more input, first doubling, so extra 100 ppm to get same output, 0.7 oC, exactly per Chris. Next doubling takes us from extra 200 ppm to extra 400 ppm for another 0.7 oC, and the next to extra 800 ppm (for cumulative from pre-industrial add 280 ppm) for another 0.7 oC, and so on, all exactly in line with the O'Neill formula.
Given starting global temp in 1900 of 13.9 oC, say 14, with the extra 800 ppm we have reached total [CO2] of 1180 ppm for a global temp of 16.8 oC. The next doubling to 1600 gives us 17.5 oC., which is 3.5 above 1900, but which the IPCC claims will arise from just 280 extra ppm (i.e. doubling from 280 ppm. to 560 ppm.). O'Neill is always right, so I hope he will convey his model to the IPCC.
Chris added: "Thus there is no such thing as an input range for which "most" of the variation in output occurs'". Actually, if you fit an Excel log linear trend line you will see most of the variation does begin (the line is steepest) at the beginning of the input range. But then I suppose Excel must have it wrong, because O'Neill is without peer in being always right.
pough is correct on the snark; and, as inveterate blog watchers will know, the CO2 angle being raised by you here, Stuart H, has recently been doing the rounds elsewhere. So I guess the snark threshold is currently set low. Also, much of the information you require/request has been talked about ad nauseum in blogs for nigh on 10 years (since the FAR (IIRC), and certainly since the TAR) and is easily available on the net. Consequently, if, as you say, you
and have got to geology degree level or greater, it seems unlikely on the face of it that you can't have come across this material (And if you have, then why ask here in the form you ask? And if you haven't, then how, for example, did you manage to get a degree? ...). Hence the snark that quickly developed after your early incredulity on the concentrations and logs.
As to theoretical underpinnings of the _C_/_C_0 part, look here for _starters_.
Now
Î_T_s = _λ_Î_F_
and
Î_F_ = _α_ ln(_C_/_C_0) --- not the only formula; see Table 6.2 in the TAR (and the e.g. linked below)
where
Î_T_s (W mâ2) = change in equilibrium surface temperature
_λ_ (K Wâ1 mâ2) = climate sensitivity
_α_ = constant (by experiment/observation/model, e.g.)
_C_ (ppmv) = current [CO2]
_C_0 (ppmv) = initial [CO2]
Now do the logs and your incredulity should vanish.
And I dare say one of your supplementaries (from past experience) may well be answered by material such as this, this and this.
Tim Curtin, you are only allowed to post to the "Windschuttle hoaxed" thread. If you post in the wrong thread again I will ban you.
By the way: Tim Curtin: you still fail.
The problem is that this isn't a debate; its one extremely well funded side twisting, distorting and mangling science to promote a pre-determined worldview and political agenda, and the other side constantly having to defend a huge volume of empirical evidence.
I don't think you understand how poorly funded the "deinialist" side is.
The denialists are well-aware that science is not on their side, but they know they do not have to win the debate on these grounds.
If the "denialists" were well aware of any such thing, and were aware that curbing CO2 was the solution, what makes you think they would object to pulling out all stops to solve the problem?
I do not believe you are thinking this through if you can bring yourself to believe, much less publicly state such things. I urge you to reconsider the issue from the perspective that both sides genuinely believe in their positions and that both sides want a better world for future generations.
Likewise, I do not believe those who believe in CO2-feedback-based AGW are guilty of a "fraud" or perpetrating a "scam" or "power grab". I think that that may be wrong in part or in full on any number of issues, but I believe they are sincere in their beliefs and their motives are not base.
I assume the motives of both sides are based on how they perceive the science and are oriented toward the good of mankind.
And remember Anthony Watts and surfacestations.org? They finally compiled a huge sample of "good" stations and "bad" stations, and... guess what? No significant difference in the trend. Gee, I guess the scientists knew what they were doing after all. Quelle surprise.
Yes, very much a surprise as the paper being written on the subject has not been released yet. I think we need to wait until it has been.
And it goes far deeper than trend in a constant environment. The environment is not constant.
It involves change of trend due to urban/suburban/exurban creep (the sort that would not result in a step change) and undocumented station moves, which causes severe discontinuities that are not factored out.
There is also an adjustment issue. I do not see how adjusting modern temperatures +0.3 C for USHCN1 or +0.4 for USHCN2 can be justified. And it makes far more sense that the SHAP adjustment would be negative rather than positive. Yet it is positive, and this makes no sense to me.
Evan Jones:
> I assume the motives of both sides are based on how they perceive the science and are oriented toward the good of mankind.
Yeah, yeah. Also, lying for Jesus is good for you too.
this is obviously false. snow cover will remove most microsite effects. "error>=5°C" can not be an "expected" difference, it must be a maximum effect.
I can only go by the actual words in the paper.
As for Yilmaz, he reports the difference to be over 11C at ground level and over 7.5C at 2 m. (Surface stations are sited lower than 2 m.) Even snow can create a warming offset, esp if the station is buried in it (which came up in the recent Antarctica controversy). The measurements are in summer, but they are taken at high altitude.
I am not stating anything is obvious and I am not reading anything into Leroy except what he actually says. And he does not say "minimum", or "maximum". He says "estimated" and "expected". If he were not using "greater than" symbols, one might assume he meant "average". But I assume that if he meant "minimum" he would have used that word or words to that effect. he does not.
I don't think anything is obvious other than that more study needs to be done under surface station conditions, year round. I don't say LeRoy is right, I only say he says what he says. Maybe he is right, maybe wrong. So let's find out.
Yeah, yeah. Also, lying for Jesus is good for you too.
Being an atheist, I'm sure I wouldn't know.
You can find as many stations with problems that might lower the temperature as those that might raise it
Pfffft.
Not on denialist sites.
So go look at the pictures yourself, then. They are all online and open to public inspection. You could even rate them yourself, using NOAA's own COOP or CRN published standards.
If you think it is cherrypicking, then go look and come to your own conclusions.
Come on, Evans, why not embrace Holy Jesus's Young Earth Creationism just this once? Yes, it's full of lies, double standards, cries of persecution, bluffs, and sheer illogical garbage, it's all for the greater good! Please consider their viewpoint!
Barton Paul Levenson:
Thank you for your reasonable discourse. All too rare.
Hanson, Reudy (2001) is concerned with UHI, not microsite. There are problems with the "nightlight" proxy. It is too variable, depending on level of development.
We prefer the "U/50" method as this is an actual measurement of nearby population. But even this is problematic, because a denser suburban sprawl that features a lot of grassy or even forested areas is different from a small city.
Also Peterson (2003) is very early in the controversy. Peterson, Parker is more recent, and that has been vehemently disputed by more recent studies.
It is hard to know whom to believe. But "settled", it ain't.
NOAA/NCDC/USCHN2 does not even apply a UHI adjustment, but uses an homogeneity method and a step change "fixer-upper". My own impression is that this merely spreads the problem around and overlooks gradual, continuing changes in mesoenvironment (or microenvironment, for that matter). Meanwhile, the US temperatures are adjusted over 0.4C from raw data. (Heck, I'd even like to see a revisiting of the TOBS issue.)
Eli Rabbet: You can find as many stations with problems that might lower the temperature as those that might raise it
Not as far as I can see. By their very nature, there appear to be more opportunities for warming bias than cooling. But, as you are a prominent scientist, I invite you to look at the pictures and come to your own conclusions on that issue.
Bernard J.: I live in a rural region about a 15 minute drive from the CBD of our state capital. The daily city maxima that were reported each evening were so consistently 2-4°C below what neighbours were reporting for our area that I spent a few hundred on a weather station to get an accurate idea (+/- 0.1°C) of what our temperatures were.
First: If you would photograph the site and post it at surfacestations.org, we would greatly appreciate it. (Check to see if it has not already been surveyed.
Second: How are your and your neighbors' stations sited?
According to COOP standards, they must be at least 100' from your residence or any paved surface (like a driveway), or any heat source (such as an AC, BBQ, pump, or parked car), should not be obscured by vegetation, and should not have shading to the south.
They must have the proper housing installed, of course (or you will get a serious warm bias at Tmax). And, of course anything mounted on the wall or roof of a house is not going to yield anywhere near proper results.
Of course, we all know the warming biases ended in 1998.
BTW, before going to the trouble of photographing any site, please make sure it is a USHCN network site. These are listed in the gallery (check by state).
Anyone who wants can be part of this. We are especially interested in well sited stations, which is why I have been concentrating on rural surveys. (Not that a city site is necessarily poorly sited, but more of the better sites are rural.) So if you have a well sited USHCN station in your vicinity that has not been surveyed, we'd really, really like a survey done.
Of course, we all know the warming biases ended in 1998.
I said:
> Come on, Evan, why not embrace Holy Jesus's Young Earth Creationism just this once? Yes, it's full of lies, double standards, cries of persecution, bluffs, and sheer illogical garbage, it's all for the greater good! Please consider their viewpoint!
By his own standards, Evan Jones should follow my advice.
Evan Jones #166: "But temperatures have, on the whole, averaged rather flat."
Averaged rather flat? On the whole? What the heck is that supposed to mean?
No, don't tell me. It's a Law of Nature. Every time someone pops up here and starts bleating about some alleged "trend" in the past ten years what follows is bound to be drivel.
"..a heat sink may well exaggerate a heating trend.."
Someone shoot me.
Once upon a time Eli looked at a bunch of photos, and to tell you the truth, Playbunny was more fun, but there were lots of sites that were close enough to tree lines and bushed that they were obviously going to be in the shadows part of the day, and obviously were in some of the photos. This, of course, does not even take into account those near enough significant transpiring veg that they would be cooled.
Now the whole thing misses the point that what is being measured is an anomaly, not a trend, so what counts is not whether a site is warmer or colder than neighboring sites, but whether the site has changed over the years in a way that would bias the trend, not the absolute temperature. Evan Jones is another idiot who needs to understand the concept, but would rather expose himself.
Evan Jones sayeth:
Let's give credit where credit is due. I find Evan Jones' honesty refreshing, he admits he's a denialist, not a skeptic.
Evan Jones:
A quick question - among the many I have, but that will come in a later post. You mentioned "Parker is more recent, and that has been vehemently disputed by more recent studies."
Are you referring to the Parker 2004 and 2006 papers? And which aspects of it are in dispute?
So, yes, once you discount the direct offset (sic) of nearby exurbanization (etc.), the heat sink effect on trend (sic) may well have been a push since 1998, or even had a mild cooling effect.
you don t start an analysis with an outlier. you simply, absolutely and always do NOT do that.
i read about a thousand denialist posts, looking at the last decade, when that decade included 1998.
i have read about ZERO denialist posts, looking at the "trend" over the last decade, simply because it is UPWARDS.
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/wti/from:1999/plot/wti/from:1999/trend
cherrypicking is the main tool of denialist analysis.
I can only go by the actual words in the paper.
this is a serious problem. because you are using the stations for a different purpose.
assume that i am selling wood screws. i have a specification list of classes for their performance. now you use them for metal, but insist in using my specification, without fully understanding it. this is road to disaster!
I don't think you understand how poorly funded the "deinialist" side is.
the denialist side is well funded. they don t have to bother with expensive real research. publishing nonsense on websites isn t expensive.
And some of that "funding" comes in the form of donated services, such as Fox News giving people like Steven Milloy a bully pulpit with no equivalent being given to the reality-driven science side of the spectrum. Milloy and others appearing as "News Commentators" not only gives the denialist side cheap access to millions of homes, it also gives them faux credibility because, well, Fox would never lie, right? :)
sod:
> the denialist side is well funded. they don t have to bother with expensive real research. publishing nonsense on websites isn't expensive.
dhogaza:
> And some of that "funding" comes in the form of donated services,
Also, Marc Morano uses the taxpayer-funded server epw.senate.gov to spread his bollocks. (although he's reportedly on his way out -- thank goodness.)
Yeah, Morano's sort of a double whammy, using tax payer support to spread his lies, while his boss is kept in office by virtue of oil money.
sod: Whether or not it is an outlier remains to be seen. Bear in mind that several multidecadal oscillations went from cold to warm phase between 1976 and 2001. Now they are beginning to revert to cool phase. Also, solar cycle 24 is starting out very quiet. So we will have to observe.
Also, three of four metrics indicate mild cooling. GISS may possibly be the outlier here. One reason that it is reasonable to make the observation from 1998, despite the fact it was an El Nino is that it was followed immediately by a La Nina of lesser strength, but longer duration. So it seems reasonable to me that both phases must be "included IN" or both must be "included OUT". So one must draw the line from either 1998 or from 2001 to get a non-jiggered trend.
Also, the heat sink effect may have exaggerated the warming prior to 1999, but it may also be exaggerating the current cooling trend as well.
The reason I don't think the issue is settled is that climate in immensely complex. For example, as recently as 1998, ten years after the alarm was sounded, scientists were not even aware of multidecadal oscillations that affect El Nino/La Nina frequency.
Bear in mind, I do think there has been warming and I do think CO2 has a direct effect (quite apart from any feedback effects). But I do not think the case has been made that there is an imminent emergency that requires precipitous action.
they don t have to bother with expensive real research.
I think that is an unfair characterization. I have based my arguments exclusively on peer-reviewed papers and direct observations. I can't say how expensive this was, but I am not relying on secondary media sources.
A quick question - among the many I have, but that will come in a later post. You mentioned "Parker is more recent, and that has been vehemently disputed by more recent studies." Are you referring to the Parker 2004 and 2006 papers? And which aspects of it are in dispute?
Yes. What's in dispute (in brief) is whether UHI is "gone with the wind" as Peterson asserts.
Pielke, Matsui (2005) and Pielke, et al (2007) dispute this, as does the LaDochy (December [sic!] 2007 paper on urbanization effect on California climate measurement from 1979 to 2001.
Note that I am not saying who will ultimately be proven correct (of if it's a split), merely that there is dispute on the issue.
As it now stands, USHCN1 makes a mere -0.05C trend adjustment over the 20th century, while USHCN2 makes none at all.
Not with statistical significance. Which you know. Which is exactly the kind of crap that makes you a denialist, not a skeptic.
Yeah, and there's an active flat earth society, too. Big deal. I pay no attention to what they say, and I pay no attention to what denialists like Pielke say.
Evan Jones:
What's in dispute (in brief) is whether UHI is "gone with the wind" as Peterson asserts.
This is not in dispute given the vast empirical evidence from canopy-layer UHI studies. UHI intensities do decrease with increasing wind-speeds (e.g. see Souch and Grimmond 2006 Progress in Physical Geography for a review on p. 271). Peterson and Parker are both correct in this assertion.
OTOH, I've read Pielke's papers and I have very grave misgivings about his analysis. His group does not appear to account for the influence of the urban canopy layer (re: Oke 1987, Boundary Layer Climates). The point is that the assumptions of Monin-Obukhov ST simply do not apply within the canopy layer, so his application of that to model heat content in the boundary layer is, well, moot.
The '05 paper's key conclusion IMO is that "...trends in temperature should be expected to be different at every height near the surface when the winds are light, as well as different between light wind and stronger wind nights." I think P & M do not consider the correct scale; the surface layer as they define it is too large scale-wise when examining the near surface UHI, and one has to consider the influence of the urban canopy on lapse rates.
I also find it most peculiar that Pielke and Matsui did not reference a seminal study in urban climatology by Nakamura and Oke (1988, Atmospheric Environment) where they obtained temperature and wind data within an urban canyon that showed that in calm conditions, air temps from surface to roof height varied less than 1K for areas >0.5 m from wall and road surfaces - i.e the lapse rate is almost neutral, in contrast to what P&M assert.
Note that I am not saying who will ultimately be proven correct (of if it's a split), merely that there is dispute on the issue.
Yes there is dispute, but I would not think that what RPSr. says makes much sense at all, given the empirical evidence on UHIs decreasing with increasing wind-speeds and his lack of understanding of urban climates. C'mon - only a single throwaway reference to Tim Oke's work in his 3 UHI-related papers?! That's very, very bad form.
This is why Watts is a dishonest twit.
When JohnV's preliminary analysis showed that siting made no difference, and apparently was adequately corrected in the surface analyses, Watts declared that there would be no more analyses until an adequate number of stations were covered. He later set that barrier at 75% - which has now been reached. And during the lengthy interval, he did not do any such analysis.
However, he continued to make claims. He made post after post after post after post about 'badly sited' stations. His readers have proclaimed widely that Watts work has discredited the surface analyses. Such claims have been made in the comments on Watts own blog, where they must first be approved by Watts. He sometimes disavows those claims - but then he feeds them byposing another bad site post, and approving another batch of garbage comments on his blog.
What he is doing is taking raw 'data,' and presenting it in a way to encourage certain conclusions, and allowing people to post on his blog that conclusions have been reached - WITHOUT ALLOWING ANALYSES TO SEE IF THOSE IMPLIED CONCLUSIONS ARE VALID.
This is fundamentally unscientific and dishonest.
It's worse, even, than trying to hide the fact that he has failed his promises to revisit issues he was called on, by banning the person (me) who several months later asked politely when he was going to do so, and then going back and removing every post I had ever made, all of which he had previously approved.
He is simply not to be trusted.
Lee: The siting is improper because both of NOAA's stiting specs say it's improper. QED. What effect this has is being examined.
And what is this "not allow" thing? You want to do an analysis? Go to the gallery. Knock yourself out. Who's gonna stop you?
The pictures are there and so are the survey reports. In the case of virtual surveys with only the measurement view, those are a WIP and have the pertinent information for analysis printed on the maps in any event. There are a few with insufficient info (not counted in the 75% total).
It's only unscientific if you make claims based on data and methods that you won't release until subpoenaed by congress, or threatened with an FoA lawsuit, hem-hem. (But maybe we'd better not go there.)
At any rate, the data is there. Watts makes no claim about trend (the effect on offset is well established).
I do understand that you are mad at him. My guess is that perhaps you made him a little mad, too, as he accorded you a singular honor, so far as I know. Perhaps "politeness" is in the eye of the beholder? #B^1
Former Skeptic: You make a good, rational, non-pejorative argument.
As I said, I don't know who is right about UHI. I have looked at attacks on and defenses of both POVs and my mind isn't yet made up. I would not argue that wind has no effect on UHI.
But the LaDochy paper shows both offset and trend to be significantly greater in cities. And that is an empirical study that disputes Peterson's conclusions.
If you ask me, the effect on trend is probably more than 0.05C/century (The NOAA/USHCN-1 20th century adjustment), but that is only my guess.
I also read something about a Chinese station being relocated from upwind to downwind of a city (both rural settings)and showing significantly warmer results. But since there was no mention of microsite conditions I did not pay much attention to it at the time (and did not snag the link). I may come back to it later.
But what is equally important as simple effect is to what extent cities have grown around station sites, where station have been moved, and the effect this has on the trend and the ability to measure trend.
But bear in mind that all I said was that there was an ongoing dispute.
It's all so new, former skeptic. Climatology is immensely complex and until the global warming issue happened by, it was considered a "non-sexy" science with relatively low enrollment. I don't think you could even get a degree in climatology, as such, two decades ago. But now, it's a hot topic and enrollment has skyrocketed (I've read that it's 10X what it was a decade ago). So has study of the issue by both CO2-AGW advocates and skeptics, alike.
That means there is a lot of stuff, all contradictory, coming pouring out. But it's such a complex system with so many uncertainties and plain old unknowns, I don't think we have an answer yet. But it sure makes folks on both sides get very irrational, very quickly.
Aside from the data issues, what I think it comes down to more than anything, really, is whether the IPCC conclusions about CO2 positive feedback loops are correct. And there appear to be negative feedbacks not properly included in the IPCC AR4 calculations.
But that is all very speculative.
Station surveys I understand. If you include virtual surveys (which include a definitive satellite or birdseye spotting or curator interview for placement on satellite maps, or both), I may have made more of them than anyone else in the world, now that I think of it. 200, at last count.
Evan Jones:
Of course, for things like cloud feedback, the uncertainty is quite high and it could actually be negative. Because it is uncertain, the wise thing to do is to just assume that it is as negative as it could possibly be, much like the people at the casino who assume the numbers are always going to come up in their favor. That strategy works well for them and it will work well for us too.
Averaged rather flat? On the whole? What the heck is that supposed to mean?
That means that if you take the four major metrics (UAH, RSS, HadCRUT, GISS) and average their trends from 1998 - 2008, the linear trend is about as flat as it gets.
"..a heat sink may well exaggerate a heating trend.."
Someone shoot me.
Hmmm. I think I shall torture you, instead.
A heat sink absorbs and reflects heat during the day, then at night it releases it. This shows up at both Tmax and Tmin. If you want to heat a greehnhouse and you want to be carbon-neutral about it, all you gotta do is place a (very big) rock in it, exposed to the sun. This spikes Tmax very nicely, and knocks the edge right off of Tmin.
In the Yilmaz experiment, we clearly see a steeper daily warming trend over concrete than over grass. Then, as it cools into nightfall, the downward trend is steeper.
Therefore, a warming trend is exaggerated by a heat sink, and a cooling trend is also exaggerated by a heat sink.
Of course, for things like cloud feedback, the uncertainty is quite high and it could actually be negative. Because it is uncertain, the wise thing to do is to just assume that it is as negative as it could possibly be, much like the people at the casino who assume the numbers are always going to come up in their favor. That strategy works well for them and it will work well for us too.
Cloud cover does seem to be the big question. The IPCC says we will see increasing humidity in the middle/upper troposphere and lower stratosphere, with increased high-level cloud cover.
But the AquaSat indicates that we instead have a significant increase in low-level clouds (which increases albedo)and a dessication of the middle/upper trop and lower strat, and no increase whatever of heat-trapping high-level clouds. This may have had a homeostasis effect over the last decade.
Pascal's Wager works fine for seatbelts. Buckle up even though you don't believe you are going to crash.
But I don't think it applies here. Pascal's Wager supposes that the cost of prevention is nothing, or near nothing. it also presupposes that what is being done will actually work if the danger is real. AGW-CO2 policy would seem to fall short of both these requirements.
Besides, why single out CO2? Why not also assume the worst for, say, particulates, population growth, plus every other environmental or demograpic factor? Why not call the cops and hospital every time you went out just in case you got robbed or hit by a car? Or contacted some dread disease? Or whatever? Should we triple the defense budget because we must "assume the worst" about being invaded? (Better be "safe" and quintuple it--we may have to fight a 7-ocean war.) Because if we did all that, we would be swamped with insurmountable "problems" requiring more wealth to "solve" than there is wealth on earth.
To say nothing of unintended consequences. (Ethanol springs to mind.)
But this is getting away from nice clean data integrity issues and into all those yucky policy issues . . .
So Pascal won't do. What we need is a cost-benefit analysis with a continual inflow of data and information as it becomes available.
"But I do not think the case has been made that there is an imminent emergency that requires precipitous action".
In other words, Evan, you are saying that humanity should continue experimenting with the atmosphere, as well as with terrestrial, freshwater and marine ecosystems whose functioning we barely understand. Procrastinate. Procrastinate. Wait until 'all the data are in'. Yup, that sure is sound strategy for managing the global commons. Forgetting, of course, that these systems permit human to exist and persist by generating a range of vital services.
I am afraid that your caution will just see us push ourselves further and further down the self-created bottleneck we are already in. In case you hadn't noticed, every natural system across the biosphere is in decline; some rapidly, some more slowly. Climate change will probably be the final nail in the coffin. Estimates are that we have lost 30-40% of critical ecosystem services since about 1970.
Speaking as a senior scientist, your arguments are totally and utterly illogical with respect to policy. Science does not operate by consensus and never will. If you have the academic qualifications your purport to have, then you should understand this. There never will be 100% consensus on any environmental issue, not matter how much data are in. There will always be outliers. But public policy must be based on consensus. Otherwise nothing will ever change. There is certainly a strong enough consensus amongst the scientific community, and. most importantly, those doing the actual research on climate, to start making changes in ongoing policies. Yes there are some uncertainties, but if we continue to procrastinate as you are suggesting, then by the time the data are all in then it will be way, way, too late to do anything. Humanity already faces massive challenges just to ensure that our species will survive for the next 200 years, given the declining health of the biosphere. I think it is wholly irresponsible for those to argue that we must 'stay the course'. That course is a cliff. The quotes Tim Lambert mined from the lectures presented at the Heartland denialist pseudoscience bash are a disgrace and should disqualify these people from being taken seriously. But, given the fact that our political systems are largely beholden to commercial elites who think only about the next fiscal quarter (or perhaps 2 years ahead at the very most), these people will always be given veritable megaphones to spread their contrarian nonsense. It is up to the scientific community to counter them.
Assume away, Evan. It works well for the people at the casino. There is very little likelihood that cloud feedback is negative overall and the probability decreases rapidly the more negative you assume it to be. You're not getting the point. The carbon emission choice is the high uncertainty, high risk choice with an average expectation that is quite undesirable.
What? You have obviously been misled but the expectation is that the earth is going to warm damagingly with continuing carbon emissions. i.e. we believe we are going to crash. Pascal's wager is not particularly accurate in these circumstances because the risk is substantial.
This is the bizarre idea that not generating carbon emissions might actually cause the same warming as generating carbon emissions. I never cease to be amazed by the bizarre ideas that some people come up with.
No-one is singling out CO2. Please spare us the strawmen.
This has been done.
Obviously you forgot to mention a continual output of action.
Can we all just conclude that Evan Jones. like Anthony Watts, is an uneducated idiot and just ignore him?
He's not interested in learning, there's really no point. He's making the same argument he made in the past on other blogs. Anyone who more or less worships Watts as being some sort of climate science guru as Evan does isn't really worth your time.
Evan,
I'm not mad at Anthony. Amused and somewhat disgusted that anyone takes him seriously. The honor Anthony accorded me is far from singular. I am far from the only person banned from WattSoup.
You might try to ask him when he plans to either retract or follow up on the following, as he said he would do. That's what I did, asked when he was planning to do this, and it got me scrubbed from his site, all past posts included.
-----------------
"UPDATE: We have had about half a dozen people replicate from HadCRUT data the signal shown in figure 4 using FFT and traditional filters, and we thank everyone for doing that. We are currently working on a new approach to the correlations shown in figure 5, which can yield different results using alternate statistical methods. A central issue is how to correctly identify the peak of the solar cycle, and we are looking at that more closely. As it stands now, while the Hodrick-Prescott filtering works well and those results in figures 2,3, and 4 have been replicated by others, but the correlation shown in figure 5 is in question when a Rayleigh method is applied, and thus figure 5 is likely incorrect since it does not hold up under that and other statistical tests. There is also an error in the data point for cycle 11. I thank Tamino for pointing these issues out to us.
We are continuing to look at different methods of demonstrating a correlation. Please watch for future posts on the subject."
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2008/03/30/evidence-of-a-significant-solar-i…
-----
and this:
"UPDATE1: Iâve decided to make this a 3 part series, as additional interest has been generated by commenters in looking at the data in more ways. Stay tuned for parts 2 and 3 and weâll examine this is more detail.
UPDATE2: I had mentioned that Iâd be looking at this in more detail in parts 2, and 3. However it appears many have missed seeing that portion of the original post and are saying that Iâve done an incomplete job of presenting all the information. I would agree for part1, but that is what parts 2 and 3 were to be about.
Since Iâm currently unable to spend more time to put parts 2 and 3 together due to travel and other obligations, Iâm putting the post back on the shelf (archived) to revisit again later when I can do more work on it, including show plots for adjusted base periods.
The post will be restored then along with the next part so that people have the benefit of seeing plots and histograms done on both ways. In part 3 Iâll summarize 1 and 2.
In the meantime, poster Basil has done some work on this of interest which you can see here.
UPDATE3: Part 2 is now online, please see it here."
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2008/02/28/a-look-at-4-globaltemperature-ano…
BTW, part 2 has been taken down.
Evan Jones:
Take it from someone who has done published UHI research â Pielke et al are categorically wrong about canopy-layer UHI and wind-speeds. Several of us have the opinion that if RPSr. attempted to publish his 2005 paper in a specialized journal e.g Boundary-Layer Meteorology, he would have been soundly rejected.
As I said, I don't know who is right about UHI. I have looked at attacks on and defenses of both POVs and my mind isn't yet made up. I would not argue that wind has no effect on UHI.
Then why argue from ignorance? If you really do want to learn and find the answer on wind and UHI, read Okeâs 1987 textbook and his chapter on urban environments, or the Souch and Grimmond (2006) article above, or the Mills (2009) article in Progress in Physical Geography as well. And look, you canât say âitâs all speculativeâ and then throw in an opinion without attempting to understand the theory and published research beforehand, yeah?
But the LaDochy paper shows both offset and trend to be significantly greater in cities. And that is an empirical study that disputes Peterson's conclusions.
I know Steveâs work pretty well, as a matter of fact. We bump into each other in conferences on a regular basis. Which LaDochy paper are you referring to? The 2007 Climate Research one? Thereâs nothing in there that says anything about UHI and wind-speed...unless you are now shifting to talk about Peterson's (2003) paper? Similarly, I don't think Steve's paper explicitly "disputes" the previous conclusion; rather, they measure different things altogether (i.e. unadjusted vs. adjusted temperature time-series for one thing), yes?
I also read something about a Chinese station being relocated from upwind to downwind of a city (both rural settings)and showing significantly warmer results. But since there was no mention of microsite conditions I did not pay much attention to it at the time (and did not snag the link). I may come back to it later.
Please let me know the reference, if you donât mind â Iâm pretty keen to see what the paper actually mentions.
But what is equally important as simple effect is to what extent cities have grown around station sites, where station have been moved, and the effect this has on the trend and the ability to measure trend.
True, but as per the IPCC AR4, it appears that Parkerâs 2006 paper is the final word on urban siting & trends for now, unless someone else has a radically better suggestion that makes sense.
Station surveys I understand. If you include virtual surveys (which include a definitive satellite or birdseye spotting or curator interview for placement on satellite maps, or both), I may have made more of them than anyone else in the world, now that I think of it. 200, at last count.
Thatâs pretty impressive actually. There is a need for these metadata that would help urban climate research. But how that data are used and interpreted is another thing altogether, no?
Another quick question â have you (or anyone at surfacestations.org) attempted estimating the source area of temperature sensors (either the old-fashioned ones in CRSs or the newer instruments) located in urban areas that are either sheltered or un-sheltered?
Evan:
There is no recent cooling trend:
http://www.geocities.com/bpl1960/Ball.html
http://www.geocities.com/bpl1960/Reber.html
Evan Jones writes:
Please read this carefully: "Climate is defined as mean regional or global weather over a period of 30 years or more." (World Meteorological Organization)
And then read my pages:
http://www.geocities.com/bpl1960/Ball.html
http://www.geocities.com/bpl1960/Reber.html
Bart, the denialist Gold Standard is now 11 years, rather than 10. They believe the world was created 11 years ago - in 1998.
PBL: Sorry, but ten years is all we have since 1998.
I think it makes more sense to look at oscillations from low point to high point, and vice versa.
Therfore I have no problem with examining the warming phase from 1979 - 1998 in isolation, even though it is less than 30 years. I think that it makes more sense to do so, regardless of the "30-years-equals-a-trend" rule.
After all, Dr. Hansen had no problem with judging the future based on a trend from 1979 to 1988, and, for that matter, neither do I.
If you want to look at the last 30 year, we see a rise for the first 20 years, and a flat-to-slight-decline thereafter. This coincides with a half-dozen multidecadal trends going from cold to warm over the first 20, remaining in warm phase for 10 years, and now, as the PDO switches to cool phase (with other cycles possibly to follow). I am also perfectly willing to consider that CO2 has an underlying effect, the magnitude being uncertain owing to of uncertainties regarding positive vs. negative feedback).
We have wheels within wheels, here. Not all the wheels are well understood (or even discovered, as of yet). Consider that when Dr. Hansen sounded the alarm, the multidecadal ceanic-atmospheric cycles not only had not been discovered, but would not be discovered for a decade after that.
BTW, for clarification, I consider myself a "lukewarmer". I believe there has been warming (though part of it may be an artifact of poor siting and poor adjustment). I do "deny", or at least consider it very unlikely, that there is an imminent emergency requiring the expenditure of over a third of world economic growth on an ongoing basis.
Evan Jones, people like you who insist on starting with 1998 are cherry pickers. That is completely junk science so you are a denier not a skeptic and not a "lukewarmer" but a dyed in the wool denier.
Go and learn some statistics and basic data handling.
Former Skeptic: I have to take it from both sides. My conclusion is that more study is required, to wit:
I am sure you have seen geographic graphs running over urban areas that show temperatures lower as they approach a UHI bubble, rise 'way up as they go over it, then decline once they are past it. What i think is that this has to be done on a year-round basis on a city (or cities) that are windy vs. cities that are not, and on a year-round basis and taking prevailing wind direction into account.
Please let me know the reference, if you donât mind â Iâm pretty keen to see what the paper actually mentions.
Unfortunately I don't have it. As best as I can recall, it came out of the flap that occurred around a year ago when the Chinese network was declared a-okay, but then it turned out it wasn't. (You may recall the incident.)
But how that data are used and interpreted is another thing altogether, no?
Gosh, yes.
I also think the NOAA and Hadley adjustment methods should be made available for independent review so that the results can be examined and replicated. At least the USHCN-1 methods were broken down into their components. The USHCN-2 page has a lot of verbiage, but no breakdown, and the adjustment is a third higher than USHCN-1.
If I am not mistaken, USHCN-1 claims a 0.6C increase and USHCN-2 claims a 0.72C warming trend over the 20th century. That is a significant difference and I would like to now how that comes about.
Another quick question â have you (or anyone at surfacestations.org) attempted estimating the source area of temperature sensors (either the old-fashioned ones in CRSs or the newer instruments) located in urban areas that are either sheltered or un-sheltered?
We do have the "lights = " and the "U/50" versions from NOAA and GISS. We also have the dates when the stations were converted from CRS to MMTS. (That's on a table somewhere on surfacestations.org, but I'm not sure where, as I work directly off a spreadsheet copy.)
Often, even usually, a CRS/MMTS involves a local station move, and based on my interviews with curators vs. MMS records, these moves are often not documented. This, of course, makes analysis somewhat difficult. Sometimes the conversion occurs when the curators are changed ("ingested" and "reactivated" in their quaint idiom).
But often, as at Stroudsburg, NOAA makes the conversion without a change of curators: No mention whatever is made of the localized site change either in the "updates" or the "Location" section of the NCDC/MMS database.
2008-1998 is eleven years.
This is the very *definition* of cherry-picking.
Evan Jones, people like you who insist on starting with 1998 are cherry pickers. That is completely junk science so you are a denier not a skeptic and not a "lukewarmer" but a dyed in the wool denier.
I do not insist. I merely suggest that trends, regardless of length, be judged from low point to high, and from high point to low. As for labels, I am not afraid of words. I am the sum total of my arguments, whatever that is. Pick your terminology.
Go and learn some statistics and basic data handling.
. . . said Wegman to Mann . . .
(Not so well received by the latter.)
Which LaDochy paper are you referring to? The 2007 Climate Research one? Thereâs nothing in there that says anything about UHI and wind-speed
The December one. Recent California climate variability: spatial and temporal patterns in temperature trends (not the one sod cited). It doesn't measure cause, but effect. He notes that urban areas have a significantly steeper trend (at Tmax and esp. at Tmin) when comparing urban vs. rural stations.
He does not appear to consider wind, per se, or microsite effects either, for that matter. He just looks at the data itself as compared with varying mesosite.
Professionals quibbling over obscure technicalities which, as it turns out, have zero impact on the result of the statistical analysis are in no way comparable to what you're doing, which is to suggest we toss everything ever learned by anyone about statistical analysis in the toilet.
And to then replace all statistical analysis with cherry-picking.
You're even stupider than I thought.
This is the very definition of cherry-picking.
Only if you pick one cherry. Not if you consider all, including 1979 - 1998.
It makes little sense to study a given trend in any other fashion other then, well, the beginning and end point of the trend.
In other words, you're a zero.
dhogaza: Coming from you, that is a mild compliment.
Wrong, wrong, wrong.
You're right, f***wad is more accurate.
which is to suggest we toss everything ever learned by anyone about statistical analysis in the toilet.
Such as the "getting rid of" the MWP? #B^1
You're right, f*wad is more accurate.
See Anon., et al, (trad.) Rubber and Glue)
In other words, you're a zero.
. . . he says as he goes negative.
Evan opines:
"This is the very definition of cherry-picking.
Only if you pick one cherry. Not if you consider all, including 1979 - 1998.
It makes little sense to study a given trend in any other fashion other then, well, the beginning and end point of the trend."
Evan, conduct this little thought experiment. Go back through the surface temperature data for the last 150 years, start at the beginning,a nd step through it in order one year at a time. Fro each year, imagining yo are actually in that year and don't have any subsequent data - How many of those years will be 'declining trends' based on your "its ok to cherry pick' methodology.
for the simplest "method" - that of simply comparing the current year to the previous high year, the answer will be "almost all of the years are in declining trends" The only yeas in which you would admit an increasing trend are the years in which there is actually a new record set.
Even if you do the somewhat more acceptable strategy o9f using trend lines, yo will still get a strong majority of 'declining trend" years, simply because you will always be cherry picking a high year to start from.
And this despite the fact that the data overall shows substantial increase over that time period.
THIS is what is wrong with your refusal to follow even basic statistical rules about data analysis.
--
BTW, Evan - have you asked Watts yet when he's going to get around to following up on his "GISS is skewed" and "covariance of ordered sets" posts? Given that he promised those followups a full year ago now?
The sick thing is that this Watts seems to think Evan is a valuable contributor. But we know Watts is as ignorant of statistics as Evan so I guess it's a marriage made in heaven, eh?
Evan: "He notes that urban areas have a significantly steeper trend (at Tmax and esp. at Tmin) when comparing urban vs. rural stations."
Evan, why one earth do you think that the surface trend analyses - GISS and HADCRUT - correct urban trends to those of neighboring non-urban stations?
They are there specifically because the study authors recognize a potential contaminant from urban effects, and try to correct for it.
This is why JohnV's analysis mattered. It showed the the corrections work, at least based on preliminary analysis.
Watts has JohnV's code. He could have - trivially easy - automated a process that would have given real-time updates in the analysis as more stations were added. He refused to do so. Watts has met his (preciously arbitrary) 75% threshold now. He could, trivially easily, repeat the JohnV analysis with all the extant stations. I suspect it would take about an hour, given that he already has all the station data in hand.
Instead, he has specifically asked people to leave it alone "until he publishes."
Evan, Watts could have his analysis up this evening, available for comment, starting work on it right now, if he really meant to do so.
But he has a history of hiding from issues and breaking promises to consider his analyses, when it doesn't favor him to do so. Until I see otherwise, I'll continue to believe that is what he is doing now that his convenient (didn't reach it until after the last denialist confab) 75% rule has been met.
The honor Anthony accorded me is far from singular. I am far from the only person banned from WattSoup.
Very few have (and are subject to redemption). However, I believe you are the only case of retroactive deletion.
Instead, he has specifically asked people to leave it alone "until he publishes."
But as the data is publicly archived, you are under no actual compulsion to comply.
Even if you do the somewhat more acceptable strategy o9f using trend lines, yo will still get a strong majority of 'declining trend" years, simply because you will always be cherry picking a high year to start from.
And the reverse applies if looking at it from 1979 - 1998. To which I have no objection, whatsoever. Looking at each trend separately is valid. I would go so far as to say conflating them (without also eyeballing them separately) is less valid.
The only yeas in which you would admit an increasing trend are the years in which there is actually a new record set.
No, I merely think that examining trends from beginning to end is the best way to interpret a trend. If you look at them all--and the overall--I don't think that can be characterized as cherrypicking.
Evan, why one earth do you think that the surface trend analyses - GISS and HADCRUT - correct urban trends to those of neighboring non-urban stations? They are there specifically because the study authors recognize a potential contaminant from urban effects, and try to correct for it.
They do, but the correction is very trivial. If you look at the specifics, almost as many cities have an "urban cooling" adjustment as a "global warming" adjustment.
What we would like is the full set of adjustment procedures to be made publicly available so they can be replicated.
Until I see otherwise, I'll continue to believe that is what he is doing now that his convenient (didn't reach it until after the last denialist confab) 75% rule has been met.
Before.
A nit-pick, true, but since my own work pushed him over the top before the conference I will, with some satisfaction, point that out.
gaaaahhhh!!!!!!
I freaking know better.
"Looking at each trend separately is valid. I would go so far as to say conflating them (without also eyeballing them separately) is less valid."
"No, I merely think that examining trends from beginning to end is the best way to interpret a trend. If you look at them all"
Even, look at them all WHAT?!?!?!?!?!?! What are your criteria for identifying the 'beginning' and 'end' of a 'trend?' "Eyeballing" them? What statistical analysis do you use to test whether that is actually a unique inflection point in the data, a change from what was before to what was after? What do you have other than pulling periods out of your posterior?
And do you realize that your comments display an appalling ignorance of basic statistical concepts?
---
"What we would like is the full set of adjustment procedures to be made publicly available so they can be replicated."
Oh, good god. Dude, the papers are out there, the code is available for download.
In fact, JohnV's Open Temps code is a rewrite that replicates the functionality but in a more readable, better structured way.
That's what JohnV does - replicates the GISS adjustments to raw data.
Handy reference to JohnV's description of what he was up to.
Note, Evan, where he states "then NASA released the code ...", which is what triggered his rewrite.
Evan Jones (#186) : "..a heat sink may well exaggerate a heating trend.."
Point is, not enough to make a significant jot of difference to the big picture, not even in the 1.6% of the Earth's surface covered by continental USA.
By the way, I admire you use of the term "trend" to decribe the change in temperature beween day and night. Excellent stuff. And here was I thinking 11 years was a tad short. 12 hours. Way to go Evan.
Now please stop torturing me and go back to torturing the temperature data.
If you bothered to address the Yilmaz study you might get somewhere.
Furthermore, I have said (repeatedly) that more study needs to be done under surface station conditions. This seems to have raised a lot of objections. One wonders why.
"then NASA released the code ..."
That was FILNET, only. And it was a non-working FORTRAN dump with no operating manuals. Mac & Co. finally got it running, but they can't reproduce NASA's results. We are still waiting for the ability to reproduce NASA's full adjustment.
What are your criteria for identifying the 'beginning' and 'end' of a 'trend?'
Well, the 20th century trends are pretty obvious, either for the US or the ROW. You should have very little trouble seeing them.
And do you realize that your comments display an appalling ignorance of basic statistical concepts?
Suggesting that to understand a trend, one should judge it from beginning to end does all that? Okay.
Can we all just conclude that Evan Jones. like Anthony Watts, is an uneducated idiot and just ignore him?
Hmm. If only everyone who thinks I am an uneducated idiot would ignore me. If only . . .
What can I say other than that I heartily endorse this suggestion?
(Well, I can dream, can't I?)
Can we all just conclude that Evan Jones. like Anthony Watts, is an uneducated idiot and just ignore him?
Hmm. If only everyone who thinks I am an uneducated idiot would ignore me. If only . . .
What can I say other than that I heartily endorse this suggestion?
(Well, I can dream, can't I?)
BTW, if you want to "recreate" GISS data, starting with NOAA raw data won't do.
In case you weren't aware, GISS starts with NOAA data, applies a "deadjustment" algorithm (which does not yield the same result as NOAA raw data), and then goes on from there.
Bullshit. It was their FORTRAN code which denialists bitched about because "we can't figure out how to compile it".
That's totally different than saying "it's non-working FORTRAN code". Obviously, the code works at GISS.
You're such a fucking liar.
Note that nothing you have done has had any impact on actual science. The real kind, the peer-reviewed, published kind.
You get attention in the blogosphere because people hope to educate your double-digit IQ mind.
Not because anyone thinks that anything you're doing is interesting from a scientific POV.
Stupid, because in science "trend" means something of statistical significance. Obviously, a priori choosing of start and end points is arbitrary, which is the definition of cherry picking, and totally in opposition to everything statistics tells us about analyzing of data.
Of course, if Evan Jones is right, not only will climate science be overturned, but *all* of science will be overturned.
My MacBook pro will be turned to dust, because the mighty Evan has proven that everything that modern science depends on has been overturned ...
Fat chance of that, dude.
No worries, serious science ignores Watts, and even more so, ignores you.
Your fame is limited to a very small slice of the blogosphere.
I actually see no evidence that anyone outside Watts thinks you're even worth listening to in the denialsphere.
I'd say you don't have to worry too much about exceeding Warhol's 15 minutes of fame.
But you've certainly exceeded 15 minutes of ridicule and insult.
Because you're deserving of both.
Science will continue to move forward long after your anti-science, denialist crap has been forgotten.
Note that nothing you have done has had any impact on actual science. The real kind, the peer-reviewed, published kind.
Well, I have developed certain methods and techniques for virtual surveys which may have some future utility. And I expect that the data I have assembled will be used in at least one peer-reviewed paper. As for its lasting impact, if any, I wouldn't know.
It was their FORTRAN code which denialists bitched about because "we can't figure out how to compile it".
Well, they did figure it out eventually, of course. (Something I think Dr. Hansen believed they would be unable or unwilling to do.) They also made the most amazing discoveries about it. But I assume you would be aware of all that.
On the other hand, GISS has a disconcerting way of changing their metadata without announcement, so I suppose that whatever code they were using in June 2007 may have been altered by now.
I was most suspicious of SHAP, at first. How they got a positive adjustment trend out of that is something that eludes me. (I have never gotten an answer to that one. Perhaps someone will care to explain it to me some day.) And FILNET has proven to be most amusing. But I am holding out hope that the homogenization procedure (which would seem to involve a spot of pasteurization) may yet provide the best entertainment of all.
And who knows what may be lurking in those TOBS calculations? It is certainly a valid and necessary adjustment. yet I find myself becoming more and more interested in the actual execution thereof.
Your fame is limited to a very small slice of the blogosphere.
My word. I had no idea I had any fame in any slice of the blogosphere, whatever. Why, thank you for your kind words!
As for the rest, I can only ardently wish that as many people as possible read what both of us have to say and come to their own conclusions.
but there were lots of sites that were close enough to tree lines and bushed that they were obviously going to be in the shadows part of the day, and obviously were in some of the photos.
COOP still uses a min-max/2 measurement (we are SO stone-age). So what the NOAA COOP requires is that the sensor be unshaded to the south (which would shade it even at noon). Otherwise, if the sensor is unshaded at Tmax time (usually not too long after noon), the question is entirely moot.
This, of course, does not even take into account those near enough significant transpiring veg that they would be cooled.
Yes, but there are not too many with that problem. And those that are usually have warming biases, as well. Check it out. Also, at night, a canopy can trap heat, affecting Tmin. That is GISS's excuse for applying an "urban cooling" [sic] adjustment in parts of South America.
Now the whole thing misses the point that what is being measured is an anomaly, not a trend, so what counts is not whether a site is warmer or colder than neighboring sites, but whether the site has changed over the years in a way that would bias the trend, not the absolute temperature. Evan Jones is another idiot who needs to understand the concept, but would rather expose himself.
Actually I have been strictly differentiating offset and trend, throughout. Had you not noticed this? After all, I would be "another idiot" had I not been very careful to do so. #B^1
Actually, when one calls someone an idiot for making a basic error, one should check more carefully to make sure he is actually committing the error--as opposed to punctiliously and explicitly avoiding the error. (Sheesh.) Not to do so would be, er, um, careless, as it were. However I remain confident that, as a professional, you meant no offense, whatever.
Yes, we know that a heat sink may seriously affect the offset.
The Big Question is if/how much it affects the trend.
The Yilmaz data very clearly indicates that it does. It certainly requires further study. There seems to be much objection to this, for an unknown (or at least unstated) reason.
However, having said all that, undocumented station moves (as exemplified by the MMTS debacle) or even nearby construction may well have resulted in offsets getting mixed into the NOAA data and affecting the measured trend, creating a spurious warming effect. Sometimes even documented site moves create serious step-changes, obvious to any observer, yet that somehow manage to appear in the post-adjustment data. Take the USHCN Champas, NM, site, for example (or Lampasas, TX).
(BTW, did you know that a Nimbus unit can seriously dud out on you if you touch it and create a static-electric shock? I have had more than one complaint about that. You should probably alert your brethren on that score.)
Evan Jones writes:
It's not a trend. A trend has to be statistically significant. You don't have enough data points for that.
Read it again: "Climate is defined as mean regional or global weather over a period of 30 years or more."
You are taking a small jog in the data that seems to lead to the conclusion you want and isolating it to prove your point. That's not legitimate. You have to use all the points, not just the ones that support the conclusion you want. And you have to have enough to draw statistically valid conclusions.
There is no cooling trend. There is no flat trend. A trend has to be statistically significant. If it isn't it is not a trend.
Evan, at times you are unwittingly funny as hell.
This is unwittingly funny as well ...
Let's see ...
Evan believes that the GISS algorithms designed to generate a useful global temperature product aren't capable of doing so because well, he's got photos to prove it.
Then he bitches because perhaps GISS is improving those algorithms and the code which executes them ...
I do object to making an unannounced change without explaining why. If an adequate explanation is made, then fine.
(And of course, the "improvements" have always been to cool the past and leave the present as is, thus increasing the warming trend.)
And I have also made it clear that we do not know if the photos affect the trend or if the data is invalid. Only that the bad siting means that the issue requires study. As does the station move issue.
You realize that no one is going to pay any attention to what you say if you so badly distort what others are saying?
I do object to making an unannounced change without explaining why. If an adequate explanation is made, then fine.
(And of course, the "improvements" have always been to cool the past and leave the present as is, thus increasing the warming trend.)
And I have also made it clear that we do not know if the photos affect the trend or if the data is invalid. Only that the bad siting means that the issue requires study. As does the station move issue.
You realize that no one is going to pay any attention to what you say if you so badly distort what others are saying?
BPL: I understand your objection.
The last three phases have all been less than 30 years. The current phase is only a decade old, the previous phase was only around twenty, and the one before that around twenty-five.
In 1988, Dr. Hansen did not see fit to restrict himself to the 30-year rule, nor in my opinion should he have. You have to call them as you see them, as indeed Dr. Hanson did. I think he was probably wrong, but I don't object to his timeframe.
I suggest the 30-year rule is arbitrary and likely to yield a poorer understanding of climate. For example, I think one learns far more by isolating the c. 20-year warming from the late 1970s to 1998 from the previous cooling and subsequent flat periods. We care, primarily, about what made the temperatures rise during that period.
(As the meaning of "flat trend" is quite clear and everyone, including you, know what I mean by it, I will continue to employ the term and beg your indulgence.)
Evan, at times you are unwittingly funny as hell.
You are one up on me, then. You never once fail to amuse.
he's got photos to prove it.
One wonders what you might be saying in the absence of those inconvenient photos, of course . . .
Well, I've never seen a photo warm enough to affect even the weather ...
And, please, quit misrepresenting Hansen's 1988 testimony.
Evan Jones:
I am sure you have seen geographic graphs running over urban areas that show temperatures lower as they approach a UHI bubble, rise 'way up as they go over it, then decline once they are past it. What i think is that this has to be done on a year-round basis on a city (or cities) that are windy vs. cities that are not, and on a year-round basis and taking prevailing wind direction into account.
And as I have said, check the references listed in my previous posts â these near-surface UHI surveys have been done for numerous cities world-wide under different wind conditions, and have shown that there is a noticeable decrease in UHI intensity with higher wind-speeds. The empirical evidence shows that:
(a.) Pielke and Matsuiâs 2005 paper has no empirical proof in urban stations sited in the roughness sub-layer/urban canopy layer, and;
(b.) Parkerâs 2004 and 2006 papers (showing that UHI from âurbanâ siting and from urban growth/encroachment has, for all intents, no impact on the global surface T record since there is no statistical difference in trends in calm vs. windy conditions) make theoretical sense.
Look, not to be as snarky like the others are here (even though I can clearly see why they are), but your repeated calls that âmore study is requiredâ would hold more water if you do actually read the literature out there and understand it.
Thank you for your answer about my source areas question, but I think you misunderstood me. I was asking whether there is information in surfacestations.org showing whether anyone estimated the areal size around the temperature sensor which it measures. Yes, itâs certainly important to document the micro-site conditions, but has anyone examined the range of influence of thermometers under different stability conditions? Perhaps this point, rather than how âbadly-sitedâ the sensors are, is the key issue here.
And yes, thatâs the LaDochy study I was referring to (the one published in Climate Research). And as I said, where does it explicitly dispute Petersonâs conclusions? Steveâs group analyzed unadjusted data while Peterson looked at data adjusted for elevation, MMTS vs. CRS, rooftop siting, latitude etc. Clear case of apples vs. oranges here â thereâs a big difference in method â did you actually notice it when reading the paper? While the LaDochy findings are somewhat interesting, especially their correlation with PDO, it lacks the spatial scope of Petersonâs study, and it does not examine trends with respect to wind-speed. IMO Steveâs paper could have made a better argument if they had looked at the dT/dt for windy vs. calm conditions, but thatâs a moot point.
there is a noticeable decrease in UHI intensity with higher wind-speeds. The empirical evidence shows that.
I am not arguing that it does not. It is purely a matter of degree.
Yes, itâs certainly important to document the micro-site conditions, but has anyone examined the range of influence of thermometers under different stability conditions? Perhaps this point, rather than how âbadly-sitedâ the sensors are, is the key issue here.
No I don't know. The actual science is being done by others. And yes, perhaps stability issues might prove to be far more key that microsite conditions. Or might station moves (either undocumented or documented yet ignored). Or faulty adjustment procedures. Or (etc.)
Look, not to be as snarky like the others are here (even though I can clearly see why they are),
Music to my ears. (Eyes?) The effect is acute self-immolation, though they don't seem to catch on.
but your repeated calls that âmore study is requiredâ would hold more water if you do actually read the literature out there and understand it.
I am trying to get a rough handle an many aspects. I can't study every aspect. The "basic literature" on any small aspect of climate is worth an MS all by it's lonesome. And there are a huge number of "small aspects". So I am doing what I can to juggle.
But I outline what I mean by a practical approach to "more study" for UHI, below, and it simply can't be answered by the basic literature.
And as I said, where does it explicitly dispute Petersonâs conclusions?
Starkly, but quite indirectly: i.e., via its conclusions.
Peterson maintains the UHI effect is relatively insignificant. To the best of my recollections, LaDochy's observations indicate that the delta-Tmax is double and the delta-Tmin is quintuple for urban areas as it is for rural areas.
I am not saying who is right and who is wrong. Which leads to my next point.
And I did rough out the "required study" that would clear up the issue, empirical though it may be.
To flesh out the detail:
--Select a sample of cities with a variety of conditions. Windy, non-windy, desert, jungle, tundra, agricultural, sheltered, open, whatever. Mix and matich. You'd know what to pick better than I.
--Use surface level sensors, as we are primarily interested in UHIE on the USHCN network. (This is important.)
--Sensors would be placed at varying points in the cities, and outside (upwind, downwind, and crosswind).
--You'd need maybe a hundred sensors. Maybe 200, depending on your sample size. Standard-issue MMTS units would be preferable, but it might be more practical to use the self-contained, fully automated (and much cheaper) stuff. Those
In quantity you could probably snag those for maybe $100 to $300 per unit.
Also, cheaper, better equipment would allow both hourly measurements and a Tmax/Tmin calculation. And they store the data automatically, so no need for daily readings and (joy of joys) no missing records. (25% or more of USHCN data is AWOL and has to be handed over to the tender mercies of FILNET, which, for an unknown reason, adds a whoppingly large warming adjustment using USHCN-1. No mas!) So long as the equipment is compatible, you'd probably get more experimental bang for the buck than by going the non-MMTS/Nimbus route.
--Run the experiment for at least a full year (for obvious reasons), making sure the stations were properly maintained and that the microsite remains constant.
This begs theory, atmospheric layers, what have you, and measures UHI effect the same way the GHCN does. In your face, down and dirty, and strictly empirical.
Then we will find out how UHI affects temperature offsets and trends, and what the UHI adjustment should be. Nothing else will tell really us. Not Peterson. Not LaDochy.
That's the "more study" I think needs to be done.
Funding, anyone? #B^1
Another of Evan's charming attributes is a historical tendency to read a paper then totally misunderstand and/or misrepresent the results. A bit like those creationists who cite research into evolutionary biology as evidence that evolution is impossible.
Evan's charming attributes
Awwww, you old softie, you. Still trying to butter me up!
Keep adding. (Maybe you'll even make hominem someday.)
Evan Jones said: "As the meaning of "flat trend" is quite clear and everyone, including you, know what I mean by it, I will continue to employ the term."
Your middle name wouldn't happen to be "Dunning" or "Kruger" would it?
Your posts are ideal examples for any high school student wishing to write an easy on the D-K syndrome.
Former Skeptic: Have you seen the Ren et al. (2008) paper on UHI in Northern China? Based on urban vs. rural station trends, it estimates UHIE to be c. 1.2C/century.
Come to think of it, Ren jibes pretty well with LaDochy.
(I believe they both use GHCN-adjusted rather than raw data, so the difference might be on top of UHI adjustment.)
Yes, they suggest that the true warming in this part of china has been 0.8C since 1950.
Real proof that AGW isn't happening, eh, Evan?
Evan suggests that the 'trends' i teh record are obviosu by "eyeballing"
Let me give it a shot, using Evan's suggestion. I'll do just 1990 - now, to make it easier.
1990 - 1992 - down trend
1992 - 1995 - up trend
1995 - 1996 - down trend
1996 - 1998 - up trend
1998 - 1999 - down trend
1999 - 2000 - gee, this must be what Evan means when he ays everyone know what he means by a flat trend.
2000 - 2002 - up trend
2002 - 2003 - down rend
2003 - 2004 - up trend
2004 - 2005 - down trend
2005 - 2006 - up trend, but almost 'flat'
2006 - 2007 - down trend.
Clearly, every up trend is followed by a down trend, and every down trend is followed by an up trend, so there cant be any warming. Or cooling. QED.
Gee, this is fun, Evan. Why did I waste all that time trying to understand the basics of time series analysis, when this is so much easier and more productive.
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs/Fig.A2.lrg.gif
Clearly, every up trend is followed by a down trend, and every down trend is followed by an up trend, so there cant be any warming. Or cooling. QED.
I never suggested that, of course. Obviously not all trends are created equal. I do think there has been a mild warming. (Probably not as much as the IPCC, NOAA, or GISS suggest.)
Evan Jones (#186) : "..a heat sink may well exaggerate a heating trend.."
Nope. A heat sink will either act to throw away heat, thus lowering temperatures in your system. I think you mean a system with a large heat capacity. This will act to dampen the overall temperature swings. As heat is input, the extra heat capacity absorbs the energy and warms slowly. When the heat is removed, the large heat capacity will slowly give up heat and slow cooling.
So your statement is completely wrong.
Yes, they suggest that the true warming in this part of china has been 0.8C since 1950.
Ren suggests that UHI effect alone has increased the warming tend measurements by 0.1C/decade since 1960.
Even Phil Jones agrees, in the case of Northern China.
Nope. A heat sink will either act to throw away heat, thus lowering temperatures in your system. I think you mean a system with a large heat capacity. This will act to dampen the overall temperature swings. As heat is input, the extra heat capacity absorbs the energy and warms slowly. When the heat is removed, the large heat capacity will slowly give up heat and slow cooling.
So your statement is completely wrong.
You are confusing the tactical with the strategic.
Take a black tar driveway. It does not produce heat. What it does is soak up joules during the day as well as reflecting.
The reflection increases Tmax. As night falls, heat is released, just as you say. And at Tmin it is still being released, thus exaggerating Tmin.
The greater the warming, the greater the disparity. Therefore, quite apart from the offset effect, a heat sink exaggerates a warming trend. But there has to be a warming trend in the first place to exaggerate.
It also exaggerates a cooling trend, as the effect undoes itself. Thus, I suspect the cooling over the last couple of years has been exaggerated by heat sink effect.
It works in both directions.
I mean "thus reducing Tmin".
Increasing Tmin?
I mean making it hotter.
baaaahahahahaaahaha...
Evan disputes my tongue in cheek 'conclusion' from parsing of an 18 year time series into 12 distinct 'trends,' but has nothing to say about the parsing into trends in itself..
Folks, this is D-K committed at a level that can only be called genius.
Evan Jones writes:
You just don't get it, do you? It's not a question of choosing whatever period appeals to you. Whether a relationship is statistically significant or not is something that can be MEASURED. You do it with ten years of annual climate data and you get "INSIGNIFICANT." Capiche?
Allow me to show you the actual tests:
YearAnomSlopep
19880.1800.0200.000
19890.1030.0210.000
19900.2540.0200.000
19910.2120.0230.000
19920.0610.0250.000
19930.1050.0220.002
19940.1710.0190.011
19950.2750.0160.044
19960.1370.0160.092
19970.3510.0070.424
19980.5460.0050.643
19990.2960.0170.084
20000.2700.0120.279
20010.409-0.0030.618
20020.464-0.0120.095
20030.473-0.0170.116
20040.447-0.0200.270
20050.482-0.0400.179
20060.422-0.0200.000
20070.402
The third column is the slope of the relationship between temperature anomaly and elapsed time in years. The fourth column is the significance, there is a chance of less than the figure indicated that the relationship is due to chance. The usual criterion statisticians use is p < 0.05 or "95% confidence." By that criterion, 1998-2007 is no better than flipping a coin. You don't even start to get significance until you start in 1995 (N = 13), and when you do that all the slopes are significant positive (warming). 2006-2007 is "trivially significant" because there are only two points and any linear fit will always be perfect.
1998-2008 tells you nothing meaningful about climate. Nothing. Nada. Zip. It's not enough information. I'm not saying this to be mean or because I don't want it to be enough. I'm saying it because I ran the regression and it came out statistically insignificant. You can do it too. The anomalies are Hadley Centre CRU, not NASA GISS. Plug the numbers into Excel and run the regression yourself.
Evan at 256: Nope, you are now confusing "heat sink" with absorber. Look at the situation when you add a tar driveway near a thermometer. During the day, the black surface will absorb visible light, turn it into heat, heat air nearby and radiate in IR. It is not "reflecting" heat to make you feel hot. It probably will increase Tmax because it is physically absorbing energy right there and heating up. It is not a significant heat capacity though, and as the sun goes down, it will efficiently cool. The same things that make it good at heating the local area (i.e. black, large surface area) also make it good at cooling to the ambient temperature. It probably won't affect Tmin. If the black surface were over a swimming pool, which has a large heat capacity, then you might affect Tmin.
In any case, how would this create a trend? If I put in a driveway, that takes a day. The next day, my thermometer might read 2 deg hotter than it would without the driveway. But it's not going to read 3 degrees hotter 10 years from now. It will be the same driveway, with the same affect, with the same offset.
It sounds like you are misusing the term "heat sink" and "trend".
Okay, call it "absorber", The effect is what it is.
In any case, how would this create a trend?
A fair question. The greater the difference between Tmax and Tmin, the greater the effect. So when temperatures actually do get warmer, the effect is magnified and added to the total. The greater the actual warming, the greater the spurious warming effect.
The reverse, of course, applies to a cooling trend.
So both warming and cooling trends are magnified.
1998-2008 tells you nothing meaningful about climate. Nothing. Nada. Zip. It's not enough information. I'm not saying this to be mean or because I don't want it to be enough. I'm saying it because I ran the regression and it came out statistically insignificant.
I know you are not. You have been civil and reasonable, throughout.
Perhaps I am disputing that a decade of "weather" is statistically insignificant. And I may well be wrong.
I certainly do not consider the 20 year warming period from 1979 - 1998 to be insignificant (nor do most AGW advocates). Perhaps I am wrong there, also.
But there appear to be statistically significant drivers with half-cycles shorter than 30 years. So if the 30-year rule is indeed correct, it leaves us in a very awkward position when we try to evaluate it.
Would you suggest looking at it from high point to high point from the 1930s to 1998 as compared with low point to low point from the mid-1950s to 2009? The trouble being that the current cooling--whatever--may not have spun out its course yet; it could end tomorrow or go on for decades.
If you take the last 30 years (discounting for Pinatubo), there has been a warming trend, but a rather mild one.
BTW, if it turns out that poor siting creates uncertainties that create an error bar of, say 2C, what would that mean for the significance of the 20th century (post-adjustment) warming trend, as estimated (a trend of 0.006C - 0.008C per year)?
Bearing in mind that the adjustment is NOT negative, but +0.3 to +0.4 degrees per century?
Evan Jones :
Pull the other one.
In other words ... I have a definition of trend that I think scientist should adopt, but I don't know enough statistics to determine if a decade of weather is statisticallly significant or not.
In other words, I'm an idiot, but I'm still going to overturn all of climate science.
Evan Jones is a tard.
dhogaza: You do realize how much you are embarrassing to those who agree with you on AGW?
(Don't worry, though, you others, I'll overlook it. I won't allow him to rub off on you. Besides, I find him almost endearing.)
Chris O'Neill: You, on the other hand, merit a civilized response.
First, please bear in mind that I do believe there has been warming. I also believe there is a CO2 fingerprint. It's all a mater of degree.
GISS has made itself a bit of an outlier out of itself, as of late. (We can spitball over their recent readjustments if you'd like.) But going by the other three (Hadley, UAH, RSS), using adjusted data, what we've had is around +0.6C (on the high side) from 1979 - 1998 and a giveback of maybe 0.1C since then. Pretty much the same trend as 1915 to 1945, which was without much CO2 increase, depending on your proxy.
These are comparable curves because they both begin at the start of warming trends. We are also stipulating that the adjustments are correct (the raw data + TOBS works even better for my argument).
Definitely warming trends, but not exactly setting off any fire alarms. And the curve is currently humping towards the cool side, not headed the other way at present.
If we are going to hit that +3.5C by 2100, we'd better get a move on. We have only 90 years to gain that 3.6C. We'll need +0.4C/decade for that, and we've been doing well under half that for the last three decades.
It all comes down to whether that CO2-positive feedback loops theory actually works out. (So far the Aqua Satellite sees the opposite effect, but those results are still preliminary. Dare I say that more study is required?)
Evan Jones:
No I don't know. The actual science is being done by others.
Thanks for clarifying. I have my doubts that this is truly the case â but the fact that nothing has been seen in the literature to confirm this issue is telling. I still fail to see why so much effort is spent by Watts and co. on documenting microsites when this issue of instrument source area under different stabilities is, IMO, a more important issue. For one thing, itâll tell you the extent (10 yard radius? 100 yards? 500 yards?) to which you should document the site conditions.
I am trying to get a rough handle an many aspects. I can't study every aspect. The "basic literature" on any small aspect of climate is worth an MS all by it's lonesome. And there are a huge number of "small aspects". So I am doing what I can to juggle.
Doesn't it feel tiring to juggle so much? Why not get an MS on climate/micro-met then? Itâll help you to learn some of the theory that you appear not to read up on. Or try to publish something on this in a reputable peer-reviewed journal rather than on a website or blog? For one thing, these steps will make you realize some of the errors that you are making.
And as I said, where does it explicitly dispute Petersonâs conclusions?
Starkly, but quite indirectly: i.e., via its conclusions.
OK, unless my English is screwed up...how does this sentence make sense? Starkly but indirectly?
There is nothing in Steveâs conclusions that directly or explicitly contradicts Petersonâs paper. Why? see below. Once again, have you read the paper?
Peterson maintains the UHI effect is relatively insignificant. To the best of my recollections, LaDochy's observations indicate that the delta-Tmax is double and the delta-Tmin is quintuple for urban areas as it is for rural areas.
Thereâs the rub. As Iâve said above â the two papers are comparing apples with oranges. If Steve's group had applied the T adjustments that Peterson made, they would not have such a large dTmin/dt.
For the last time, have you read the paper and tried to understand it? Or did you just read a cherry-picked summary that I've seen posted on blogs?
In any case, there is a chance I'll meet Steve LaDochy next week. Iâll definitely raise this issue with him.
But I outline what I mean by a practical approach to "more study" for UHI, below, and it simply can't be answered by the basic literatureâ¦And I did rough out the "required study" that would clear up the issue, empirical though it may be...To flesh out the detail:(edit)
And as I said, there are studies in the urban climate literature that have (largely) done what you suggest. E.g. Jerome Fast in Phoenix, Kathy Runnalls in Vancouver, Ingegärd Eliasson in Sweden, Winston Chow in Singapore etc. It helps to read the stuff out there.
Then we will find out how UHI affects temperature offsets and trends
And as I said â these folks found that near-surface UHI does âgo with the wind.â David Parker used this to show that globally, the UHI has insignificant effect on SAT record trend since 1950.
Evan Jones:
Have you seen the Ren et al. (2008) paper on UHI in Northern China? Based on urban vs. rural station trends, it estimates UHIE to be c. 1.2C/century.
I have. And sadly, it is fundamentally flawed for one reason:
They do not analyze minimum temperatures.
If you want to study UHI, you have to examine nocturnal T â not mean T, which is what they did. On top of the conflation of larger-scale daytime/nightime T forcings that would affect the "urban" signal (the Asian brown cloud being one example off the top of my head), there is also strong evidence of urban âcool islandsâ/rural âheat islandsâ during daytime periods. This is caused by higher thermal inertia (i.e. concrete takes a longer time to heat up than bare soil) and greater shading in urban areas which will obviously affect the data quality. And, as several of their ârural sitesâ are arid deserts, which generally have higher daytime T than in urban areas, this would strongly contaminate their background T signal.
I feel very sad when I read this paper. Ren and co. obviously did a lot of work as documented in their methods section, but they chose the wrong metric to analyze, which makes their conclusions fatally flawed. What a bummer.
Come to think of it, Ren jibes pretty well with LaDochy...(I believe they both use GHCN-adjusted rather than raw data, so the difference might be on top of UHI adjustment.)
No. Both Ren and LaDochy use unadjusted raw station data. Please read the papers - especially the respective methods sections - before making such assumptions.
The anomalies are Hadley Centre CRU, not NASA GISS.
Yes, one can tell by all those minuses at the end . . .
I have to admit that if I have to pick between Jim Hansen and Phil Jones, I'll go with HadCRU. (At least they don't rely on the "Siberian Thought Criminals" to grid them to the north pole.)#B^1
Former Skeptic.
Hmmm. If it's flawed, then why is Dr. Jones buying it?
And are not all effects (both cool park and hot spot deals) all meat for the average?
I am concerned with UHI effects on temperature data (Tmax & Tmin) more than the inner zen of UHI, itself. So why would one not use the mean to determine that? (For that matter, how would one not use it?)
I am assuming the brown cloud is a cooling offset overhead (increased albedo)--until it gunks up the arctic ice and increases melt, that is. Albedo up, albedo down. Four legs good, two legs bad. But I've heard a lot of disagreement as to its overall effect.
Ren simply compares urban (by size) data with rural. The data is standard max-min How do you get away from that?
Please read the papers - especially the respective methods sections - before making such assumptions.
I read LaDochy a year back, but only the abstract for Ren, so far. I'll get to it. (Do you recall offhand if they include a TOBS adjustment?) At any rate the UHI adjustment would have been minuscule--about 5% of the observed difference for Ren.
Quite possibly nothing at all.
Have you ever sat through a first year 'accuracy' versus 'precision' lecture?
I give up. Evan Jones is unteachable.
Evan Jones at 262. If you start out by not understanding what you are talking about, I doubt any of the rest of your argument will be worth anything. Saying "it's an absorber, it's a heat sink, whatever" is the equivalent of someone confusing power and ground or a resistor and a capacitor in an electrical circuit. If they then go on to tell me about their magical circuit, I'm not going to waste much time on them.
I doubt a driveway is going to drive down Tmin. In any case, people observe Tmin increasing, right, so this goes against your simple argument.
By trend, I mean specifically changing temperatures over a long time. Like what is observed. I can see how adding a driveway near a thermometer could increase Tmax, but why would that increase change over a long time? You will see a step change when the driveway is put in (which should be easy to spot in the data and correct for.) But this would not create an increasing trend, which is what you need to argue for if the thermometer signal we see that indicates global warming is simply installed driveways.
Evan jones:
So you think this is proof of same cause? If you do you're wrong. BTW, why do you ignore the fact that there has been more recent warming than from 1910-1940. Some intellectual honesty would be much appreciated.
No it's not.
We don't need 3.5C to have serious problems.
We already have 0.75C.
More like 0.3C/decade.
More than half what's required for a massive disaster actually.
Not just a theory actually. Observations confirm it.
Don't believe everything corporate shills like Marohasy tell you about results from this satellite. Contrary to what Marohasy says, water vapor is increasing with temperature.
You can certainly do more study to try to determine if releasing yet more CO2 is going to be safe for the earth's surface temperature. However, it's not looking too promising at the moment that releasing more CO2 will be safe. You've got the right idea that we shouldn't take unknown risks with the earth before more study is done.
Evan Jones:
And are not all effects (both cool park and hot spot deals) all meat for the average?...I am concerned with UHI effects on temperature data (Tmax & Tmin) more than the inner zen of UHI, itself. So why would one not use the mean to determine that?
You are contradicting yourself. You claim to be concerned with UHI effects on temp data without wanting to know what causes, modifies or influences UHI in the first place.
Watts up with that?
Itâs like wanting to examine statistical significance without knowing which test to use or how to apply the test. Not understanding the technique will make you look like an idiot (e.g. Pielke Jr.).
If you understand near-surface UHI theory, you would know exactly why Tmax, DTR and Tmean are poor metrics to measure the urban effect on T. Even Pielke Sr. knows this. There are way too many factors that would distort and possibly increase the urban signal from these metrics, as Iâve stated in my previous post.
(For that matter, how would one not use it?)â¦Ren simply compares urban (by size) data with rural. The data is standard max-min How do you get away from that?
For someone who has admitted to not reading the Ren paper, you seem to know a lot about their methods. Ren and co. did not use standard max-min because, in China, âordinary stations do not take measurements during nighttime. (p. 1335)â So they had to use mean T, which as I said, is the wrong metric to use. Remember what I said? Please read the papers - especially the respective methods sections - before making such assumptions.
I read LaDochy a year back, but only the abstract for Ren, so far. I'll get to it. (Do you recall offhand if they include a TOBS adjustment?)
Offhand? No.
At any rate the UHI adjustment would have been minuscule--about 5% of the observed difference for Ren
Is that fact, or your uneducated guess? What was that I said about not making assumptions prior to reading a paper and not just the abstract? But hey, if you persist in making these guesses, go ahead, no oneâs bothering to listen.
Hmmm. If it's flawed, then why is Dr. Jones buying it?
I presume you are talking about Jones et al. (2009)? Forgive me if it's the wrong paper.
You have to ask Phil. I donât buy it at all â especially when Philâs group does not explicitly explain â despite their promise to do so in his intro paragraph â why he ditched minimum T records when he should know that it is the best metric of urban influence. Para. 18 of his article just merely talks about DTR trends, with no direct mention of Tmin trends, which is sloppy work IMO. While thatâs not dishonest, thatâs being economical with the truth.
Sigh. Chris O'Neill, dhogoza, BPL, Bernard J., Gator...I share your pain. It's one thing to try to discuss and to educate; it's another thing to try to discuss and to educate with someone who is intransigently happy in one's ignorance.
Oh well, I tried.
...and your efforts are much apprecaited, Former.
Well, you were doing fine until that last post. I can only read so fast, and I have a lot on my plate. I will get to it.
If you understand near-surface UHI theory, you would know exactly why Tmax, DTR and Tmean are poor metrics to measure the urban effect on T.
Okay, temperatures are taken at Tmax and Tmin. So that's when UHI would affect the temperature readings. What happens in between, by definition, can't. That much seems obvious.
Looking at the charts in the Ren study, he is simply comparing the readings from urban areas of various sizes with each other and with rural data. This produces the difference. I still don't see why that doesn't work. (You'd want TOBS adjustments, if any.)
And, yes, that's the right Jones paper. (Note that he does not concede that the China conclusions apply elsewhere.)