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Geoff Sherrington Says:
January 15th, 2011 at 3:00 pm
There is further error measurement by Jane Warne of BOM at Broadmeadows, N of Melbourne
http://www.geoffstuff.com/Jane%20Warne%20thermometry%20Broadmeadows.pdf
There is a quite fundamental question which I have never seen addressed. In the reconciliation with temperatures over the land or sea surface, should on measure 1 mm, 1 cm, 1 m, 1 km or 10 km above the surce, or at some intermediate value determined by experiment?
If the experiment has been done, what was its purpose and how was it established as the “right” altitude?
It seems that we are adopting initial conditions for complicated model projections like GCMs based on the convenience of being able to read a thermometer at about eye level.
Is that a scientific approach?
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val majkus Says:
January 17th, 2011 at 7:40 pm
I see there’s another great post by Ira Glickstein on WUWT
iT’S about data bias
This posting is about how the official climate Team has (mis)adjusted past temperature data to exaggerate warming, and how the low quality of measurement stations and their encroachment by urban heat island (UHI) developments have distorted the historical record.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/01/16/the-past-is-not-what-it-used-to-be-gw-tiger-tale/#more-31814
Ira Glickstein is the expert who had a previous post on WUWT on the race between 1934 and 1998 to be the highest temperature; I recall she had a ski slide for 1934 and a ski lift for 1998 and itemised the adjustments made to the two temperatures with the result that 1934 lost the race; in her words ‘bad luck to the old timer’
CONCLUSIONS
It seems to me that my estimate of 0.3ºC for Data Bias and Station Quality is fully justified, but I am open to hearing the opinions of WUWT readers who may think I have over- (or under-) estimated this component of the supposed 0.8ºC rise in global temperatures since 1880.
Here’s the other Ira Glickstein post
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/12/25/do-we-care-if-2010-is-the-warmist-year-in-history/
selective quote
OOPS, the hot race continued after the FOIA email! I checked the tabular data at GISS Contiguous 48 U.S. Surface Air Temperature Anomaly (C) today and, guess what? Since the Sato FOIA email discussed above, GISS has continued their taxpayer-funded work on both 1998 and 1934. The Annual Mean for 1998 has increased to 1.32ºC, a gain of a bit over an 11th of a degree (+0.094ºC), while poor old 1934 has been beaten down to 1.2ºC., a loss of about a 20th of a degree (-0.049ºC). So, sad to say, 1934 has lost the hot race by about an eighth of a degree (0.12ºC). Tough loss for the old-timer.