BOM scandal heats up: Kininmonth, Watts, Nova quoted in The Australian “We audit banks, why not BOM?”

Today, Graham Lloyd, and Jennifer Marohasy turn up the heat even more on the Bureau of Meteorology’s strange practice of “editing” raw data. The Bureau says it works to the “highest possible standards”. Natch. So an independent audit would clear them, silence the critics, and restore their reputation. Strangely, instead they have been apparently avoiding an independent audit for six years now and counting….

The Australian: BoM faces storm over weather data inaccuracies

 It is the biggest public scandal for BoM since furious debate was sparked three years ago over its treatment of historic and contemporary temperature rec­ords to compile its new homogenised national temperature data series known as ACORN-SAT.

For an agency that screams from the rooftops every time the mercury nudges to the slightest record high, losing a half a degree Celsius here and there at the lower extremities is a pretty poor look.

In reply, once again, the BOM promises another do-it-yourself review. The Minister (Josh Frydenberg) has insisted on two external independent experts, but if the BOM gets to approve or appoint them, that box won’t be hard to tick (just ask the NZ NIWA team). Apparently the last public scandal in 2014, the Minister then (Greg Hunt) killed off a proper investigation of the BOM to supposedly “protect the reputation and integrity of the institution” which, of course, did exactly the opposite. Given the BOM’s “excellence”, the effect of another hand-picked one-day forum to study none of the key issues that skeptics raised, told everyone that Hunt didn’t think its integrity would survive a high school debate, let alone a forensic investigation.

As “blogger Jo Nova” is quoted as saying:

“We audit banks, companies, government departments, energy flows, and projects, but we don’t officially audit science.

“Whenever big money is involved we assume things need to be checked.

When it’s just the planet at stake, who cares?

— from the just released new IPA Book — Climate Change: The Facts 2017 (pre-order your copy now!)

Automatic weather stations work in Antarctica, but not in Goulburn?

Bill Kininmonth — the guru himself, cannot figure out why the equipment would fail now:

William Kininmonth, a former head of BoM’s National Climate Centre, says he is puzzled that after decades of service the bureau now claims the automatic stations are not fit for purpose at some cold weather locations.

“My understanding is a lot of testing was done before the automatic weather stations were installed in all different sorts of conditions,” Kininmonth says. “Why this is happening now, unless they have changed their manufacturers who they get them from, I don’t know.

“I would have thought minus 10 would have been well within their scope. They take automatic weather stations down to Macquarie Island and Antarctica, I can’t understand this at all.

“It seems to me they have some sort of automatic collection system in the computer; once the data comes in, they check on it then. I don’t know why they would be doing that at that stage.”

The rise of citizen scientists

Major kudos and plaudits to Lance Pidgeon — one of the original unofficial BOM audit team that gathered together around this blog, who have been posting here for years. See Lance’s other savage BOM critiques here, none of which have been resolved.

Lloyd comments on the unofficial BOM team — the volunteers that won’t stop asking hard questions:

What cannot be controlled is a small army of largely amateur enthusiasts such as Pidgeon who pore over the millions of lines of BoM’s temperature data made public by the high-profile institution. Pidgeon, a freelance radio technician and citizen scientist, has found instances where thermometers accurate to a tenth of a degree were adjusted by as much as two degrees. Original cooling trends in temperature records were being revised to warming trends.

There are vast areas of the nation where identical temperature readings have been recorded over long periods and places where the daily minimum temperature has exceeded the maximum, changes that defy logic.

Records of extremely hot days before the turn of the century have been erased, in one celebrated case simply because a diligent worker had taken the observation on a Sunday, which was outside of usual practice.

Thanks to the dedication of the other volunteers and their cutting work, advice and cameraderie (Thank you Ken, Chris, Bill, Bob, and Geoff and Warwick (thorns for decades, long before me), and David, Andrew, Ian, Phil, John, John, Ed and Tony and of course, Jennifer Marohasy).

Last word from Anthony Watts:

[Anthony] Watts says a solution would be to calculate temperature trends from stations that have a long record, no moves, no equipment changes, no time-of-observation changes, and remain free of nearby infrastructure encroachment.

“Choosing only stations like this ensures that there is no need for adjustment of data, and that this data is representative of the true changes in the surface temperature over time,” he says.

“Until the existing data quality problem is fixed, which has created an artificial warming bias, it is nonsense for the mass media to promote the idea of any year being the ‘warmest year on record’ ”.

— Also from Climate Change: The Facts 2017 .

I’ll have a lot more to say about this article. Lloyd has done a great job. Credit to Jennifer Marohasy for this and for editing the magnificent new IPA book.

 

 

 

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304 comments to BOM scandal heats up: Kininmonth, Watts, Nova quoted in The Australian “We audit banks, why not BOM?”

  • #
    Tom R Hammer

    I won’t be holding my breath for any serious review into the BoM. It seems to me that the only outcome of a review will be embarrassment for Turnbull and his support for the green industry. Any serious review will have the wrath of the ABC attack dogs brought into play to discredit it.

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    • #
      Mark

      Apparently the world is in peril, but the bureau meant to monitor these things is lying, and no-one except a few bloggers and their readers seem to care very much.

      If I try to imagine this into a plot of a movie, I can’t make it make sense even as weird fiction.

      I am not sure of the counter-story required to defeat this disease, but we are in desperate need of one – one that is as emotionally attractive as millennialism, original sin, and gaia. One that harnesses the sentiments, but also is constructive, positive, and true.

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      • #
        Greg Cavanagh

        Yes, a movie based on wilful incompetence has not been done. I’ve got the movie Dr Strangelove on order, but never yet seen it. It might come close.

        The movie Brazil relied on an error caused by a bug in the machine. All of the movies I can think of are accidents, which cause a string of events.

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        • #
          Ian Hill

          What about the various Titanic movies?

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        • #
          Rick Bradford

          Dr Strangelove is not about wilful incompetence. It is about a blind allegiance to an ideology which outweighs all other considerations.

          So it is entirely appropriate to the climate debate.

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      • #
        el gordo

        We are a small political cell engrossed in a war of words over the weather, our main aim is to bring about a scientific paradigm shift. A wonderful romantic comedy with a millenarian bent.

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        • #
          Geoff Sherrington

          The target is a major change to a one world government and more control over you and your dollar. Climate is just the vehicle. Geoff

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          • #
            el gordo

            AGW is a Trojan Hoax.

            Ultimately the weather gods will come to our rescue, simply because Nature has a mind of its own.

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            • #
              Manfred

              The preordained (1999/2000) UNFCCC definition of “climate change” (ALWAYS ADVERSE direct and indirect anthropogenic influence on atmospheric composition and land usage) may only be ‘managed’ by this definition and the infinite justification for eternal regulation it provides, unless of course, the anthropogenic component is unpalatably ‘fixed’ by a ‘final solution’. Nevertheless it is a unique definition that is capable of flawlessly segueing to population control, the next UN catastrophe perhaps? (see Clive James link below). Why most fail to notice and be alarmed by this is beyond reason.

              The climatism Trojan Horse is revealed for what it is by the UNFCCC definition and while the NWO process is well underway, Clive James informs in The Australian (June 2017) things do not appear to be going so well for the eco-Marxist elite. Nevertheless, the UN supranational global administration presently remains poised in the wings. 2030 is probably one staging point of no return (except possibly by outright insurrection) – it is the target date of the UN Post 2015 Sustainable Development Agenda.

              Still, when one thinks that a recent US CDC survey reportedly shows that >63% parents and 59% mothers in California smoke pot daily, perhaps the wider societal prognosis is so bad that the UN will be reduced to pointlessly herding cats with spongiform brains … case in point: The High Priest of Hypocrisy, Al Gourdo, has a domestic power bill x34 greater than your average power bill.

              Al Gore’s Inconvenient Reality:
              The Former Vice President’s Home Energy Use Surges up to 34 Times the National Average Despite Costly Green Renovations

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      • #
        Leonard Lane

        Mark it is the same story every time.
        Renewables are the absolute best and we must have them to save he planet. Oh by the way, renewables need huge tax breaks, government grants, and all kinds of subsidies.

        BOM caught falsifying public data for the second time in about 4 years. We are honest, we can do our own internal audit, because no one else has the expertise and scientific excellence.
        Oh by the way, all audits and their findings will be kept secret because we have nothing to hide.

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    • #
      Yonniestone

      Every time the public hears of another misuse of taxpayer money it adds to the lack of respect developing for government and those associated with it, even with a relatively cordial society as ours people are used to having a certain standard of living and don’t like it being interfered with, when they make the connection of political decay with political agenda the anger will rise.

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      • #
        Greg Cavanagh

        I console myself by reminding myself; there will be no politicians in heaven. I’ll finally be free of them.

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      • #
        C. Paul Barreira

        Nothing in South Australia supports this argument. See here. Nick Xenophon’s policies are here.

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      • #

        Trump is President of the United States because large numbers of American voters believed their Government was both incompetent and corrupt. Or as Trump said, “stupid”.
        Maybe the same thoughts motivated “Brexit”.

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        • #
          Rick Bradford

          Not maybe. Certainly.

          Ordinary people are sick of self-appointed elites saying: “You people are stupid bigots. Shut up, we will tell you how to think and act.”

          The British government and media was overwhelmingly and overtly anti-Brexit; they lost. All the US media and people of influence were rabidly anti-Trump. They lost.

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    • #

      The BOM is a protected species like the ABC.

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    • #
      Dennis

      We keep playing their game by mostly only discussing and criticising global warming climate change as presented by the politicians and crony capitalist mates involved in the scam.

      It is in fact a diversion and an excuse for raiding taxpayer’s monies from all UN member nations where politicians have the new world order, one world government objective.

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    • #
      Graham Richards

      The MSM not giving any prominent exposure to this fraud. In fact I notice a distinct increase in ” climate change” propaganda since the news broke.
      ABC & SBS running subtle messages about the ensuing disasters awaiting the world with .warming in the Arctic running at double the forecast rate. Total [snip] of course baffles those brains of a sheep!
      Turnbull will ignore the expose as well lest it interfere with his ” carbon tax/ETS by stealth”. Not to forget the proposed tax on cars using fossil fuels.

      So there will never be an independent audit until we get rid of Turnbull & the 54 assassins & put a real conservative back in power.

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      • #
        Manfred

        Fake News Downunder style
        A distinct increase in climatism propaganda.
        The MSM media in NZ peddling their new magic number – 92%.
        Apparently the magic number in Australia is 87%.

        Talking climate change and the Paris Agreement

        A total of 92 per cent of New Zealanders do not want their nation to follow President Donald Trump’s lead and withdraw from the Paris Climate Change Agreement set in 2015.

        New Zealanders are even more united in their commitment to the Paris Accord than Australians at 87 percent support, Pure Advantage chief executive Simon Millar says.

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  • #
    tom0mason

    This is not a public scandal for BoM but just another minor glitch with the ongoing task of virtualizing all weather data and converge all readings with the preferred climate models.
    This would allow them to get ahead of the UK Met office in virtual weather forecasting.
    Or in some remote probability, maybe, it is not.

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  • #
    Spetzer86

    Climate data is always treated as if it’s top secret, eyes only. It’s outside temperatures/rain fall FFS! These should be some of the most open, transparent, and simple datasets in existence.

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    • #
      GD

      Why they put temperature gauges at airports has me perplexed.

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      • #
        Lionell Griffith

        The pilots need to know the actual local air temperature to be able to compute the takeoff and landing velocity. Hot air is less dense than cold is and thus requires a higher velocity to produce the necessary lift.

        To use those thermometers for anything but local takeoff conditions is illegitimate. The heat island effect of all the runways and the heat emitted by the jets as they land and take off seriously rises the local air temperature. It is not and cannot be representative of the remaining 99.99999999999999999999% of the surface of the earth and will be unrelated to the global surface temperature.

        However, if you want to fake global warming to gen up a global panic, the landing field temperature is exactly what you want to use. Almost in exclusion of any other temperature measurement. You get the desired increasing temperature measurements without having to adjust the raw data. You can then easily pretend that you are doing real science.

        To do actual science, the measurement readings you use must be clearly causally unaffected by anything other than what you are interested in studying. The problem with that is you have to prove what you are proposing is going to happen is happening. Otherwise,you can’t get the billions in grant money and stimulate the spending countless trillions on futile actions to “save the earth”. All to be followed by more of the same only more so.

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        • #
          GD

          Thanks, Lionell. It belies belief that they can be so obvious about it. Perhaps is it simply a matter of expediency that airports must have temperature gauges, so why not use those for weather readings?

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          • #
            Greg Cavanagh

            Once upon a time, recording temperatures around the country was a point of curiosity only.

            Now it’s been morphed into something that is inappropriate for the data collected. And worse, while they calculate a single figure average value for the entire planet from them all, they make no attempt to record accurately or better coverage of data points.

            The whole field of temperature averaging is junk science. The data is useful where it is collected, it’s not useful 100 miles away let alone 1000, or over the ocean or arctic. Hell why not collect temperatures form all of the planets and average that?

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        • #

          The heat island effect of all the runways and the heat emitted by the jets as they land and take off seriously rises the local air temperature

          Is that something you can back up with any factual data, or is it just “the vibe”?

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          • #
            Greg Cavanagh

            Heat Island Effect is well known and documented. You are being a troll.

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            • #
              Lionell Griffith

              It is just Craig doing what Craig does. He makes such demands largely because he doesn’t have to prove anything.

              When he does make a statement he thinks is a fact, he is verbally drawn and quartered for its errors and irrelevance. So, in a twisted way, he is learning something here. Not enough soon enough but something is better than nothing.

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            • #
            • #

              So you have no documentation that there is any positive bias at airport stations?

              Watts spent years insisting this “vibe” of yours was correct, however when he sat down and actually analysed his data, it showed the precise opposite – the stations he identified as “lower quality” showed less warming than the sites that he rated “high quality”.

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              • #
                Anonymous Cow Herd

                Craig must define what he means by warming in this context. From Watt’s paper:
                https://pielkeclimatesci.files.wordpress.com/2011/07/r-367.pdf

                Temperature trend estimates vary according to site classification, with poor siting leading to an overestimate of minimum temperature trends and an underestimate of maximum temperature trends, resulting in particular in a substantial difference in estimates of the diurnal temperature range trends.
                …. the overall mean temperature trends are nearly identical across site classifications.

                So the average temperature trend was not biased downwards in low quality sites, contrary to Craig’s claim.

                The poor siting biased the daily minimums trend upwards similar to how the greenhouse effect would, so Watts did find a bias and it was quite relevant to diagnosing cause of warming in the USA. Try again, Craig?

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              • #
                Roy Hogue

                To Craig Thomas,

                The Heritage Foundation studied thermometer placement way back in about 2007 or 2008 and found significantly different readings when thermometers were in locations where they were influenced by the temperature of objects, including pavement and air conditioning compressor cooling air outlets, that were near them. When they aren’t measuring only actual ambient air temperature they give you a wrong reading, hence the use of Stevenson screens to protect them from direct sunlight which would have the same effect but to an even greater extent. But near any heat source not even the Stevenson screen can protect them properly.

                Of course, Heritage Foundation is anathema to you warmers because they speak the truth. So you’ll no doubt just ignore what they have to say. And with that being the case, how about this? If I stand next to the thermostat on the wall in my hallway long enough, I can see the temperature display go up a whole degree F (1.8 degrees C) within a minute or two, sometimes within 30 seconds. Just the fact that I’m there at 98.6 F and radiating heat is enough to influence the reading. And the actual temperature sensor is buried somewhere inside the case so the whole case — which is white and as reflective as a practical thermostat can be — must be heated in order to increase its measured temperature.

                I also have an alarm clock that displays inside and outside temperature. If I sit down on the bed near the clock on the nightstand, the indoor temperature it shows can go up a whole degree within a minute or two.

                I have observed this behavior many times over the years. So if the direct, repeatable experience of someone who knows something about making measurements — and I spent much of my career in that field — doesn’t convince you, then nothing will.

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              • #
                Roy Hogue

                To Craig Thomas,

                The Heritage Foundation studied thermometer placement way back in about 2007 or 2008 and found significantly different readings when thermometers were in locations where they were influenced by the temperature of objects, including pavement and air conditioning compressor cooling air outlets, that were near them. When they aren’t measuring only actual ambient air temperature they give you a wrong reading, hence the use of Stevenson screens to protect them from direct sunlight which would have the same effect but to an even greater extent. But near any heat source not even the Stevenson screen can protect them properly.

                Of course, Heritage Foundation is anathema to you warmers because they speak the truth. So you’ll no doubt just ignore what they have to say. And with that being the case, how about this? If I stand next to the thermostat on the wall in my hallway long enough, I can see the temperature display go up a whole degree F (1.8 degrees C) within a minute or two, sometimes within 30 seconds. Just the fact that I’m there at 98.6 F and radiating heat is enough to influence the reading. And the actual temperature sensor is buried somewhere inside the case so the whole case — which is white and as reflective as a practical thermostat can be — must be heated in order to increase its measured temperature.

                I also have an alarm clock that displays inside and outside temperature. If I sit down on the bed near the clock on the nightstand, the indoor temperature it shows can go up a whole degree within a minute or two.

                I have observed this behavior many times over the years. So if the direct, repeatable experience of someone who knows something about making measurements — and I spent much of my career in that field — doesn’t convince you, then nothing will.

                40

              • #
                Mark D.

                Careful Roy, if the alarm clock/thermometer was behind you you’ll have proven that “back” radiation exists!

                90

              • #
                Roy Hogue

                Mark,

                You get the gold star for creativity this morning. Have a green one on me.

                Now if you can tell me how a comment I submitted only once, showed up twice with the same date and time you’ll get another gold star. 😉

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              • #
                Greg Cavanagh

                Roy:
                A glitch in the matrix.
                You phase shifted in a quantum tunnelling event.
                The universe split just as you posted, and we got both events in this universe.

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              • #
                Roy Hogue

                Mark,

                You are good. Can I pick your head for material to use in my sci-fi novel?

                20

              • #
                Roy Hogue

                Greg, not Mark. Getting to late in the day for me. I need to put down the toys and watch TV or something.

                20

              • #
                Greg Cavanagh

                By all means Roy; I’m up for a collaborative effort on a novel, or just random excuses for why things worked out. Or use what has been stated. I’m easy.

                I read a story about Douglas Adams; after he had written the story of Arthur and Ford on the Vogon space ship and getting expelled into space, he had written himself into a corner and thought to himself “It would be very improbable for them to be rescued from space”, and so the Improbability drive was born.

                10

              • #
                Roy Hogue

                Greg,

                Improbable drive??? You will think mine is completely impossible. Actually it’s an idea I stole from an old Heinlein novel and then embellished until he wouldn’t recognize it. But all that stuff is just the world in which an interesting story has to take place. Science fiction is nice because I can invent any world I want to, something like Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings or even a hybrid of reality and fantasy. But in the end you’re telling someone’s story and that has to be interesting, even compelling or no one will care about it. So I’ve gotten started on something that’s been in my head for a long time, the meeting of humans and aliens from across the galaxy fleeing from the nova of their star and looking for a new home. How does that look for a story line?

                I’ve written myself into a corner several times and had to scrap some of what I had done and start over. And I have the whole thing well mapped out as to where it goes and why. But then it come to knitting various phases of the story together and I go off the rails.

                I connected with a local writers group and was sent this quote that may surprise some people. I know it surprised me.

                Writing sounds easy to those who aren’t writers.

                It’s none of their business that you have to learn to write.

                Let them think you were born that way. – Ernest Hemingway

                It’s that learning thing that hurts sometimes. But if one of the most respected and read authors in the world can say you have to learn to write then I guess I can manage it gracefully.

                10

              • #
                Roy Hogue

                And now I better get back to work on it while I still have some time left to do it.

                00

              • #
                Greg Cavanagh

                Thanks for the story Roy.
                I’m doing a re-write of The Divine Comedy myself. I’m filling in the gaps that Dante didn’t. He was writing for people of his time, so they knew the people he was speaking of. But today, it’s a very difficult read. I’m going to address that difficulty and fill in the gaps.
                I’m starting the story the year before Dante takes his journey, and depicting the events of the time leading up to his trip. It’s a very difficult thing to write because I’m covering real events 700 years ago. But I’m making progress.
                Cheers.

                00

          • #
            el gordo

            Craig finding stations which have temperature trends, ‘that have a long record, no moves, no equipment changes, no time-of-observation changes, and remain free of nearby infrastructure encroachment’, is going to be hard to find.

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          • #
            TedM

            A matter of physics.

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          • #
            James Bradley

            idiot

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          • #
            David Benn

            Would this help?

            http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/11733731/Met-Office-caught-out-over-its-hottest-July-day-ever-claim.html

            (I know it’s from the UK – that’s where I live…..)

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          • #

            Craig Thomas- Go figure!

            “In fact, it causes a phenomenon known to climatologists as the urban island heat effect, whereby dense cities have been empirically found to be up to twenty degrees Fahrenheit warmer than their surrounding hinterlands”

            http://www.yalescientific.org/2013/05/five-things-you-didnt-know-about-cities/

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          • #

            WMO- “The nature of urban environments makes it impossible to conform to the standard guidance for site
            selection and exposure of instrumentation required
            for establishing a homogeneous record that can be
            used to describe the larger-scale climate”

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          • #

            Chapter 3 – Meteorological data

            “As airports are often situated near urban conditions, temperatures may be higher than those found in rural agricultural areas. Wind speed is commonly measured at 10 m height above the ground surface”

            http://www.fao.org/docrep/X0490E/x0490e07.ht

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          • #
            Glen Michel

            Craig the idiot. Probably thinks the Earth is Borg cube.

            00

        • #
          Mark

          Lionel, I take it you aren’t a pilot. An aerodrome by design doesn’t suffer from heat island effect as much as a country road does. Urban Heat Island is a manifestation of the concrete jungle. Yes, big aerodromes have a huge amount of apron surfaces (the bits where aeroplanes park) but they also do not inhibit the free flow of wind across their surfaces. In fact! You will find aerodromes are some of the coldest places in Australia. Having said that, there are certain recording sites that suffer from jet exhaust contamination under certain conditions, resulting in temperature spikes.

          If the questionably intelligent persons that locate AWIS on aerodromes put them away from buildings and apron areas where aircraft stand with jet engines running we would find temp data would be more consistent with unbiased rural landscape that aerodromes closely resemble.

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          • #
            Lionell Griffith

            No I am not a pilot but I did live in the southwest for over 30 years and had friends who were. I understood that some small planes couldn’t take off in the heat of the day 120+ degrees F. Had to wait until either sundown or the next morning when the temperature was a “cool” 90 degrees. I can understand that some places might not have it as bad. Still, I seriously doubt that an airport is a proper site for a thermometer for “normal” surface temperature measurements.

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            • #
              Rupert Ashford

              Lionell, I got the following information from an aeronautics expert in the US on the topic recently (after the recent big news about planes not being able to take off in Arizona). Planes are like all machines issued with user manuals and part of that is that they are tested at different conditions and certified to operate within the limits of those testing criteria. If operated outside of those limits, and something goes wrong the operator can be liable for damages. You can appreciate that a commercial airline company flying a plane with 150 passengers outside of those criteria can be up for serious damages should something happen to the plane, so from a risk-management perspective they ground their planes even if they can still fly effortlessly. He also said for small craft the planes are usually relatively under powered and they often don’t have the capacity to increase their output to ensure the lift in warmer conditions hence tighter safe operating criteria, more safety groundings and also more accidents in warm weather.

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          • #
            peter

            Mark, I take it you aren’t a scientist. I’ve done work at Sydney International airport. As part of the work I took temperature readings on the aprons. They weren’t much higher than Sydney reported temperatures but they were higher. What most people don’t appreciate is that it isn’t just aircraft engines under operation that emit huge volumes of hot exhaust gases. The airport is a very busy operation with hundreds of vehicles, mostly diesel, providing services all day long to the aircraft parked at the terminal. Many of the trucks and vans are supplying refrigerated food items to resupply the aircraft. They keep their engines running the whole time they are parked there to drive their refrigeration. Even some trucks that aren’t refrigerated still keep their engines running while at the aircraft. There are numerous petrol driven airport vehicles and diesel-fuelled plane-towing tractors called tugs running around all day. It’s very busy, like being in the centre of the city. But it doesn’t end there! Each aircraft, parked at the terminal keeps their APU, auxiliary power unit, running ALL the time. Why? To power the aircraft for lights, instruments, power points and air-conditioning so that after your café-latte and duty-free shopping spree in the terminal you can walk onto the aircraft in comfort. What are the APUs? Well, they’re generally a large diesel engine in the tail, running on jet fuel, and of the size of a truck engine. Getting the picture? Walking around the terminal on the ground, the greatest risk was being hit by a vehicle or breathing vehicle exhaust – not the planes themselves.

            And airports have large areas of heat absorbing tarmac and heat reflective concrete and buildings. Still think airports would be great places to measure city temperature?

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            • #

              Where’s your data, Peter?
              Because Watts looked into this and proved you are wrong. Airports are colder because they allow air to flow freely. Hot air doesn’t hang about, it moves up and is replaced by cool air. The amount of air that has been heated up by the action of the Sun is negligeable when compared with the vast amount of cool air that is available to replace it.

              822

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              • #
                Lionell Griffith

                I see. There can be an absolute panic over a few tenths of a degree increase in the sacred climate alarmists temperature record but a half to a whole degree at an airport is of no concern whatsoever. Isn’t it special how you can choose what to panic over and what not.

                Still, it is quite clear that using airport temperatures as part of the so called global database is illegitimate. This because it has special and KNOWN circumstances that increase both the temperature and the rate of increase in temperature. Especially when compared to a well sited rural measurement. I suggest THAT is the exact reason they are used. Then they can pretend they are using actual data rather than totally dry lab numbers.

                But then it is climate science’s specialty of selecting the data points that support its theory of man caused climate catastrophe. Then to correct the data if it goes against its theory. That way they can keep the flood of tax money coming from the pockets of those who create the wealth to those who would destroy the ability to create wealth.

                Why the pretense? Why not simply create the temperature record using a simulation so the data and theory match exactly. Wait! This is already being done but they can’t even match their repeatedly and badly fudged record.

                But then all you allow yourself to know is what your significant others tell you to know. Try investigating and thinking for your self for a change. We don’t have to agree but it would be nice to hold a conversation with someone who is not a sock puppet on strings.

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              • #
                el gordo

                Adelaide Airport is intriguing, we see a clear uptick in temperatures over recent times (UHI), but the cooling trend back to 1857 is remarkable.

                ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/ghcn/v3/products/stnplots/5/50194672000.gif

                The Southern Hemisphere Hockey Stick doesn’t show up.

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              • #
                el gordo

                I’ll throw in Darwin Airport for good measure and you’ll plainly see the discrepancy between adjusted and unadjusted.

                ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/ghcn/v3/products/stnplots/5/50194120000.gif

                I demand a Royal Commission..

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              • #
                James Bradley

                Craig,

                For your theory to be correct then the surface of the earth heated by GH effect of CO2 should be cooling – not warming, but for you to sell your CO2 global warming beliefs you would need to manipulate the data from the cooling urban heat islands like… Goulburn Airport…

                91

              • #
              • #

                Craig Thomas- by golly i think you get it- “hot air rises to be replaced by cool!!” and there we were thinking the world was overheating.

                “Because Watts looked into this and proved you are wrong. Airports are colder because they allow air to flow freely. Hot air doesn’t hang about, it moves up and is replaced by cool air”

                22

              • #

                Goulburn airport is just a tad smaller than Heathrow, has a tiny bit less infrastructure, and hosts a slightly smaller number of slightly smaller planes.

                But apart from that, yes, Goulbrun airport is almost the same as Heathrow.

                412

              • #
                el gordo

                Goulburn is quiet and Darwin is like a big country town, no apparent UHI.

                http://berkeleyearth.lbl.gov/stations/152446

                20

            • #
              tonyM

              Craig Thomas:
              Do you always play with your dreams that they become reality for you?

              An analysis of Watt’s data does not support you; careful your dreams create porkies.

              https://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2012/07/watts-et-al-2012-figures-and-tables-final1.pdf

              Take a look at Figs 5 & 6.

              The US airports, no matter the class of instrument location, show higher Tmean increase rate than the respective measure for non airport observations. The best site classifications (class 1&2) run at twice the Tmean increase per decade for airports vs non airports.

              Please do take those sleeping pills to avoid these wet dreams of yours.

              92

              • #

                The competent analysts who looked at his data showed it revealed a cooling bias on the part of the lower quality stations as well as in the homogenisation.

                Independent Koch-funded researchers were surprised to find the same results – indicating Watts’ narrative was wrong for all those years.

                One thing Watts was unable to put a gloss on was his finding that temperature stations were resilient to nearby localised hot spots.
                In Watts’ own words, “the overall mean temperature trends are nearly identical across site classifications.”
                And from his team:
                “The minimum temperature rise appears to have been overestimated, but the maximum temperature rise appears to have been underestimated…they cancel each other and the mean trends are not much different from siting class to siting class”
                and
                “we found that the global average surface temperature may be higher than what has been reported by NCDC and others as a result in the bias in the landscape area where the observing sites are situated. “

                310

              • #
                el gordo

                ‘The competent analysts ….’

                Link?

                30

              • #
                tonyM

                Craig:
                Answers like yours continually remind me of the paucity of science in this field other than political science viz lots of waffle and no relevance.

                You asserted that Watts found airports to be no different to other sites in T change avg and asked for data to the contrary.

                I referred you to the data which say your claim is refuted (fig 5 & 6 referred to earlier).

                All you have done is waffle about some so called anonymous expert comment which has no relevance to the specific issue and data. You are in denial of that data.

                00

          • #

            No Mark, no voice of reason, please, the natives will get restless.

            622

            • #
              el gordo

              If I could just bring you back to the topic in hand.

              You maybe unaware that Bertrand Timbal et al (2010) drew the connection between the intensity of the STR and global warming?

              20

              • #

                I’m not sure that was Timbal’s original idea, but I gather it is accepted knowledge that global warming causes a stronger sub-tropical ridge, further south, which is part of what’s behind the reduced rainfall projections for SE Australia.

                How is that, “the topic at hand”?

                34

              • #
                el gordo

                The inquiry needs to speak with the ACORN architects.

                Timbal said its a global warming signal because it showed up in the 1940s and here it is again. The intensification might be a natural variable and a precursor to global cooling?

                10

              • #
                el gordo

                The inquiry should also have a chat with the ‘panel of world-leading experts convened in Melbourne in 2011 to review the methods used in developing the dataset. It ranked the Bureau’s procedures and data analysis as amongst the best in the world.

                ‘The Panel is convinced that, as the world’s first national-scale homogenised dataset of daily temperatures, the ACORN-SAT dataset will be of great national and international value. We encourage the Bureau to consider the dataset an important long-term national asset.’ ACORN-SAT International Peer Review Panel Report, 2011

                10

        • #
          Roy Hogue

          Lionell,

          Airport temperature readings for operational purposes are usually made by instruments on the roof of the control tower and positioned so they’re as protected as possible from hot pavement. If there’s no tower at an airport you may be getting the temperature from a station some distance away. But in both cases pilots are a careful bunch who don’t want to show up as a statistic in tomorrow’s newspaper so they calculate conservatively and don’t push it too close to the limit.

          There are old pilots and there are bold pilots. But there are no old bold pilots.

          40

          • #
            Roy Hogue

            I am a pilot if anyone cares about actual experience.

            Lionell is essentially correct about the effect of temperature at an airport.

            60

    • #
      David Maddison

      I have my own weather station and upload the data periodically. I haven’t got it reporting in real time at the moment.

      I guarantee the data hasn’t been tampered with!

      https://www.wunderground.com/personal-weather-station/dashboard?ID=IVICMELB5

      54

  • #
    Roger

    Secrecy and refusing to release data or methodology is the classic sign of someone who has something to hide, of someone who knows that data or methodology release will let their grubby little secret out of the bag.

    Any public or publicly funded organisation (other than national security) which insists on secrecy as opposed to transparency is prima facie not fit for purpose.

    BOM’s secrecy alone is sufficient to require an in-depth independent examination and audit of all they do, how they do it and, most importantly, Why. The fact that they tamper with data without good reason or explanation makes independent audit an immediate imperative.

    420

    • #
      stan stendera

      +1000.

      150

    • #
      Leonard Lane

      Agree Roger. And we should insist that any review displays the entire record of un- adjusted and un- homogenized data ALONG with all the adjusted and homogenized data. This is the only way to gain any transparency of what BOM has been doing and why. These databases should be set up permanently and made easily to enter and check by anyone with a computer, not posted for only few days and for a limited time, or for just a part of the data. And these transparent data should be updated every day and maintained continually.
      Anything less that full and complete transparency, and observers name, data processors names, database maintaining names, and all names of all supervisors for the all the supervisors from the observers to the administrator/director of BOM.

      110

      • #
        OriginalSteve

        Hiding the data isnt the real issue – the issue is *why*…..

        One the surface, it seems a bit off, but as others have said, the climate “crisis” is the key to passing laws to allow creating a global govt.

        This reality needs to be clearly and profoundly understood and slowly and carefully explored- the data hiders are just follwoing orders of their political masters.

        Its the political masters that need to feel the blow-torch heat, and the public should be asking why Turncoat et al ( including both sides of parliament, bar a few ) are cooperating to push oz into a UN-run global govt…….

        Oz appears to being politically hijacked for the globalists. The real reason the pollies dont like Sen Richards et al is they ask the *real* questions that expose the lies….

        110

        • #
          Rereke Whakaaro

          What do you suppose the outcome would be, if a One World Government, were formed, but Australia declined to play along?

          Would it create chaos, in the nicely-laid-out-plans for a OWG, as Brexit appears to be doing with the nicely-laid-out-plans of the EU? Or would the rest of the world focus their entire and collective military resources on subjugating Australia? Or would the rest of the world just thumb their collective foreheads and yell, “Loser – loser”!

          40

          • #
            Rupert Ashford

            So you suggest we should just go along because of fear for the consequences if we don’t? Wow!!! I can assure you the bunch that will eventually hold the reigns of that global body will in any case not have the wellbeing of Australia and other western countries at the forefront of their priorities and will in any case come for us (and our cargo) once they have the power to do so.

            60

          • #
            OriginalSteve

            Churchill wasnt keen on the UK being a satellite suburb of Berlin, so he told them to get lost, if I recall.

            Australia is run by a bunch of Chamberlains.

            111

          • #
            Greg Cavanagh

            You know the answer to that already Rereke.

            They can’t stand somebody not agreeing with them. As per their demands to “fix” people’s thinking now, they will take the high moral ground and “fix” the nation’s wrong thoughts. Yes they would go to war, and it would be crewel and brutal, but they’d be right to do so (in their mind).

            20

      • #
        Glen Michel

        Well, from my point of view is that I accuse you of obfuscation or outright lying. Defend yourselves scoundrels!

        10

    • #
      David Maddison

      There secrecy about their treatment of data, including “homogenisation”, is a gross violation of the scientific method.

      If the methodology or any other item of information is not disclosed it is not science.

      It is that simple.

      The data is bring altered to conform with the political narrative of supposed global warming.

      162

      • #
        David Maddison

        Their not there.

        51

      • #
        David Maddison

        Being not bring. Grrrrr…

        31

      • #

        The record and it’s watchers, such a bore when
        you require a snappy story and a doomsday headline.
        Stephen Schneider on the 1970’s on The Coming Ice Age.
        Take a look at the video Part 3, he comes on towards the
        end,(6.00.)

        http://algorelied.com/?p=2839

        And there’s that quote from Stephen Schneider, you know
        the one about needing scarey scenarios and scientists
        being in a double-ethical-bind,having to find a balance
        between being effective and being honest.

        Guess we shouldn’t be TOO hard on the BOM, it’s not easy
        bein’ activist. Choices-must-be-made.

        10

    • #
      David Maddison

      My reply went in at 3.2 above:

      I have my own weather station and upload the data periodically. I haven’t got it reporting in real time at the moment.

      I guarantee the data hasn’t been tampered with!

      https://www.wunderground.com/personal-weather-station/dashboard?ID=IVICMELB5

      41

      • #
        Lucky

        Looks good re temp readings, 999.9C, sure proof of carbon warming.
        But that humidity of 101%, we all know that carbon warming produces dryth.

        40

    • #
      Roger

      BOM are now trying to blame some of these temperature adjustments on ‘faults’ in some existing automatic weather recording stations and are looking to urgently replace them.

      People must now Insist that any new equipment is installed alongside the existing and and with both run side by side for a minimum 24 months; the recorded temperatures from Both must be published as recorded and without adjustment.

      If BOM Refuse to do so then I, for one, would conclude that BOM don’t really believe there is anything wrong with the existing equipment and the replacement is simply to cover up the shenanigans of adjustments to the actual recorded temperatures.

      90

  • #
    Ruairi

    When temperatures near minus ten,
    Are they tweaked to warm up there and then,
    As the BoM wouldn’t like,
    A cold downward spike,
    Would they homogenize data again?

    330

  • #
    Don B

    BOM does not want an audit of its work, because auditors might find something wrong with it.

    200

  • #
    Dennis

    Weathering A Storm

    GRAHAM LLOYD
    Bureau of Meteorology readings seem to go strange if the mercury dips too low.

    The Australian

    70

    • #
      Rereke Whakaaro

      What is the melting-point temperature of mercury? It has been so long, that I have forgotten.

      The freezing point and vapour point of alcohol, also slip my memory.

      30

      • #
        Griffo

        It is below the melting point of gold,small scale gold miners use mercury to bind with gold in dirt and crushed rock,the amalgam is separated on a screening table and heated up,the Hg sublimates leaving the Au in a pot. Do not try this at home.

        60

        • #
          Rereke Whakaaro

          Oh, I didn’t know that. Well, I knew that gold miners used mercury, but I didn’t know what for. Now I do. Thank you.

          But, what I was alluding to, was that Mercury thermometers will not work in the Arctic and Antarctic, because they “freeze”. Alcohol thermometers must be used in their stead. But they both read temperature relative to a scale in the device, marked in degrees.

          So why the climate scientists feel a burning need to apply “adjustments” to the actual readings, based on the only technology that is suitable in the circumstances, beats me. It is really something, quite ineffable.

          40

          • #
            Graeme No.3

            Rereke Whakaaro:

            The freezing point of mercury is just below minus 38℃. Standard laboratory thermometers can be -10 to 50℃ or -10 to 110℃. There is no reason that they shouldn’t be used in mainland Australia. Alcohol thermometers freeze below minus 110℃ (-114℃) and boil just above 78℃, so they become inacurate above 50℃.

            As for their claim that ordinary mercury thermometers can be accurate to 0.02℃ this is unadulterated BS**. Even pre-calibrated thermometers show bigger variations over their range. The problem is variation in the diameter of the bore and standard thermometers are ‘calibrated’ at 0℃ and 100℃ (ice in water and boiling water). These are marked as the range and linear markings are spread along that length. Calibrated thermometers are usually far longer (finer bore to increase accuracy), and are tested at a series of temperatures in their range and come with a Certificate listing the errors at those temperature. They are much more expensive and the calibration runs only for a few years, after which they have to be recalibrated.

            **I once calibrated a packet of 10 standard -10 to 110℃ mercury in glass thermometers. Only 3 were within ±0.1℃ at 25℃.
            One was out by by -1.3℃. Several weren’t within 0.4℃. For the BoM to use such thermometers out of the packet without even checking them is sloppiness of the worst kind.

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  • #
    Dennis

    I do not have a copy but who remembers the hacked emails released just before the UN IPCC Copenhagen Conference revealing “scientists” working out ways to manipulate data in favour of global warming climate change political agenda?

    And in particular comments wondering what might happen to them if the public found out what they had been doing.

    The Australian BoM scandal reminded me and I wonder how they and elected government members are going to explain as their plotting unravels.

    180

  • #
    Debbie

    BoM has been granted a type of legislative monopoly that gives them the power to basically Mark their own homework.
    They inform policy in a number of different depts
    When they get it wrong they’re not accountable.
    They desperately want everyone to love them yet they get downright snooty when asked reasonable questions about their reporting.

    120

  • #

    More importantly, how about a review of the Arctic Sea Ice, because all that melting could be just fraud on the part of the Arctic ice, eh?

    736

    • #
    • #
      el gordo

      You know its only an Arctic anomaly, surely the STR intensity in the Southern Hemisphere is more important for your side.

      80

    • #
      OriginalSteve

      Is good agitprop, yes?

      All hail comrade Craig!

      /sarc

      92

      • #
        Rereke Whakaaro

        No it’s awful agitprop. He’s an amateur.

        92

      • #

        Could you please clarify for us whether you know the answers to the following questions,

        (1) Is Arctic Sea ice extent:
        a) above average
        b) average
        c) within one standard deviation below average
        d) within two standard deviations of average
        e) below two standard deviations from the average and at the 2nd-lowest level measured in 38 years

        (2) If any of (1) c), d), e) apply, would references to Arctic sea ice melting be,
        a) propaganda
        b) statements of fact

        (3) If statements of fact are being referred to as propaganda, would that be an example of,
        a) honest dialogue
        b) dishonest rhetoric

        59

      • #
        Mark D.

        Hey Craig, just curious here, is 38 years climate? Why not 138? why not 276?

        Whilst we are a it how does cherry picking fit into your questions 1, 2 and 3? I mean if 38 years is a cherry pick, would you say that is:
        a) honest dialogue?
        b) dishonest rhetoric?

        Hey thanks in advance for your learned reply.

        62

        • #

          38 years is clearly not a cherry pick, for reasons that should be obvious to anybody engaged in honest dialogue.

          You are welcome to rely on any longer record you can find.

          411

          • #
            Mark D.

            Your reply comment is not learned. I take back my thanks.

            Actually your comment rather well fits the definition of vacuous.

            62

          • #
            AndyG55

            It is a piddlingly small period, in a drop from the highest level since the EXTREMES of the LIA.

            That makes it highly dishonest, because the reality is that Arctic sea ice levels are only just below the HIGHEST they have been in the last 10,000 years.

            https://s19.postimg.org/vgdnb299v/Arctic-Sea-Ice-Holocene-Stein-17.jpg

            43

            • #

              Andy’s reference excludes the last several decades of recent observations.

              Let’s see what our options are…

              Q. Excluding the last several decades from a discussion on current trends would be…
              a) intelligent analysis
              or
              b) batsh1tcrazy

              35

          • #
            el gordo

            I always assumed 30 years is climate, its half the 60 year climate cycle found in ice cores and shallow sea cores.

            20

    • #

      Referring to the melt of the 1920s? Or the melt of the immediate post-Napoleonic period? The current melt?

      Which melt?

      Quick, get it all measured before…well, before the climate changes!
      http://web.archive.org/web/20060812025725/http://time-proxy.yaga.com/time/archive/printout/0,23657,944914,00.html

      You’ve heard of climate change, haven’t you?

      93

      • #

        Relying on Time magazine covers for your “knowledge”, are you?

        Maybe try being scpetical of that idea….

        https://arstechnica.com/science/2016/06/that-70s-myth-did-climate-science-really-call-for-a-coming-ice-age/

        411

        • #

          No, I don’t read Time or rely on any part of it, but I well remember the Global Cooling scare which is now being given its rushed and hushed burial by drek media like Ars Technica.

          Mind you, the Arctic temp plunge of the 60s and ice expansion of the 70s were impressive. It’s just that I’m not the type to extrapolate or react to a brief trend…or to read Time or Ars Technica.

          83

        • #
          Greg Cavanagh

          As I read the story linked, I thought to myself, this sounds like a young kid who has no memory of the event and only heard stories of it second hand. So I went looking for Scott, and sure enough, it looks like he’s in his early 20’s.

          His main claim to fame is a paper that came out in 2008 claiming that the majority of papers from the 60’s and 70’s proclaimed warming. And to Scott’s credit he did write this:

          …It showed that there were far more studies projecting global warming than expressing concern about cooling. But that reality wasn’t reflected in what the public heard at the time.

          When you read the abstract to that paper (paywalled paper), it reads just like today’s alarmist drivel. All the hyperbole words are there in the abstract.

          So believe Scott when he say: Warming:-

          …wasn’t reflected in what the public heard at the time.

          22

        • #
          AndyG55

          relying on ARS-technical for your limited knowledge, hey CT ????

          No wonder you always come across as a brain-washed, nil-educated troll.

          22

    • #
      Rereke Whakaaro

      Is that the best you can do, Craig? I mean, is that your absolute top-of-the-line-best-effort?

      It’s pathetic!

      The readers and commentators here, deserve better than that. Give us something decent to chew on.

      143

    • #
      Robert Rosicka

      So Craig says look over there it’s a squirrel.

      82

      • #
        Rereke Whakaaro

        “No it’s not, it’s a raccoon …” and thus does the conversation get misdirected.

        Sorry to break the bad news to you, mate. But, you are well past your “use by” date.

        102

    • #
      Glen Michel

      What a fool you look Craig. Presented with information that rejects your in house prattle and tittle-tattle world view you go into a supine position. Poor intellect that goes down well at ABC and the Fairfax mob. Shit for brains.

      62

      • #

        Let me get this straight – you think global warming is not occurring because of some dodgy story about a temperature reading at Goulburn airport, but you can’t grapple with the obvious and visible effects global warming is having on Arctic sea ice?

        410

        • #
          Mark D.

          Hey Craig,
          Let me get this staight -are you suggesting that it is OK for the BOM to improperly handle data? – You know the subject of this post?

          Would you say in your (00) view of ethics that drawing the subject discussion off – topic was:
          a) honest dialogue?
          b) dishonest rhetoric?

          Hey thanks in advance for your learned reply.

          83

          • #

            Show us where BoM have “improperly handed data”, first, then we can discuss the ethics motivating the various actors in this narrative.

            48

            • #
              OriginalSteve

              If it smells like a rat, usually it is….

              The lack of transparency sets off reasonable peoples BS meters loudly.

              Or if I spell it out – hiding temp data implies dodgy activities ( like trying to create an artifical warming trend in base data ).

              Not sure how more succinctly we can put it Craig, it seems anyones unwavering beliefs in the CAGW Big Lie seem closer to the blind unthinking approach of a cult member, not reasoning thinking scientist….

              If you are a scientist, you should be demanding the BOM release all data. If youre a CAGW believer, you really should stop wasting our time here and go and play with the other CAGW believers…

              13

          • #
            Mark D.

            Right! Lets get the BOM to provide some transparency so that we can settle this. Glad to see that you support getting this sorted out.

            On the table we have them NOT being transparent. Why do you suppose that is?

            Craig I’m pretty confident that come funding time, it is helpful to provide a report that suggests everything is fine right?. So in the ethics and motivation arena why do unpaid volunteers have to fight so hard to get the “ethical” public servants to become transparent?

            22

    • #
      James Bradley

      Oh no, Craig,

      Surely you are not suggesting the North West Passage has never been open before in recent history? Idiot…

      102

    • #
      Dave in the States

      Are you aware that during WWII the Germans passed armed merchant cruisers and supply ships into the Pacific Ocean through Arctic passages? That is something that could not be done today.

      12

      • #

        …that would be the Russian Northern Sea Route, which has been navigated since the 1600s, first sailed end-to-end in 1878, and which saw a total of 247 through-transits between 2011 to 2016?

        Is “something that could not be done today” some kind of code for something other than what it would appear to mean to me?

        20

  • #
    TdeF

    The BOM explanations do not make sense to any scientist. The sudden need to replace entire stations does not make sense. In particular to replace the one at Goulburn has only one explanation, to blame the weather station for the problem. A diversion.
    Or is it really the problem, in which case we have a Volkswagen moment in reverse. The software has been set deliberately to eliminate low extremes. The removal of these boxes is removing the evidence.

    222

    • #
      TdeF

      I mean, if these remote and cold locations are to be serviced 24/7, surely it is automatic. Maybe by telephone using GSM chips and a local CPU which collects data from the instruments, stores the data, checks the data and then transmits it and confirms the transmission. In this process unacceptable data and obviously wrong data is modified by the software to be correct. It saves a lot of individual homogenization work later.

      92

    • #
      Dennis

      I agree, no doubt about it.

      50

    • #
      TdeF

      Why these four units? Why are they different? How do they know which ones to replace immediately?

      -10C is a lovely winter’s day in much of the Northern hemisphere where billions of people live and where they invented such equipment. Why is Australia different that we need ‘different’ equipment in special locations. Or are our low temperatures special somehow that special instruments need to be adjusted? Or is this the work of one individual who wrote very special data collection software and that just happened to include an absurd -10C lower limit? What other logic was used to reflect our obviously unique Australian conditions. Do I need the sarc tag?

      161

      • #
        OriginalSteve

        Because glorious soviet republic Dear Leader says so……

        All Soviet weatherscreen technology is glorious and above pathetic west technology made inferior by weak capitalism ……(now add usual rants and ravings, desk thumpings and gibberish and I think were there….)

        40

      • #
        Ted O'Brien.

        #11.3.
        “is this the work of one individual”. Hopefully we will be told. One would expect it would be a software thing, not a hardware problem.

        Are there other errors?

        What was happening to the rejected records? Are they substituted with zero, or average, or is the day deleted?

        00

  • #
    Ted O'Brien.

    When I met Bill Kininmonth many years ago, he was servicing a BOM rain gauge. So, either Bill must have come up through the ranks at the BOM, or one of the bosses was extending his field experience.

    50

  • #
    Dennis

    Their ABC has worked the problem out …. more climate scientists needed

    http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-08-03/australia-needs-more-climate-scientists-review-urges/8767004

    100

  • #
    David-of-Cooyal-in-Oz

    Morning all,
    Thort you might like to know a solution (?!?) is already being proposed:

    http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-08-03/australia-needs-more-climate-scientists-review-urges/8767004

    The SMH is also running the story.
    Cheers,
    Dave B

    70

    • #
      Robert Rosicka

      To David and Dennis , the only way to fix this problem is to make the problem bigger , it makes perfect sense to a lefty or a coal troll .

      180

    • #
      Allen Ford

      The SMH is also running yet another story about the reef copping it!

      I thought the reef had already copped it, so how can it now cop it again unless it somehow miraculously recovered in the last few weeks? How come we did not hear about this miraculous recovery?

      I think someone has been reading too much of Norman Lindsay’s Magic Pudding!

      100

    • #
      Greg Cavanagh

      My God, there were so many logical fallacies with that article, I felt like throwing a shoe at the television.

      50

  • #
    Graham Richards

    If the branch office or a subsidiary of a large company/corporation gets involved in fraudulent practises the CEO will take action to stamp it out & make sure the practise is not repeated & also puts processes in place to ensure it never again occurs.
    The CEO of the Australian government must now step up & behave like a real PRIME MINISTER
    & stop the BOM dead in its tracks over his issue. Let’s see how he handles this. I can guess that he’ll not even comment but will probably tell the chief of he BOM not to get caught again & give him an increase in pay.
    .

    WE ARE IN BIG TROUBLE WITH HIS LOT RUNNING THE COUNTRY!!.

    160

  • #
    pat

    Dennis and David-of-Cooyal-in-Oz beat me to it.

    from their link:

    (excerpt)
    More staff needed ‘urgently’
    The review calls for 77 extra positions — 27 of which are needed urgently this year — in areas like climate observation, modelling and understanding.
    It doesn’t prescribe where those staff should be based but offers suggestions, such as within the Bureau of Meteorology or CSIRO, or even a new climate research agency similar to the Australian Institute for Marine Science.

    theirABC, which still hasn’t covered BoM-gate (lol), also has the above on RN’s AM program today:

    3 Aug: ABC AM: CSIRO lacking in crucial climate scientists: expert
    by Jake Sturmer
    Australia’s top scientists have recommended an overhaul of the nation’s climate research system, finding a critical lack of staff in key areas like climate modelling…
    Featured:
    John Church, oceanographer, University of New South Wales
    Professor Trevor McDougall, Australian Academy of Science
    http://www.abc.net.au/am/content/2016/s4712196.htm

    80

  • #
    cohenite

    “the Pidgeon affair”

    Great stuff.

    81

  • #
    pat

    meanwhile, the following story posted online by AFR 19 hours ago, which is of major public interest, is nowhere to be found on theirABC:

    2 Aug: AFR: Glencore’s coal chief fires up on energy costs
    by Angela Macdonald-Smith
    Glencore’s most senior local executive has stepped up his attack on Australia’s failing energy policy, calling for heavy industry to be excluded from clean energy measures and suggesting the country delay its Paris climate goals to rein in soaring energy prices…

    He castigated “irresponsible” state governments for announcing renewables and emissions targets without disclosing the true hit to power prices and jobs…READ ALL
    http://www.afr.com/business/mining/glencores-coal-chief-fires-up-on-energy-costs-20170801-gxnhrp

    the only other coverage to be found so far:

    3 Aug: Australian: Matt Chambers: Cut power prices or business will go bust, says Glencore boss
    The nation’s biggest coalminer and copper producer, Glencore, has called for the abolition of the renewable energy target and suggested pulling out of the Paris climate accord as Australian industry struggles under the weight of rising power costs…

    “Electricity prices have got to a level where many industries, both large and medium, are either suffering or are becoming uneconomic because of high energy prices,” he said. “Either we intervene now to protect those businesses or we let them go — that’s a government decision.”…

    He said that if something had to take a back seat in solving the so-called energy “trilemma” of affordability, reliability and emissions reductions, it should be emissions…
    …its Australian electricity bill is about $400 million a year and power is a third of the costs at its Mount Isa copper smelter and Townsville copper refinery…

    “You can’t run a business, you can’t produce a great product and can’t employ people without energy and without power,” Mr (Tony) Abbott said yesterday. “We need affordable, reliable power and policy has to change.’’…
    Federal Environment and Energy Minister Josh Frydenberg said the Turnbull government was committed to the RET…
    http://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/mining-energy/cut-power-prices-or-business-will-go-bust-says-glencore-boss/news-story/b28a07b4b450d828d5da39b5622bf261

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  • #
    pat

    unbelievable:

    3 Aug: ABC: Jordan Hayne: Pumped hydro opportunities in Australia in the thousands, researchers say
    Mountains along Australia’s eastern seaboard are brimming with opportunities for the construction of pumped hydro systems that could help secure the country’s energy future, according to a survey conducted by the Australian National University (ANU).
    A team of researchers is scouring the country for sites where pumped hydro systems could be constructed — and has already identified about 5,000 sites across Tasmania, Queensland, the ACT and surrounding parts of NSW…
    South Australia was previously found to have 185 sites where viable systems could be built.
    ANU Professor Andrew Blakers said the team was still searching in other states, and had already identified more sites than Australia could conceivably need.

    ***”We have already found 35 times more sites than are required to support a 100 per cent Australian renewable electricity system,” he said…

    “Queensland has about 100 times as many sites as it needs, Tasmania has hundreds of times more sites than it needs, the Canberra district has 200 sites more than it needs…

    Pumped hydro provides a simple and established way to store electricity for when it is needed, and acts as a necessary backup to renewable sources when wind and sunshine are in short supply…

    The capital cost of installing new pumped hydro systems can be high, sparking concern from some experts the economics would not be feasible.
    But Professor Blakers said low running costs would make the systems worthwhile once they were up and operating…
    “Interestingly the total cost of the whole system, including the storage, the power lines, and the wind and [solar cells] is going to be cheaper than simply maintaining the current system.”
    http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-08-03/pumped-hydro-thousands-of-opportunities-australia/8768450

    20

    • #
      David Maddison

      You can only use pumped hydro as storage if you generate power to pump the water in the first place and then cover the losses due to pumping and later generation.

      We will only be able to generate enough power if we build more coal plant or go nuclear.

      But if we built more coal plant we wouldn’t need any pumped hydro would we?

      The Infeasibility of pumped hydro for grid scale backup of “green” energy for the USA is investigated here.

      https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/2011/11/pump-up-the-storage/

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    • #
      Another Ian

      But according to Flannery where will we get the extra water required?

      /s shouldn’t be needed

      130

    • #
      a happy little debunker

      Pumped hydro needs to be stored in a dam – find me a Greenie that favors MORE DAMS & I’ll show you a DAMN LIAR.

      170

    • #
      Raven

      3 Aug: ABC: Jordan Hayne: Pumped hydro opportunities in Australia in the thousands [. . ]

      Since when did the Greens agree to dams?

      60

  • #
    pat

    in response to ANU Professor Andrew Blakers’s 100% renewables claim, uncritically reported by theirABC:

    1 Aug: ColoradoSpringsGazette: Pie in the sky from Jared Polis
    By Scott Weiser
    Gubernatorial candidate Jared Polis is obsessed with making Colorado rely on “100 percent renewable energy by 2040.” But as his obsession grows, the science behind the push for renewables falls apart.

    Stanford University engineering professor Mark Jacobson published a paper in 2015, “Evaluation of a proposal for reliable low-cost grid power with 100 percent wind, water, and solar” in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences claiming that between wind, hydro, solar and hydrogen the country could run on renewables alone by 2040. Congresspersons, mayors, governors, actors and even the National Academy of Science swallowed his pie-in-the-sky propaganda hook, line and sinker. Worse, the press pandered to Jacobson without an iota of journalistic scrutiny.

    Skeptical of the claims, former National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration scientist Chris Clack and 20 other scientists peer-reviewed Jacobson’s work. On June 27, their critique was published in the same publication, saying Jacobson’s paper does “not show the technical, practical, or economic feasibility of a 100 percent wind, solar, and hydroelectric energy vision.[It] contains modeling errors; incorrect, implausible, and/or inadequately supported assumptions. In short, [it] does not support the claim that such a system would perform at reasonable cost and provide reliable power.”

    Clack goes on to say, “Given unlimited resources to build variable energy production facilities. one would eventually be able to meet any conceivable load.” The key words are “unlimited resources,” something neither ratepayers nor the U.S. have…

    Clack addresses Jacobson’s windmill advocacy by calculating that “roughly 6 percent of the continental United States” would have to be festooned with windmills. Jacobson proposes that nearly 490,000 individual wind turbines would be required to meet his wind energy goal alone.

    According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, there are 7,658 electrical generating plants over 1 megawatt in size in the U.S. Jacobson’s idea therefore requires 64 times the number of generator repair and maintenance technicians, 64 times the number of spare parts and 64 times the amount of labor simply to maintain those windmills. Who is going to pay for all those unnecessary parts and mechanics? Ratepayers, of course.

    But eco-activists don’t care how much people have to pay for their electricity, they have an agenda that doesn’t include compassion for poor people like the ones in Pueblo who are being victimized by high energy prices brought on by Gov. John Hickenlooper’s obsession with renewable energy, which would be exacerbated by Polis’ ridiculous and cost-prohibitive fantasy…

    Jacobson’s response to Clack’s criticism? National Review’s Robert Bryce wrote on July 18, 2017, “Jacobson responded with tirades on Twitter, Eco-Watch, and elsewhere. He claimed that his work doesn’t contain a single error, that all of his critics are whores for hydrocarbons, and that, well, dammit, he’s right.” Jacobson says he’s “hired an attorney to address the falsification of claims about our work in the Clack article.”

    Not “I’m going to review my work and address the issues raised by my colleagues,” which is what real scientists do. His threats are becoming a typical response by eco-zealots who have been debunked.
    More on that in my next column.
    http://gazette.com/column-pie-in-the-sky-from-jared-polis/article/1608264

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  • #
    David Maddison

    How would an audit actually work in reality?

    If the BoM are not keeping records of what data points are being altered or deleted or why, what exactly do the auditors (assuming some honest ones are used) have to work with?

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  • #
    David Maddison

    Does anyone from the BoM read this blog?

    72

    • #
      Another Ian

      Hard to think that there is not at least one designated reader there during work hours

      Or are they that confident?

      90

      • #
        OriginalSteve

        I think some of them would enjoy reading on the quiet…hours of enjoyment….bit like Dilbert for climate….

        30

  • #
    Another Ian

    O/T

    Bust goes another prediction

    Nobel laureate Paul Krugman on Donald Trump’s election: “It really does now look like President Donald J. Trump, and markets are plunging… If the question is when markets will recover, a first-pass answer is never.”

    http://www.heraldsun.com.au/blogs/andrew-bolt/dow-rises-krugman-goes-splat/news-story/854928feaf733f5806090b928b6567ef

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    • #
      Curious George

      That tells you something about the Nobel Prize in economics. About as good as a Nobel Peace Prize, awarded to worthy individuals like Yasser Arafat, Al Gore, and B. Hussein Obama.

      50

  • #
    pat

    3 Aug: Australian: Rachel Baxendale: Australian Academy of Science calls for climate research overhaul
    World renowned sea level expert John Church was made redundant last year after almost four decades at the CSIRO.
    “I guess it was tough on me, but more importantly it did a lot of damage to climate science in Australia and Australia’s relationships with international partners,” Professor Church told ABC radio…

    “The changes that are happening, the uncertainty around those changes means we have to work harder, do more research, particularly in the climate modelling area, to be able to say with any confidence, for example how the rainfall and evaporation, the growing conditions in the Murray-Darling Basin will change over time, because currently we just don’t know that,” Professor McDougall said…

    Labor science spokesman Kim Carr and environment spokesman Mark Butler called on the government to “take responsibility for the damage they have caused to Australia’s climate science capacity; not only tarnishing our international reputation but putting all Australians at unnecessary risk from climate change impacts.”

    “Australia has leading scientists whose research is helping develop climate policy around the globe, but here at home the Turnbull government is happy to see these capabilities diminished as his government refuses to introduce any real climate change policy in Australia,” Senator Carr and Mr Butler said…
    “The agency remains in crisis, reduced and under resourced, making climate change mitigation and adaptation harder and ***more expensive for all Australians, especially future generations.”
    http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/australian-academy-of-science-calls-for-climate-research-overhaul/news-story/f81023709d85d9e0276c737810c0688f

    ***once more, Labor perversely claims, without challenge, that NOT spending millions/billions more on climate modelling/CAGW policies is making life “more expensive” for Australians.

    30

    • #
      Andrew McRae

      ABC also reporting on the need for 77 more climate scientists.
      Key finding :

      Accurate climate modelling can potentially avoid costly, unnecessary investments

      Taken at face value, I have to agree! But the full quote from the article body gets worse :

      Accurate climate modelling can potentially avoid costly, unnecessary investments by helping work out the difference between natural climate variability and climate change itself.

      They are still using the politically biased definition of climate change at least 4 years after the IPCC stopped using it!

      “In Queensland they went ahead and built a desalination plant at the cost of $2 billion but in fact, that was in response to the millennium drought, which really wasn’t an indication of climate change at all, but just the regular climate variability,” Professor McDougall said.

      “So that’s the kind of expensive mistake that we can make if we don’t do this kind of research.”

      Actually, That’s what happens when you believe Tim Flannery instead of doing any research at all.

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  • #
    crakar24

    Can anyone tell me the manufacturer and model number of the thermometers used by the BOM?

    TIA

    60

  • #
    David Maddison

    The magnitude of the data tampering is extremely serious as it has caused:

    -Unnecessary waste of tens or hundreds of billions of dollars.
    -Irreversible economic decline.
    -Poverty.
    -Possible deaths.

    People found guilty of tampering for political purposes need to be sent to prison.

    There is a good reason why economic prosperity is proportional to energy cost and overall level of consumption.

    We need more coal, gas, nuclear and hydro (not storage) generation.

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    • #
      el gordo

      ‘People found guilty of tampering for political purposes need to be sent to prison.’

      We first have to prove negligence, so taking the longest temperature record in pristine condition (1858-1983) at Bathurst gaol should give us a better handle on the tampering. ACORN is Orwellian.

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      • #
        David-of-Cooyal-in-Oz

        Ah the irony. We’ve got to go to a gaol to get true numbers…
        Cheers,
        Dave B
        Cooyal

        60

  • #
    pat

    is this a separate piece? I can’t access it, so hope someone will check it out:

    More BoM weather stations put on ice
    The Australian-9 hours ago
    Equipment problems have been blamed for errors in NSW temperature data-handling at Goulburn and Thredbo Top Station, which have led to a national review …

    More Bureau of Meteorology weather stations put on ice
    The Australian-10 hours ago

    30

    • #
      pat

      should have noted that, while Goulburn & Thredbo are mentioned in the brief summary, it seems MORE STATIONS have been identified and put on ice.

      that’s the bit I hope someone can find out.

      30

  • #

    “[Anthony] Watts says a solution would be to calculate temperature trends from stations that have a long record, no moves, no equipment changes, no time-of-observation changes, and remain free of nearby infrastructure encroachment.”

    Yes. And then present the information without further processing, suggestion, interpretation. Just treat us like adults…which is to say, treat us like people deeply distrustful of statistics who don’t mind absorbing the odd statistical fact for cautious digestion.

    Verbal and numerical stunts are killing the spirit of observation. Don’t be sciency. Be adult.

    31

    • #
      Greg Cavanagh

      Adding and averaging temperatures is junk data, no matter for what purpose you can think of. It produced a non-relevant value.

      Like average height, so what? It’s not useful information.

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      • #

        Indeed, it’s like the average depth of that river you want to wade.

        Or it’s like the number of people responding in a certain way to a push poll (er, I mean academic survey) who are then deemed representative of a certain demographic – even of people who think push-polling (sorry, academic surveying) is dodgy and don’t respond or say “dunno”.

        But there are few bigger fibbers than climate stats. A drift-in of cloud at potential max time, a drift-out of cloud at potential min time…and a seriously hot day goes into the books as cool.

        But there isn’t a statistic in this world that doesn’t have its pants on fire. It’s just a matter of how big the fire and whether the statistic is worth saving.

        31

        • #
          Greg Cavanagh

          It is mostly a point of curiosity, and if bounds are provided with the average then it gains some value in meaning.

          Like your average river depth analogy; lets say I say the average river depth is 6 feet +- 6 feet. Now you know you can’t get your yacht in there. An average value is useful when accompanied with more information; a single averaged value on it’s own has little to no value.

          So the average temperature of the earth is 15C +- 60C. Now that’s useful information, not!

          31

  • #
    crakar24

    Can anyone tell me the manufacturer and model number of the thermometers used by the BOM?

    Have already asked but don’t want the question to get lost in comments

    cheers

    50

    • #
      David Maddison

      You might get some hints here. They published some instrument test reports but nothing published since 1994.

      They also say the stations have to be WMO certified.

      http://www.bom.gov.au/inside/services_policy/pub_ag/aws/aws.shtml

      Also see

      http://environdata.com.au/faqs/what-are-the-weather-station-standards-and-license-requirements/

      “The Australian Bureau of Meteorology (BoM) uses its own design of weather station that closely complies with World Organisation (WMO) specifications. These specifications include sensor accuracy, sensor placement, station siting and specialised data formats, such as METAR and SYNOP.”

      22

      • #
        crakar24

        Found this

        http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/change/acorn-sat/documents/ACORN-SAT_Observation_practices_WEB.pdf

        and read this!!!!

        Maximum and minimum in-glass thermometers
        purchased for network use have never been calibrated
        or verified by the Bureau’s metrology laboratory,
        and not field checked during an inspection. The
        0900 check is the only verification process for these
        thermometers.

        Still reading all the gory details

        80

        • #
          crakar24

          Further to my last, they did improve as of 1974

          From 1974, ordinary MiG thermometers were batch
          tested by the Bureau metrology laboratory according
          to the Bureau standards in place at the time (Easson
          2011, pers. comm.). These tests were performed to
          determine which of the thermometers was suitable
          for further testing and ultimately for use in site
          inspections. Those identified as potentially suitable
          for use as inspection thermometers were calibrated
          by the metrology laboratory. Those likely MiG
          inspection thermometers were calibrated across the
          temperature range of likely use required to measure
          the temperature in laboratory conditions with less than
          a 0.1 °C deviation from the scale read temperature.
          The majority of ordinary MiG thermometers that did
          not meet inspection thermometer performance in the
          first instance or were rejected during the calibration
          process were transferred to the supply store for ordinary SAT observations

          So the bad thermometers were used to measure the temps, but at least they started to check them.

          40

          • #
            crakar24

            I like this

            While it is possible to provide a calibration certificate
            for each probe with a likely 95% uncertainty of
            <0.02 °C using either tabulated or polynomial
            coefficient corrections, no calibration data were
            used for field PRTs. Currently there is no method
            to incorporate these coefficients into the AWS for
            routine measurement process, as a fixed resistance
            to temperature conversion is part of the system
            firmware.

            I have used LEMO connectors and whilst they are a good connector (they are keyed so numpties cant plug them into the wrong hole) you need to solder the wire onto the connector pin which will have resistance. I would have thought they would calibrate each PRT whilst in the screen to ensure there is no stray resistance.

            Also it seems they only measure down to -10 so the Goulburn and Thredbo PRTS are as we say in the trade “shagged”. Hence why the BOM jacked the temp up in the first place.

            41

            • #
              crakar24

              LOL, LOL, LOL EFFING LOL

              Third, it would require introduction of an internal or
              external audit framework to enable demonstration
              rather than assumption of tolerance compliance.
              Typically this would entail the metrology laboratory
              and site protocols and procedures being accredited
              under ISO 17025 or similar. Note ISO 9001 does
              not require technical competence to be audited
              successfully and therefore would be unsuitable to
              maintain the required uncertainty.
              Hence, while possible, it would require a significant
              investment in metrology, quality systems and data
              infrastructure well above the current capability and
              capacity.

              They don’t have this system in place as of now??????????

              50

              • #

                check what 17025 labs are available (obviously no need to check prior to the existence of 17025) that perform temperature calibrations. I’d be surprised if there were not plenty and therefore no excuse to comply to ISO standards with NIST certified or whatever is required.

                Ah the joy of nata

                11

    • #
      Mikky

      1. Bring up some data for a station of interest using Climate Data Online, such as this for Charleville Aero:

      http://www.bom.gov.au/jsp/ncc/cdio/wData/wdata?p_nccObsCode=36&p_display_type=dataFile&p_stn_num=044021

      2. Click on DETAILS on the right-hand side of the page

      3. Click on Basic Site Summary (pdf) near the bottom of the page, this contains details of equipment used for recent years.

      10

  • #
    pat

    beyond hilarious.

    no mention in summary that BoM Affair will be discussed.
    first six minutes is all about how the 77-80 more “climate scientists” are needed because, at present, they can’t forecast rainfall, coastal sea rise etc, without them.
    Fran is a bit surprised they know nothing. it should be basic climate science, as far as she is concerned! especially as she’s been reporting false predictions for years, I guess.

    then, at 6 mins, Fran moves on to BoM/Goulburn/Thredbo/mentions earlier accusations.
    (closely paraprhasing)
    FRAN: is there a problem that you are aware of, with the basic science of climate science just getting the raw numbers right?

    (PEARMAN NEVER ADDRESSES THE QUESTION AT ALL. BESIDES, IT’S ALL JUST A ***”SCIENTIFIC ENDEAVOUR”)

    PEARMAN: I don’t think there is. the process of actually recording long-term changes, whether temperature, rainfall, the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere, is a serious ***scientific endeavour so, when you get a measurement, it’s a little bit like when you get your water bill and you find it’s very different from what you expect. the first thing you do is to reject it, & say this can’t be right, & then you go and look around and see if you have a pipe leaking somewhere and, when you find that isn’t the case, then you accept that the measurement is correct.

    And I think that’s what has probably happened with the Bureau. they will have a protocol that says they accept the data after we are absolutely certain that there wasn’t some extraneous factor that affected this particular piece of information.

    But look, the question of whether the climate is changing, is based not only on BoM but on measurements that are made by hundreds of stations all around the world, to say nothing of the fact we now have almost daily measurements from satellites, and we also have measurements that exist in the ocean down to thousands of metres, and we know the amount of heat that is accumulating in the oceans. it’s absolutely clear that the climate is warming, and the consequences of that into the future need to be as clearly as possible articulated to the people who will be affected.

    FRAN: and measured, and that brings us back to your report.

    AUDIO: 8mins49ses: 3 Aug: ABC Breakfast: Fran Kelly: Funding & direction of Australian climate science research needs an overhaul: Academy of Science
    Australian climate science research is not currently providing the answers that farmers, local councils and all levels of government need to make decisions on future climate variability and risk…
    Guest:
    Dr. Graeme Pearman, Professorial Fellow at the School of Earth Sciences at the University of Melbourne, co-author, AAS Climate Science Capability Review; Chief, CSIRO Division of Atmospheric Research 1992 to 2002.
    http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/breakfast/climate-science-research-needs-an-overhaul-academy-of-science/8769378

    10

  • #
    David Maddison

    We have fake news and fake science and lying politicians.

    It’s difficult to believe anything any more.

    192

  • #
    richard verney

    [Anthony] Watts says a solution would be to calculate temperature trends from stations that have a long record, no moves, no equipment changes, no time-of-observation changes, and remain free of nearby infrastructure encroachment.

    “Choosing only stations like this ensures that there is no need for adjustment of data, and that this data is representative of the true changes in the surface temperature over time,” he says.

    “Until the existing data quality problem is fixed, which has created an artificial warming bias, it is nonsense for the mass media to promote the idea of any year being the ‘warmest year on record’ ”.

    I have been saying similar for a long time, but what needs to be done in addition is to retrofit these prime stations with the same LIG thermometer used by the station in the 1930/1940s and calibrated in Fahrenheit or Centigrade as appropriate at the station in question and then observe using the same TOB as used by that station in the 1930s/1940s.

    There would be no attempt to make a global or hemisphere data set, just simply compare each station’s RAW data with the RAW data collected by that station in the 1930s/1940s.

    If we were to do this we would quickly get a feel as to whether the stations have truly warmed since their earlier historic highs of the 1930s/1940s and the approximate order of any change.

    A comparison with 1930/1940 is a sensible comparison since we know that this was a warm period, and because approximately 95% of all manmade CO2 emissions have taken place since then.

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  • #
    RossP

    This story is going quite a bit further outside Australia –even Zerohedge had piece on it. Instead of more climate scientists BOM might need more damage control PR spinners.

    80

  • #
    Mark M

    With the fate of the planet at stake, you’d think the BoM would want to release all data available and welcome transparency.

    80

  • #
    pat

    still nothing on BoM Affair, but plenty of space for this blatant push…

    3 Aug: SMH: Julien Vincent: This is the climate risk jolt that super funds need
    Enough of the gentle nudges and warning signs from regulators and leaders in the investment community. Superannuation fund trustees are legally obliged to consider climate change risk and that’s that.
    That at least is the opinion from Noel Hutley SC and James Mack, as reported by Fairfax Media today. The opinion makes it clear that climate change is a financial risk and trustees have a duty to consider it as such.

    Earlier this year, Australian Prudential Regulatory Authority’s (APRA) executive board member Geoff Summerhayes described climate change as “distinctly financial in nature”, “foreseeable, material and actionable now”, and having “potential system-wide implications”.

    If this view is shared by Australian super funds, they do a great job of hiding it from the public. ***Market Forces reviewed public disclosures of the 100 largest funds in Australia and found that 82 per cent had disclosed little to no evidence that they were considering climate risk…

    Summerhayes’ speech, the Financial Stability Board’s Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures and the view from Hutley and Mack all talk about climate change as a financial risk…READ ALL
    (FOR THOSE WHO GET TO THE BOTTOM OF THE ARTICLE, AUTHOR DISCLOSURE: Julien Vincent is executive director of ***Market Forces)
    http://www.smh.com.au/business/energy/this-is-the-climate-risk-jolt-that-super-funds-need-20170802-gxnwst.html

    ***no mention Market Forces is affiliated with Friends of the Earth or that Noel Hutley SC and James Mack opinion was commissioned by Market Forces/FoE in the above!

    3 Aug: SMH: Caitlin Fitzsimmons: Most super funds failing to disclose climate risk
    The $2.3 trillion superannuation industry is so woeful in its disclosure of climate risk that trustees could be in breach of their legal duties.
    Sixty of the 100 biggest super funds, or three out of five, have no disclosure of climate risk at all, according to the August report by Market Forces, an affiliate project of environmental group ***Friends of the Earth…

    A new legal opinion by Noel Hutley SC and James Mack, commissioned by ***Market Forces, reinforces that trustee directors of super funds are legally obliged to consider climate change risks to the extent they intersect with members’ financial interests. This does not include self-managed funds.
    The lawyers found the directors should source, consider and weigh relevant information relating to climate change risk and record their decision making processes…

    A spokeswoman for industry group, the Association of Superannuation Funds of Australia, said superannuation fund trustees were “best placed to consider how to manage risks, including climate”.
    She noted the government was introducing a disclosure regime from 2019 that would require detailed public disclosure of funds’ investment decisions…READ ALL
    http://www.smh.com.au/money/super-and-funds/most-super-funds-failing-to-disclose-climate-risk-20170802-gxnpj9.html

    forewarned is forearmed.

    30

    • #
      TdeF

      You have to love the names of the pushers of Climate Change. Weatherill and Summerhayes.

      100

    • #

      At least some Superannuation/retirement funds are investing their money in power plants other than renewables.

      I mean, take just two plants in Queensland, both of them SuperCritical, one level of technology lower than HELE USC, two of the four most modern coal fired plants in Australia, all of them in Queensland.

      Callide C and Milmerran.

      Both are part owned by a super/retirement company.

      They call themselves Intergen, you know, to have an ….. energy word in their title, or perhaps to distract from the real names of the owners.

      Intergen owns almost 30% of Milmerran power plant, and around 25% of Callide C.

      InterGen is jointly owned by the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan and China Huaneng Group/Yudean Guandong Group, which has owned both plants since construction Milmerran in 2003, and Callide C in 2001.

      The remaining part of Callide C is owned by another corporation with the word energy in their title, CS energy, a Queensland government owned corporation.

      And the other two SuperCritical plants Kogan Creek, owned by CS Energy, and Tarong North, owned by Stanwell Corporation, another Queensland government owned corporation.

      Queensland Government 50% renewables by 2030?????

      WTF and cut their own thr0ats.

      50% renwable by 2030. Go hard! because at the moment it’s 96% coal fired at 4AM every morning.

      Hey look over there, isn’t that Britney Spears?

      Tony.

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  • #
    pat

    29 Jul: Youtube: 18mins15secs: Tony Heller: Extreme Heatwave Fraud At The New York Times
    On July 28, 2017 the New York Times published a spectacular fake news story about heatwaves, where every single one of their “facts” was inverted from reality.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=41Cv7MJYZKI

    1 Aug: WaPo: 59,000 farmer suicides in India over 30 years may be linked to climate change, study says
    By Vidhi Doshi
    Every year, thousands of Indian farmers commit suicide. Now one researcher thinks it may have something to do with climate change.
    Tamma Carleton, a researcher at the University of California at Berkeley, compared almost five decades worth of suicide and climate data and concluded that temperature variations in India may have “a strong influence” on suicide rates during the growing season.

    In her study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, Carleton estimates that more than 59,000 farmer suicides over the past 30 years can be linked to global warming…
    According to Indian authorities, bankruptcy and indebtedness or farming-related issues are cited as the major causes of suicide among farmers in India…
    https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2017/08/01/59000-farmer-suicides-in-india-over-three-decades-may-be-linked-to-climate-change-study-says/?utm_term=.6a7b059cc239

    2 Aug: WaPo: Chelsea Harvey: Unchecked climate change could bring extremely dangerous heat to South Asia, scientists warn
    Extreme temperatures in South Asia could reach dangerous thresholds by the end of the century if we don’t curb our greenhouse gas emissions, according to an alarming new study…
    “These are people who did not contribute to the root cause of the [climate] problem,” noted Elfatih Eltahir, a hydrology and climate expert at MIT and one of the study’s authors. “The accumulated emissions have been contributed primarily by the rich fraction of the world’s population.”…

    Above certain temperature and humidity thresholds the body can no longer function properly and will eventually die…
    In the new study, which was published Wednesday in the journal Science Advances, the researchers focus on what is known as “wet bulb” temperatures, an index that accounts for both air temperature and humidity…
    https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2017/08/02/unchecked-climate-change-could-bring-extremely-dangerous-heat-to-south-asia-scientists-warn/?utm_term=.5094813516fc

    31 Jul: Daily Caller: Grace Carr: ‘Existential Threat’: Vanity Fair Points Out Major Problem Facing NYT And WaPo
    Vanity Fair designated the growing number of people who don’t trust what they read in The Washington Post and The New York Times as an “existential threat” to the two media organizations in the September issue of the magazine…
    Warren cites a 2017 Pew poll showing that only 20 percent of adults trust what they read from national news organizations like the NYT and WaPo…
    http://dailycaller.com/2017/07/31/existential-threat-vanity-fair-points-out-major-problem-facing-nyt-and-wapo/

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  • #
    David Maddison

    Here’s an idea.

    Could independent investigators like us set up our own weather stations near BoM ones and compare the results?

    We would only need to measure temperature as that is the only questionable measurement as far as we know.

    What do you think?

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      Curious George

      Sure you can, if the landowner permits. Then you get your own data, which will not be peer-reviewed, and will generally be sneered upon. Finally they will dismiss all your data for a bad siting.

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    Geoffrey Williams

    I have a dilemma and could use some advice. My wife and I will be meeting some friends tonite at the theatre.
    One of them is a retired physics professor from Macquarie University and another is an auditor (the money kind) with the Clean Energy Commissioner. My wife is begging me not bring up the climate in conversation. In the past it used to be so easy talking about weather but these days it can start a war of words. Wish me luck . . .
    GeoffW

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      Curious George

      Here goes the Golden Rule of English conversation …

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      Reed Coray

      You’re probably smart to stay away from climate as a topic of discussion. If you have a moment of weakness, ask the retired physics professor if “heat can be trapped?” If he says yes, ask him what material/substance “traps heat,” and why don’t we make hot coffee thermos bottles out of that material/substance?

      20

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    Mark M

    Sun’s impact on climate change quantified for first time

    For the first time, model calculations show a plausible way that fluctuations in solar activity could have a tangible impact on the climate.

    Studies funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation expect human-induced global warming to tail off slightly over the next few decades.

    A weaker sun could reduce temperatures by half a degree.

    https://phys.org/news/2017-03-sun-impact-climate-quantified.html

    40

    • #
      David Maddison

      Surely it is obvious that the sun is the primary driver of climate anyway, along with Milankovitch Cycles?

      This sort of stuff used to be taught when I was in Grade 6.

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  • #
    Geoffrey Williams

    On topic this time but I trust that any auditing of the ACORN data would be carried out by independent meteorologists and statisticians.
    We don’t want any sort of a white wash or a group of number crunchers without experience. Where do we find them and who would be appointing them?
    GeoffW

    30

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    el gordo

    Two independent characters chosen by BoM would be unacceptable, a red and blue team battling it out in public would be ideal.

    51

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    pat

    can’t have an independent review/audit of BoM, and can’t accept the red team/blue team scenario in the US:

    2 Aug: Vox: Scott Pruitt’s terrible plan to “objectively” assess climate science
    We should use “red team exercises” to respond to climate change, not deny it.
    by David Roberts (Grist)
    The way Pruitt reportedly plans to do it is, he will assemble a team of climate “skeptics,” who doubt some or all of the results of mainstream climate science, to be one team. Another group of climate scientists would defend the existing body of research, as the blue team…
    This is, for many, many obvious reasons, a terrible idea…

    As many scientists and others have already pointed out, science basically is one giant, slow-moving red-team exercise, and it’s working just fine. Scientists spend a great deal of time scrutinizing one another’s work. Correcting or amending important work can make a scientific career.

    There is always the possibility of cultural bias in peer review, as there is in everything, but there is no evidence, at long last, after years of attacks, that the many disciplines that fall under the rubric “climate science” face any unique problems in that regard, or have ignored significant results…

    No body of science has been more reviewed and stress-tested than climate science. The most-cited list of skeptics hasn’t changed in years, in some cases for decades. They are kept in the public eye entirely through the efforts of an organized ideological campaign, but they rarely add to their ranks.

    Trump’s a denier, Pruitt’s a denier, and the whole point of the exercise is denialist…
    They have not thought a lot about climate science, certainly not about systemic weaknesses in the peer review process. They don’t even really know what those words mean…
    https://www.vox.com/energy-and-environment/2017/8/2/16082020/pruitt-red-team-exercise

    2 Aug: HuffPo: Magic Scott’s Misdirection: Pruitt Gives Climate Science The Reality Show Treatment
    by Keith Gaby, Senior Comms Dir (Climate/Health), Environmental Defense Fund & EDF Action
    Like a magician who distracts the audience to accomplish his trick, Scott Pruitt has decided to stage an exercise pitting the well-established science of climate change against a grab bag of fringe theories…

    Like Pope Gregory trying Galileo, OJ searching for the real killers, or President Trump looking for 3 million illegal votes, the “Red Team-Blue Team” exercise is a show based on everything but reality…

    Pruitt claims he simply wants to test current climate science, but he ignores one of the most fundamental facts about how science works: Our current knowledge about the way pollution is causing dangerous changes to our climate comes from decades of testing, researching, and challenging by thousands of scientists worldwide.

    Climate science is not speculation devised by a clever professor alone in his study – it’s based on satellite images, ice core samples, temperatures records, sea level measurements, and millions of other data points across the globe since long before we put a man on the moon. The conclusions have been challenged and refined and challenged and refined countless times.

    The only result of pretending to now “test” it in one highly publicized event will be to confuse the public that the long and rigorous scientific process is somehow on equal footing with the dubious theories that will be arrayed against it…

    So what would a legitimate climate science exercise look like?
    1. It would not be organized by officials who have a political motivation for seeding doubt, as Mr. Pruitt and President Trump have clearly demonstrated, but by scientific leaders in the field.
    2. It would acknowledge data that has been established by the international scientific community, NASA, the National Academies of Science, and every major American Scientific organization – and move on to important open questions…ETC ETC

    Treating Mr. Pruitt’s reality show like a legitimate exercise in scientific inquiry could do serious damage. It will set back our effort to solve this problem and create confusion about well-established facts. That increases the likelihood that we’ll leave an even greater burden to our children.
    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/magic-scotts-misdirection-pruitt-gives-climate-science_us_59822d70e4b094ff5a3f0b74

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      Ted O'Brien.

      Who pays Keith Gaby?

      And who reads the HuffPost?

      They are certainly obsessed with anti Trump mania!

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    old44

    “I would have thought minus 10 would have been well within their scope. They take automatic weather stations down to Macquarie Island and Antarctica, I can’t understand this at all.”

    We can.

    “It seems to me they have some sort of automatic collection system in the computer; once the data comes in, they check on it then. I don’t know why they would be doing that at that stage.

    We do.

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    Robert Rosicka

    Just talking to someone who works at an altitude where snow is common , last winter and most they have locks freeze up and can’t leave cars with hand brakes on due to freezing and sticking but this year so far none of these things have been a problem .

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    EyesWideOpen

    When you’re mentioned by name, Jo, you’re surely over the target.

    Drop all munitions in truth bomb bay … time to blanket truth bomb the BoM.

    No crooked organization can survive the scrutiny of transparency.

    !!! INDEPENDENT AUDIT NOW !!! … take no prisoners on this one.

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    pat

    ***so their work has been improper up til now?

    3 Aug: TheConversation: Australia needs dozens more scientists to monitor climate ***properly, report says
    by Michael Hopkin, Environment + Energy Editor, The Conversation
    Australia is falling short in its ability to monitor the climate, potentially leaving farmers and other groups unable to access crucial information about rainfall, droughts and floods, the Australian Academy of Science has warned…

    Without these resources, Australia risks being unable to provide accurate information to those who need it, said UNSW oceanographer Trevor McDougall, who led the review…
    Although the review says Australia is strong in some areas, such as studying extreme weather events, it identified several key shortcomings, particularly in climate modelling…

    “Other countries are not looking in detail at our country – we need to run those models ourselves,” Professor McDougall said.
    “These requirements are brought into sharper focus when you consider that our country is potentially more exposed to the impacts of climate change than most developed nations.”…

    Julie Arblaster, an atmospheric scientist at Monash University and co-author of the review, said Australian climatologists do not have enough access to the supercomputing facilities needed to run advanced climate models. “We need to look at multiple models from all around the world, but at the moment there isn’t the funding available,” she said…

    Australia currently has 420 full-time equivalent positions in climate change science and monitoring, spread across CSIRO, the Bureau of Meteorology, the Institute of Marine Science, Geoscience Australia, and universities…

    McDougall: “My guess is that we would be able to recruit more than half from inside Australia – we have quite a good crop of people who are early in their career. There are also Australians working overseas, waiting for their opportunity to come back.”
    http://theconversation.com/australia-needs-dozens-more-scientists-to-monitor-climate-properly-report-says-81958

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    pat

    229 comments at time of posting:

    3 Aug: Australian: Graham Lloyd: More BoM weather stations put on ice
    The bureau has confirmed automatic weather stations at Tuggeranong in the ACT, Butlers Gorge and Fingal in Tasmania, and Mt Baw Baw in Victoria would also be ­replaced. The stations sit in areas where the climate record indicates it might reasonably be ­expected to reach below minus 10C.
    “It is important to note preliminary analysis has found no outages related to this issue at these sites,” a bureau statement said yesterday…

    He (former head of the bureau’s national climate centre, William Kininmonth) supported the use of bureau engineering staff to contribute to the review.
    “It is a pretty narrow field and the bureau is probably most experienced there,” Mr Kininmonth said.
    “To say you have got to have a totally independent review is to imply that the engineers and so forth within the bureau are acting dishonestly.
    “I don’t think that is the case.”
    http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/climate/more-bureau-of-meteorology-weather-stations-put-on-ice/news-story/0412a1aa5ab48d588fa71df90763aba2

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    pat

    amazing how this insanity manages to include a dig at coal!

    2 Daily Wire: Gore: ‘Climate Change’ Is A ‘Moral And Spiritual Issue’
    Global warming industry leader co-hosts propagandistic CNN infomercial with Anderson Cooper
    By Robert Kraychik
    Gore praised Pope Francis for hyping “climate change” as an existential threat to humanity and framed his proposals for increasing centralization of political control over human behavior to combat “climate change” as a Christian calling.

    “Now I was taught in my church that the purpose of life is to glorify God and if we are heaping contempt on God’s creation, then we’re not living up to the duty that God is calling us to,” said Gore. “The way we live our lives is definitely connected to this … It’s not a political issue, it is a moral and spiritual issue.”…

    FROM TRANSCRIPT:
    COOPER: Mr. Vice President, I want you to meet Father John Rausch. He’s a Catholic priest in the Appalachian mountains of Kentucky and a member of the Glenmary Home Missioners. Father Rausch, welcome…
    RAUSCH: …Appalachia has really fueled the prosperity of America for a long time, through its coal and other natural resources. Now, many people in Appalachia have done very well by that, and we have some very terrific middle-class people in Appalachia. There are many who are living in poverty, and they’re not only living in poverty, they’re living right next to polluted streams and mountains that have been destroyed.
    So my question, Mr. Vice President, how can we influence people to see a spiritual connection in their consumer habits that they can see the consequences of their buying, those consequences have on people in Appalachia and also in other parts of God’s kingdom?…

    GORE: Well, thank you, Father.
    And thank you for what you do. I’m a Protestant, but I’ll tell you, because of Pope Francis, I really could become a Catholic…
    And one way to answer your question would be for people in all faith traditions to read “Laudato Si,” the encyclical from Pope Francis, which really addressed the question that you’re asking here…
    http://www.dailywire.com/news/19264/gore-climate-change-moral-and-spiritual-issue-robert-kraychik#

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  • #

    “The Australian: BoM faces storm over weather data inaccuracies” links to a paywall. Would it be possible to copy the article and put it somewhere, e.g. https://pastebin.com/?

    20

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    Peyton Walton

    At what point do “adjustments” become fraud…?

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      tom0mason

      Peyton,

      “At what point do “adjustments” become fraud…?”

      In any public bank (or publicly listed company) the basic parameters for appraising whether or not it is doing its job correctly is the figures as stated in the audited accounts. All adjustments to those basic figures MUST be fully explained (and often independently verified) or fraud may be suspected.

      With BOM its basic operating parameters are the weather records, including temperature records. The only method to confirm that they are doing their job correctly is to audit the records (including equipment calibration records) and have all adjustments explained and verified. Anything less and fraud must be suspected.

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        Greg Cavanagh

        I’m guessing there are specific laws covering “adjustments” to financial accounts.

        But no such laws covering “adjustments” to recorded temperature data. Even thought the financial burden placed upon everyone has been far more significant.

        This needs to gain legs.

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    Another Ian

    On the other hand of heating up

    “Weather Station Data Shows One Billion Chinese Are Living Through A 20-Year Cooling Trend”

    https://wattsupwiththat.com/2017/08/03/weather-station-data-shows-one-billion-chinese-are-living-through-a-20-year-cooling-trend/

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  • #

    It’s a total mess!

    “The glaring lack of readily available and accessible datasets from global to local scales is
    hampering our knowledge of long-term climate variability and change”

    “Furthermore, long-term, high-quality, homogeneous and in this context reliable climate datasets
    are needed before undertaking any climatic analysis, particularly those aiming to assess climate
    variability and change. However, it is well known that long climatological time series often contain
    variations that are not only due to the vagaries of the weather or climate. Mostly these variations
    are related to non-climatic factors, such as the introduction of new instrumentation, relocation of
    weather stations, changes in exposure of instruments or in observing practices, modification of the
    environment surrounding the meteorological stations, etc. At the same time, wrong or aberrant
    observations are common in most observational systems”

    “All these factors reduce the quality of
    original data and compromise their homogeneity. Some of these changes can be the cause of the
    presence of outliers and abrupt discontinuities in the time series (i.e. stations relocations, changes
    in exposures, in formulae used to calculate averages, changes in observing times, etc.) while
    others can induce artificial trends or gradual biases in the data (i.e. changes in the environment
    around the station such as new developments, growing trees gradually shading instruments, urban
    heat island effects, impacts related to the development of new irrigated fields around the stations,
    etc.), all widely recognized in the relevant scientific literature and recently assessed in the
    WMO/WCDMP’s Guidance on Metadata and Homogeneity (Aguilar et al., 2003). ”

    http://www.omm.urv.cat/MEDARE/docs/WCDMP_Spain_case_study-cor_ver_6_March.pdf

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    Another Ian

    Around this area

    “The Data Adjustment Bureau”

    http://www.smalldeadanimals.com/2017/08/the-data.html

    20

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    Robber

    O/T but what happened to SA electricity supplies yesterday?
    From 9am spot prices were around $350/MWhr and mostly stayed that way until 1.30pm.
    Market Notice 58930
    AEMO ELECTRICITY MARKET NOTICE
    Refer AEMO ELECTRICITY MARKET NOTICE 58915 & 58916
    AEMO has been advised by the TNSP, the problem associated with the South East 275 kV SVC1 and SVC2 has been rectified.
    AEMO has cancelled the reclassification of the simultaneous trip of South East 275 kV SVC1 and SVC2 as a credible contingency event.
    Constraint set S-X_SE_SVC was revoked at 1245 hrs.
    This constraint set contains equations with the following interconnector on the left hand side. V-SA

    As I interpret the notice, there was a threat that the major Vic-SA interconnector could trip, throwing SA into darkness again.
    At that time yesterday, wind was dropping from 200 MW to just 50 MW, and SA gas generation suddenly dropped from 1400 to 1200 MW so they were probably up against the 500 MW transfer limit.
    Can they fly those diesel generators in urgently?

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    Amber

    When you can’t trust the scientists you have a problem .
    Climate fudge is just killing the global warming fear industry .

    30

    • #
      Another Ian

      Amber

      There is that saying about being better to be of closed mouth and thought a fool than open it and remove all doubt.

      Like the toothpaste and the tube once the mouth is opened you can’t revert to pre-fool

      00

  • #
    Dennis

    Down Down Down

    Temp drop as BoM orders fix

    GRAHAM LLOYD
    Temperatures recorded at an automatic weather station have plunged since action was taken to make it ‘fit for purpose’.

    The Australian

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    pat

    4 Aug: Australian: Graham Lloyd: Temperatures plunge after BoM orders fix
    Recorded temperatures at the Bureau­ of Meteorology’s Thredbo Top automatic weather station have dropped below -10C in the past week, after action was taken to make the facility “fit for ­purpose”.
    A record of the Thredbo Top station for 3am on Wednesday shows a temperature reading of -10.6C…

    The BoM has admitted that, in addition to Goulburn and Thredbo Top, stations at Tuggeranong in the ACT, Butlers Gorge and Fingal in Tasmania and Mount Baw Baw in Victoria would be replace­d…

    It has been reported online that electronic smart cards were allegedly fitted to the BoM’s automatic weather stations, which put a limit on how low temperatures could be recorded in official weather data. The BoM declined to comment ahead of the internal review.
    “The findings of a review into this matter will be made available after completion,” a BoM repre­sentative said. “We do not intend to publish detail prior to that.
    “The AWS program is part of the observing systems and operations program, separate from the climate areas.”…

    On her website yesterday, Dr Marohasy said it was not the recording­ devices that were at fault. “To be clear, the problem is not with the equipment; all that needs to be done is for the smart-card readers to be removed,” Dr Marohasy said.

    “So that after the automatic weather stations measure the correct­ temperature, this temp­erature can be brought forward firstly into the daily weather observation sheet and subsequently into the CDO (climate data online) dataset.”

    Mr Frydenberg rejected any suggestion that he had prior knowledge of smart cards or the cause of problems which made the stations not fit for purpose. He said he only learnt of the issue with the weather station readings when it was raised by The Australian…
    “I’m treating this seriously and am determined to get to the bottom­ of what has happened. I look forward to receiving recommendations as to how we can ensure that the public’s confidence in climate data is maintained.”
    http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/climate/temperatures-plunge-after-bureau-orders-weather-station-fix/news-story/9230dd914ac532fa735700ffc7799203

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    • #
      Dennis

      Please somebody remind Mr Frydenberg that the PM Abbott Cabinet was informed of “errors and omissions” in BoM weather and climate media releases in 2014 and that BoM management promised that steps would be taken to ensure it did not continue.

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  • #
    Dennis

    It’s true, man made global warming up … see BoM Australia

    30

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    Dennis

    HAARP in Australia, there are a number of Google references to choose from but this one might interest people here;

    http://www.colinandrews.net/HAARP.html

    30

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    Robert Rosicka

    The great minds have been at work and have a solution for the impending energy crisis this summer .

    http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-08-04/power-bill-discounts-offered-to-switch-off-air-con-sa/8772370

    Again pure genius we’re all saved .

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    John Watt

    Assuming that Australian weather monitors are no more honest or dishonest that their overseas counterparts this topic indicates there should be doubt about all weather records? Who’s gonna tell Big Al?

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    pat

    Robert Rosicka’s ABC link is a must-read. theirABC gives it such a positive spin. of course, theirABC’s electricity bills are paid for by Australisn taxpayers.

    3 Aug: UK Telegraph: Jillian Ambrose: Ex-energy chiefs warn Big Six to ‘adapt or die’
    An influential six-strong group of former FTSE chief executives and policymakers has warned that traditional energy companies have already “chronically underestimated” the market’s pace of change and could lose out to a rising breed of tech-based rivals.

    In recent years the energy industry has seen a surge in the number of consumers harnessing renewable energy technology to generate their own energy. This trend is expected to accelerate in line with the emergence of internet-connected metering and appliances, as well as the Government’s backing for home batteries and electric vehicles.

    But the “digitisation” of energy could leave the door open for tech-giants who are better prepared to tap the changing industry to take market share from traditional energy suppliers.

    In order to survive Ian Marchant, the former boss of SSE, together with ex-National Grid boss Steve Holliday and Volker Beckers, who led RWE npower, have called for bold action from energy companies to adapt to the changing market place.

    Ed Davey, a former Energy Secretary, as well as long-time energy minister Charles Hendry and Joan MacNaughton, the head of energy at the former Department of Trade and Industry, also contributed to the report…

    Beckers: “I don’t see the Googles and Amazons wanting to enter the traditional electricity and gas markets, but they may enable new starters to be successful. I think we will see more of this. These technology innovators will keep the Big Six on their toes,” he said…
    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2017/08/02/ex-energy-chiefs-warn-big-six-adapt-die/

    Telegraph/Ambrose tell the reader nothing about the current status of all these characters, or their past CAGW form, for that matter, e.g.

    17 Jul: EnergyLiveNews(ELN): Volker Beckers becomes ELN Chairman
    The former CEO of npower Volker Beckers has joined Energy Live News (ELN) as Chairman…
    Mr Beckers is currently the Non-Executive Director at the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority as well as Non-Executive Chairman at Reactive Technologies and Albion Community Power, where he’s drumming up investments of £100 million of green projects…

    NOTE: Energy Live News: Sumit Bose
    Editor and co-founder. Sumit has more than two decades in journalism, firstly with National newspapers and then in broadcasting. He joined the BBC in 1993 as a reporter and presenter and has worked on all major news outlets including Breakfast, One and Six O’Clock News, 5Live, BBC News channel, BBC Three and World Service. He presented the BBC One current affairs strand Inside Out for five years…

    12 Jul: BBC: Swansea tidal lagoon review head Charles Hendry ‘hopeful’
    The author of an independent review into the planned Swansea Bay tidal lagoon said he remains hopeful the UK government will back the scheme.
    It is now six months since ex-energy minister Charles Hendry’s report was published, concluding that the £1.3bn lagoon would be a “no regrets” option…

    7 Jul: PowerEngineering: Nova Innovation leads €20m European tidal energy project
    The project, which begins this month and will run until June 2022, has been won as a competitive contract awarded by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme to develop marine energy sources and demonstrate technologies in European waters…
    The total project costs are expected to be €20.2m ($22m), of which the EU Horizon 2020 Programme will be contributing €14.9m…

    ***In 2013, IAN MARCHANT, former boss of SSE, one of the UK’s ‘Big Six’ utilities, joined the company as chairman…

    Horizon 2020 is the largest ever EU Research and Innovation programme with nearly €80bn of funding available over seven years…
    http://www.powerengineeringint.com/articles/2017/07/nova-innovation-leads-20m-european-tidal-energy-project.html

    Wikipedia: Ed Davey
    Davey’s appointment as Global Partner and non-Executive director of private equity investor Nord Engine Capital was announced in February 2016.
    In July 2016 he became non-paid patron of the Sustainable Futures Foundation, a charity promoting environmental sustainability for the public benefit…

    TheClimateGroup: Joan MacNaughton CB Hon FEI
    Chair of the Board, Europe/UK
    She is currently Chair of The Climate Group and of the Energy Academy of Europe. She sits on the Strategic Advisory Board of Engie UK and is a Director of the James Hutton Institute and a member of the Council of Warwick University…
    From 2011 to 2016, she was Executive Chair of the annual assessment of countries’ energy policies for the World Energy Council, the ‘Trilemma’, of which she is now Honorary Chair. She has served on the Board of Governors, Argonne Laboratory at the University of Chicago where she chaired the Budget Committee; the Boards of the Carbon Capture and Storage Association (CCSA), the International Emission Trading Association (IETA), and the Policy, Regulatory and Legal Steering Group of Global CCSI, and for six years was a Non Executive Director of a FTSE 250 company…ETC ETC ETC

    Wikipedia: Steve Holliday
    Holliday viewed the concept of baseload as “outdated”, as microgrids would become the primary means of production, and large powerplants relegated to supply the remainder…

    30 Jan: BBC: Roger Harrabin: UK ‘need not fear electricity blackouts’ says ex-National Grid boss
    The UK has enough energy capacity to meet demand – even on the coldest days when demand is highest, says Steve Holliday, the man who ran National Grid for a decade.
    He said news stories raising fears about blackouts should stop…
    Much of the back-up will be provided by old gas and coal plants that would otherwise be scrapped. Funded by the bill-payer, they will offer a sort of power insurance policy…
    Mr Holliday, who was chief executive of National Grid until July 2016, forecasts that all future talk of blackouts will be made redundant by a revolution in flexible electricity, with customers using power when it is cheapest…

    Sept 2016: CityAM: Steve Holliday to receive a bumper pension after 10 years leading National Grid
    The former chief exec of National Grid will be celebrating the start of his retirement next month by drawing down on a £11,000 a week pension that kicks-in on his 60th birthday…

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      pat has this in his text: (my bolding here)

      Mr Holliday, who was chief executive of National Grid until July 2016, forecasts that all future talk of blackouts will be made redundant by a revolution in flexible electricity, with customers using power when it is cheapest

      So, then what of the customers who require their power for 24 hours of every day? You know, 24 hour Industry and Commerce, every high rise, every Coles, Woolies, any place with cold storage, and the list goes on, and on, and on.

      60% PLUS of every watthour of power being consumed is required for 24 hours of every day.

      How the hell are those consumers going to use their power when its cheapest?

      Tony.

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      • #
        ROM

        .

        Mr Holliday, who was chief executive of National Grid until July 2016,

        Mr Holliday as chief executive of the National Grid was well enough paid and had a large enough Golden Handshake not to ever have to bother his tiny addled utterly self satisfied hypocritical brain cells, both of them, with ever having to cut back his electicity use and try and exist on the cheapest electricity if and when it was available.

        And so goes yet another unthinking, utterly ignorant of real life member of the arrogant, overpaid, utterly self centred, self congratulatory, smugly ignorant and overwhelmingly smug in their superiority to the common man, elite.

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    pat

    of course it will save billions, Fran:

    AUDIO: 4 Aug: ABC Breakfast: Phase in new carbon pollution standards for cars two years early: ClimateWorks
    Tough new carbon pollution standards are proposed for the 1.2 million passenger vehicles sold every year in Australia.
    A voluntary scheme was scrapped several years ago because it was ineffective, but the government is now looking at phasing in compulsory new standards from 2022.
    Submissions to the governments review of the proposed new light vehicle emissions standard close today.
    Think tank ClimateWorks Australia says the proposed new standard will save motorists billions in fuel costs, cut carbon pollution and speed up the roll out of Electric Vehicles in Australia.
    Guest:
    Scott Ferraro, Head of Implementation, ClimateWorks Australia
    http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/breakfast/phase-in-new-carbon-pollution-standards-for-cars-two-years-early/8773716

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    pat

    check the photo, caption admits it’s “steam” but pic taken as night falls or at dawn!

    2 Aug: Reuters: Vera Eckert: Germany’s long goodbye to coal despite Merkel’s green push
    Burning coal for power looks set to remain the backbone of Germany’s energy supply for decades yet, an apparent contrast to Chancellor Angela Merkel’s ambitions for Europe’s biggest economy to be a role model in tackling climate change.
    Merkel is avoiding the sensitive subject of phasing out coal, which could hit tens of thousands of jobs, in the campaign for the Sept. 24 election, in which she hopes to win a fourth term.

    Although well over 20 billion euros are spent each year to boost Germany’s green energy sector, coal still accounts for 40 percent of energy generation, down just 10 points from 2000.

    To avoid disruption in the power and manufacturing sectors, coal imports and mines must keep running, say industry lobbies, despite the switch to fossil-free energy.
    “(Coal) makes a big contribution to German and European energy supply security and this will remain the case for a long time to come,” the chairman of the coal importers’ lobby VDKi, Wolfgang Cieslik told reporters last week.
    He also stressed it was crucial for steel manufacturing in Germany, the seventh biggest producer in the world, that use a quarter of the country’s coal imports…

    “Merkel … has no right to criticize the disastrous climate production policy of U.S. President Trump … figures in this country speak for themselves,” said former Green lawmaker Franz-Josef Fell, referring to Overseas Development Institute (ODI) figures showing the extent of public money going to coal…

    Apart from the environmentalist Greens, who want coal generation to end by 2030, none of the main political parties have set phase-out target dates…
    But plants burning imported hard coal still make up 17 percent and brown coal from domestic mines 23 percent of power output.
    Cheap coal lets them run at full tilt when necessary while the weather dictates if wind and solar produce anything at all…

    VDKi warns that nuclear energy, accounting for 14 percent of power, will remove even more of the round-the-clock supply when it is phased out by 2022.
    Wind and solar cannot even fill current gaps and a system run mainly on green power would fail to provide guaranteed supply over a winter fortnight, it says.
    Power grid operator Amprion has said German networks came close to blackouts during settled and overcast conditions in January when renewable plants produced almost nothing…

    Even environmental groups acknowledge the fossil fuel lobbies have a point, arguing there must be remedies to the problem of intermittent renewable supply…
    http://www.reuters.com/article/us-germany-coal-election-idUSKBN1AI1HF

    is theirABC planning to report the above?

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    ROM

    Just checked my memory of the debacle in German weather temperature recording when the Germans switched from the mercury / alchohol thermometers to the solid state temperature measuring sensors.

    From Pierre Gosselin’s; german to english translation NoTricksZone blog.

    Dated; January 2015.

    Weather Instrumentation Debacle? Analysis Shows 0.9°C Of Germany’s Warming May Be Due To Transition To Electronic Measurement

    Klaus Hager also has a website. At this website he posted a meteorological bulletin, which he authored and was published as an annex to the Berliner Wetterkarte (Berlin Weather Chart).

    That bulletin was about the results of his eight and a half year study where he compared in a side-by-side test the former glass mercury thermometers with the newer electronic thermometers, which were installed during the 1980s and 1990s by Germany’s DWD German Weather Service.

    Results of 8.5 year side-by-side test

    Hager compared the two different measurement systems side by side at the GeiInfoAdvisory Office of Fliegerhorst Lechfeld from January 1, 1999 to Jul 31, 2007.
    The following is a plot of the differences between the two measurement methods:
    .
    [ graph ]
    .
    Figure 1: Differences in the daily maximum temperatures from the Pt 100 compared to glass thermometers for 3124 days (ca. 8.5 years) conducted at the GeiInfoAdvisory Office of Fliegerhorst Lechfeld (from 4) – mean difference 0.93°C. Figure from Rengelink, 2012)

    Clearly the electronic thermometers produced warmer readings than the mercury thermometers.

    Worse, Hager says, the German DWD Weather Service did not adequately investigate the two different measuring systems and compare them, writing that:

    Although the DWD set up so-called climate reference stations at (way to few) locations and published the studies from the comparison measurements, the results unfortunately were not satisfactory. Here not the “old data was compared to the new data”, instead only the electronic thermometer was investigated in various locations, but were not compared with the glass thermometers, which are readily at hand.”

    Hager provides an example illustrating why one must be very wary when comparing data from the new electronic instrumentation to data taken from the old mercury thermometers.

    [ graph;]

    Figure 2: Pt 100 measurements taken on 12 November 2005 at Fliegerhorst Lechfeld (WMO 10856) station. Red curve (upper) is the measurement sensor of the aluminum enclosure, showing daily mean temperature of 5.9°C. Blue curve (lower) is the Stevenson screen, showing daily mean temperature of only 5.2°C.

    Hager writes:

    Differing daily measured values from the old and new sensors for temperature measurement spurred the author [Hager] to conduct a comparison spanning from January 1, 1999 to July 31, 2006 at Fliegerhorst Lechfeld (WMO 10856) 8-1/2 years long, daily without interruption, among other comparison tests of mercury maximum glass thermometers in a Stevenson screen and a Pt 100 resistance thermometer inside an aluminum enclosure, both unventilated.

    The 3144 days yielded a mean difference of +0.93°C; the Pt 100 was higher than the mercury thermometer.

    The maximum daily difference even reached 6.4°C!

    More>>

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    pat

    2 Aug: UKTelegraph: Steven Swinford: Green energy taxes to treble in five years
    The cost of green taxes on energy bills will more than treble over the next five years, the official economic forecaster has said.
    The Office for Budget Responsibility said that cost of the subsidies, which are levied on household and business energy bills, is expected to rise from £4.6billion in 2015-16 to £13.5billion in 2021-22.

    It comes after British Gas claimed that green taxes will cost households £150 from next year as it blamed the Government for a huge rise in electricity bills…
    British Gas forecast that the cost of the subsidies, which are used to fund renewable sources of energy such as wind and solar, will hit £149 next year having risen by by two-thirds since 2014…

    Michael Gove, the Environment Secretary, has signalled that more wind farms may need to be built to power a new generation of electric cars under Government plans to ban the sale of diesel and petrol vehicles. Asked about wind energy, he said that “we have no alternative to embracing new technology”.
    However some Tory MPs have warned that the taxes are “regressive” and will penalise those who can least afford it…

    British Gas said that the cost of green subsidies levied on bills has created “significant pressures” and suggested that it had no choice but to respond by raising prices…
    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/08/02/green-energy-taxes-treble-five-years/

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    pat

    28 Jul: Daily Mail: Are smart meters to blame for house fires? Fears families are being put at risk after evidence suggests some engineers installing the devices don’t know what they are doing
    A rush to install energy smart meters in millions of homes could have triggered fires
    Evidence suggests some of the engineers hired to install the meters do not know what they are doing
    One employed by British Gas told a horrified couple: ‘Sorry, I’ve blown up your house’
    Details of two fires linked to the installation of smart meters were highlighted by the BBC Watchdog programme
    By Sean Poulter

    One couple, Paul and Lou Lynch, from Enfield, north London, said a tenant in a flat they own witnessed a British Gas engineer get into difficulties as he was installing a smart meter.
    The gas supply ignited, setting the kitchen on fire. It was safely extinguished but the rest of the flat was smoke and water damaged and the tenant lost her possessions.
    Landlord Mr Lynch said: ‘Both myself and the fire officer were standing together when the gas engineer installing the meter … said ‘I am really sorry, I’ve blown up your house’.
    ‘It was devastating. You sit there and think – where do you start? Seven months after the fire, we are still in the same position.’

    Marina Devall, from North Wales, told the programme she had just gone outside her rented house to collect her car keys when it went up in flames. ‘There wasn’t anything we could do, so we just watched the house burn,’ she said.
    Three months later, Miss Devall is living in a caravan with her partner while the house is repaired.
    The fire service confirmed that the blaze began at her electrical distribution board.

    Her energy provider, Ovo Energy, which had installed a smart meter six months earlier, launched a full investigation and provided the caravan for her to live in, but has denied responsibility for the fire. It said there is ‘no evidence’ the smart meter was the cause.

    British Gas said its engineers get comprehensive training and blamed the Enfield fire on ‘human error’, adding: ‘This mistake had nothing to do with smart meter technology.’
    And the Government energy department, BEIS, said: ‘We work together with energy suppliers and network operators to continuously review safety trends and have seen no evidence of increasing safety risks.’
    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4737864/Are-smart-meter-blame-house-fires.html

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    Robert Rosicka

    If we have to give up cheap reliable energy to stop a half a degree of warming in 100 years , what is it going to cost us to stave off an ice age ?

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    Don A

    I inadvisedly entered in to a “conversation” with a global warmist as follows. I will not do that again.

    The Climate Council
    August 2 ·

    Temperature Anomalies 1900-2016
    Wait til the end

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    Don A

    Hmmm.I wonder what happened to the rest of it

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    • #
      Robert Rosicka

      No worries they have a cunning plan to get people to willingly turn off their aircons when needed .

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        David Maddison

        Yes. DRED technology. The power co will shut down air cons on hot days to shed load because, you know, wanting to be cool is selfish…and against the interests of the State.

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    pat

    this morning our time President Trump was in coal country, West Virginia.

    TWEET: Mariam Khan ABC America News: People are lining up hours in advance of Trump’s speech tonight. Organizers estimate more than 20k have RSVP’d. #HuntingtonWV

    3 Aug: TheStateJournal: Jim Ross: Trump rally crowd exchanges words, keeps its cool despite the heat
    President Donald Trump’s visit brought thousands of visitors to downtown Huntington, from nearby communities in Ohio and Kentucky and Trump fans all the way from Brooklyn to Louisiana…
    A few people had gathered at the Big Sandy Superstore Arena before the morning rush hour, but many more arrived in late morning for the 6 p.m. rally. The cloudless sky, the summer heat and the asphalt street where people stood in line contributed to more than 20 people being treated for heat-related problems, said Gordon Merry, director of Cabell County Emergency Medical Services…

    4 Aug: WestVirginiaMetroNews: Alex Thomas: Trump finds support at Huntington rally
    The president mentioned a recent analysis from the federal Bureau of Economic Analysis regarding GDP growth during the first quarter of the year. While the national growth was mixed and at an average of 2.6 percent, West Virginia’s was at 3 percent during the same time period.
    “I wonder how that happened,” Trump said. “West Virginia, you’re leading the average! When was the last time you heard that, West Virginia? You’re leading the country’s average.”…

    The president also mentioned the growth of the coal industry, noting the end of “the war on beautiful clean coal,” rollback of regulations and increase in coal exports.
    According to the U.S. Department of Labor, coal mining employment has increased by 1,100 jobs since November 2016. Reuters reported on July 28 coal exports have increased by 60 percent because of demand in Europe and Asia…

    Bob Murray, chief executive officer of Murray Energy Corp., said Trump is a pro-worker leader.
    “He’s a hero for the working people and he deeply cares about them,” he said. “That clearly came out in his message. I know the gentleman, and he does genuinely care about working people.”…

    3 Aug: TheStateJournal: Ann Ali: Trump energizes Huntington crowd
    The crowd of thousands Thursday evening at Big Sandy Superstore Arena didn’t need much fuel to fire it up, but the cheers got louder with each guest, culminating in rock-concert levels once President Donald Trump walked across the long platform to the sounds of “Take Me Home Country Roads.”…

    Before he even took to the podium, former Marshall University football coach Bob Pruett drew applause.
    “I’m here not as a coach and not as a politician,” Pruett said. “I’m here as a West Virginian.”…
    “He said he would help our coal miners and he has,” said Pruett, a long-time spokesman for the Friends of Coal organization…
    Trump told the crowd American exports of coal are already up 60 percent this year…

    Trump said since the election 1 million new jobs had been added, “and victories keep pouring in.” He then introduced West Virginia’s Democratic Gov. Jim Justice, who told the crowd he could no longer “help you anymore as a Democrat governor,” so he plans to change his party affiliation to Republican…

    “We are building our future with American hands, American labor, American ore, aluminum, steel, and what else? Coal,” (Trump) said…
    In closing, Trump told the crowd freedom will triumph and America will prevail.
    “American workers will build this great future and American energy and American clean coal will power this future,” he said. “Our nation will thrive as never before.”…

    3 Aug: AP: The Latest: W. Virginia gov. announces party switch to GOP
    Justice told about 9,000 Trump supporters at a rally in Huntington on Thursday night that he will be changing his registration Friday…
    He says that he recently visited the White House twice with proposals on manufacturing and coal, that neither he nor Trump are politicians, and they both ran to get something done…
    Trump says they spoke a few weeks ago about working together to open coal mines and create jobs in furniture manufacturing and other forms of manufacturing.
    He says Justice showed the country their agenda “rises above left or right.”…

    3 Aug: Breitbart: Adam Shaw: Trump Scorches D.C. Establishment in West Virginia: ‘We Don’t Need Advice from the Washington Swamp’
    “We don’t need advice from the Washington swamp,” he said to the electric crowd in Huntington, West Virginia. “We need to drain the swamp.”…
    He used the rally to tout his successes in office, including an all-time high on the stock market, a low unemployment rate, and his decisions to pull the U.S. out of the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the ***PARIS CLIMATE AGREEMENT…

    Signs, with campaign slogans like “Trump Digs Coal” and “Veterans for Trump” peppered the rally, along with the iconic red “Make America Great Again’ caps…
    Trump was given a boost by the presence of Democratic Gov. Jim Justice, who announced that he was defecting from the Democrats to join the Republican Party. The coal business owner and billionaire told the crowd that there was nothing more he could do for them as a Democrat…

    3 Aug: Daily Caller: Amber Athy: West Virginia Governor Changes Party Registration To Republican
    Justice’s party switch means Republicans now hold 34 state governorships, tying a record set in 1922…

    3 Aug: AmericansForTaxReform: Starting Tonight, GOP Will Have Full Control of 26 States
    West Virginia governor’s switch from Democrat to Republican means GOP will have full control of legislative and executive branch in 26 states; Dems have full control in just 6 states…
    Population of GOP-controlled states: 164,139,104
    Population of Dem-controlled states: 50,190,213

    3 Aug: WilliamsonDailyNews: Officials applaud mine proposal to create jobs in West Virginia, Virginia
    U.S. Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke this week applauded the initial construction of the Berwind Mine located on the border of West Virginia and Virginia, according to a news release from the U.S. Department of the Interior.
    The developers, Ramaco Resources, expect the mine to initially create 50 good-paying jobs and employ roughly 200 coal miners when the mine reaches its projected production level, the release stated.

    The Berwind Coal Reserve is estimated to contain about 72 million tons of clean recoverable metallurgical coal, which is critical for infrastructure and is used for steel, roads, bridges, and building construction.
    The Berwind Mine will produce about 800,000 tons per year and will create jobs in some of the hardest-hit areas of Appalachian region including McDowell County, W.Va., as well as Buchanan and Tazewell counties in Virginia, officials said…

    “Appalachia’s coal workers are at the heart of rebuilding our nation’s infrastructure because we can’t build if we don’t access our natural resources,” Zinke said. “Under President Trump’s leadership, the Department of the Interior is dedicated to being a good partner with local communities. This administration is dedicated to streamlining permitting and approval processes, and empowering local employees to get work done on the front lines. The Berwind Mine is the first of many projects that demonstrate the Trump Administration’s commitment to coal country and to good government.”

    Ramaco officials also praised the progress.
    “Coal mining jobs can be created and preserved by a more pragmatic approach to regulation. On behalf of the coal industry, we look forward to seeing better and more timely results from agencies who interact with coal mining.” said Michael Bauersachs, the CEO of Ramaco Resources.
    The West Virginia Coal Association (WVCA) sang President Trump’s praises for his administration’s commitment to rebuilding America’s coal communities.

    “Once again, President Trump has shown West Virginia coal miners that he meant it when he said he would help them get back to work,” said WVCA Vice President Jason Bostic. “This administration shows exactly how the federal government can be a partner with the states and facilitate coal mining development while still fulfilling its responsibilities to protect the environment.”

    ***U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin, (DEMOCRAT)-W.Va., said the Berwind mine is a good example of what can be achieved when government works as a partner with business.
    “We know that coal will be in the energy mix for decades to come, and I’m encouraged by the work of Secretary Zinke and the Fish and Wildlife Service in ensuring this project moves forward,” Manchin said. “This mine will produce 800,000 tons of clean recoverable metallurgical coal annually that will help rebuild our roads, bridges, and other critical infrastructure.”

    U.S. Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, R-WVa., said the Berwind Mine will help West Virginia improve and expand America’s energy potential.
    “It is great to see the public and private sectors working together to advance this project, and I appreciate the administration’s continued support in promoting a true all-of-the-above energy strategy – both in West Virginia and across the country,” she said.
    https://www.williamsondailynews.com/news/officials-applaud-mine-proposal-to-create-jobs-in-west-virginia/article_89c9a1a4-2280-597f-a255-71feda8bae0c.html

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    David Maddison

    Why are we letting politicians and public serpents make engineering decisions? None of these Green/Renewable schemes have any valid engineering analysis or purpose behind them, except for the deliberate destruction of the economy.

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      Another Ian

      David

      Have a read of the chapter “High Finance” on the atomic reactor in Parkinson’s Parkinson’s Law: or The Pursuit of Progress”

      Seems like things haven’t improved since 1958

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    David Maddison

    There is nothing fundamentally wrong with science but has something gone wrong with the way it’s taught in these times of Cultural Marxism? I think the answer is yes!

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    Bruce

    Thank you Jo and friends, this victory is doing my state of mind, a great deal of good.

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    Another Ian

    “Larry Ledwick says:
    4 August 2017 at 7:12 am

    On the silliness of the climate modeling and magic computer folks:

    http://dailycaller.com/2017/08/03/report-127-million-climate-supercomputer-no-better-than-using-a-piece-of-paper/

    https://chiefio.wordpress.com/2017/07/29/tips-august-2017/#comment-85462

    And BOM needs a more expensive computer?

    10