Whopper part II: Look what the BoM did to the last three Februarys in Australia?!

The Bureau of Meteorology did what to February?

Wow, just wow. Look what the Bureau of Meteorology has covertly done to February? Something like one third of a degree has been added to the average Australian summer maximum anomalies over the past few years according to the “expert” data from the worlds-best-practise equipment.

In the BOM Whopper Part 1 we revealed that in the BOM’s latest round of unannounced adjustments there were big increases in the rate of Australian summer warming. It turns out a lot of the summer rise comes from changes to February. Mysteriously, there were large changes to the national average of the last three years. Let that sink in.

These changes were incomprehensible because while the averaged “whole nation” got warmer, there were no changes to the data in any of the 104 individual stations.

It’s all rather spooky… but what it isn’t, is scientific.

The two main points in Bob Fernley Jones’ work:

  1. There are big increases to measurements recorded in the last three years? Why? Yet again, the adjustments are down in the early years, up in the latter years, and overall, the rate of warming, surprise, increases thanks to man-made adjustments. He points out that it makes no sense that modern equipment needs more adjustments than equipment from the 1960s? Somehow our thermometers today are under-reporting temperature? Seriously?
  2. Mysteriously, the national averages in recent years are different even though the individual site data is identical v1 versus v2 (and the raw Climate Data Online). Bobs Fernley Jones says “I can find no evidence that the area-weighting in itself has been changed, including my reading of The Second Book of Trewin (as in the V2 official doc).  Perhaps there has been a covert change in how it is applied (different exponentially from the centre points maybe?), but that’s pure speculation on my part.

The BoM needs to explain…

Despite urbanisation of modern sites, which would artificially warm them, we see adjustments that work in the opposite direction, effectively warming the modern era recorded in built-up sites, and cooling the past that was recorded with sites in fields and gardens.

Jo

—————————————————————————————————

Australia’s Bureau of Meteorology has covertly made summer hotter:

Guest post by Bob Fernley-Jones

In 2011, the BoM adjusted (homogenised) Australia’s temperature records with the objective of making corrections for the varying measurement conditions back in time.  Controversially, they deleted all data before 1910 by ruling them unreliable (especially the inconveniently hotter records) and by adjusting the surviving early 1900’s values generally downwards.  Amid the controversy, this program received much official praise and publicity that culminated in a third and final government sponsored report in 2017 declaring it to be among the world’s best practice. Despite that acclaim, in October 2018 they found it necessary to quietly launch a new program that further increased warming rates.

The BoM has long had a propensity to issue many media releases and special reports that emphasise hot weather events, and yet strangely, they were silent in this matter.  Consequently, the vast majority of Australians are unaware of the big changes to the already modelled data.  It was presumably well received by the IPCC in time for their coming sixth assessment report though.

The two adjustment programs employ a methodology known as homogenization which is described under the acronyms ACORN-SAT (2011), and then by ACORN-SAT version 2 (hereafter v1 & v2).   The discovery of what follows arose from enquiries to the BoM made last year over some already existing concerns with v1 data and the fortuitous archiving of BoM data and graphics that no longer exist on line (but which are easily proven to be genuine).   It resulted in citizen researcher awareness of v2 and hence in recent interest to compare outcomes.

In monthly terms, the most extreme warming increase in the all-of-Australia summer average was in February, as seen in the following animation.  It is derived from a BoM online download archived in early 2018 compared with the replacing v2 copy in 2019:

Australian February summer maximum temperatures, adjusted again?

Australian February summer maximum temperatures, adjusted again? Animation by Chris Gillham at waclimate.net

Typically, (as seen elsewhere, regionally and temporally) the greatest adjustments are increasingly negative towards 1910 (cooling) and increasingly positive towards 2019.  Typically, they are netting rather flat with minimal change in the centre and over the full range they are in a random magnitude pattern.

The v1 data were also archived which has enabled determination of comparative linear trend rates of the modeled data as follows:

Graph, February Temperatures

Adjustments mean the trend in February maximums has risen (yet again). |  Click to enlarge.

The v2 over v1 warming rate 1910 – 2018 is increased by 87%!  (v1 data not available in 2019).  Similar calculations for Summer (DJF) give an increased trend of 57% for 1910 – 2018.

Notice that the two trend lines merge and cross close to the centre, which is typical of what was seen in Part 1 (and elsewhere).  In effect, this can be called ‘rotating the dataset anti-clockwise,’ with minimal net change around the centre.  Strangely, equipment in the middle period as highlighted in the chart has seemingly worked more accurately than modern equipment.   The reason behind this paradox is elaborated next.

The biggest surprise is seen in the following figure:

Graph, adjustments to temperatures across Australia in February

Adjustments mean February maximums have cooled in the distant past and risen in recent times. (Yet again). |  Click to enlarge.

 

Of particular interest is that the final three years show increased warming on top of that already existing under “world’s best practice” in v1:

 

2016 = 0.34 °C

2017 = 0.33 °C

2018 = 0.30 °C

 

The site specific data did not change. To make this very clear, look at the table below with eight randomly chosen sites. The values are identical — there are no changes from the raw to V1 to v2. The mystery remains — if the data are the same, yet the averages  are different, what has changed?

Graph, Australian Bureau of Meteorology, February, Maximums.

Thanks to Chris Gillham for review of draft, the animation and this table (and for Joanne’s edits).

ACORN-SAT national annual temperatures are the area-weighted * average of the 104 network stations. By definition, homogenisation should be a thing of the past and certainly shouldn’t cause adjustments to observed temperature over the past decade or so.

It will also be shown in Part 3 that there is an additional warming distortion in the data as a consequence of increasing the number of hot stations in the latter decades. A third of a degree in the summer months here, and another third there, all add up of course.

There is more analysis and information in the February and Summer Supplementary File

* ‘Area-weighting’ is the process of modelling the contribution of individual stations to the national/regional averages.  Stations that are in remote areas have higher contributions than those concentrated closer together.  There have been no changes to area-weightings in recent years.

REFERENCES:

8.9 out of 10 based on 114 ratings

248 comments to Whopper part II: Look what the BoM did to the last three Februarys in Australia?!

  • #
    thingadonta

    I currently work in the desert, and we got some really hot days last February. I watched the BOM readings on these days, and noted that they now record individual readings of hottest gusts of wind (in this case on an asphalt surface on an airport strip), rather than at 30 minute intervals. So what you can get is say, a reading at 3.00pm of 40.0, at 3:30pm of 40.1, but what is recorded as the max for the day is a gust of hot wind of 42.3 at 3:13pm. This comes up immediately in the daily readings. What is then often recorded as the max is this hottest very short interval. The main trouble with this is that they didn’t do this in the past, meaning highest max’s would go up even without any warming.

    Now theoretically, the same should occur in coldest readings, if u had a site near a drift of snow, say, but in Australia there aren’t many of those, and I would hazard a guess they don’t use this same same methodology for coldest readings.

    Add to this , a statistician who wants to find some extra high readings and impress his boss, and what you get is ‘human induced global readings’.

    Just saying…

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    • #
      Deano

      “Add to this , a statistician who wants to find some extra high readings and impress his boss, and what you get is ‘human induced global readings’. ”

      thingadonta – that’s a very clever definition of anthropological global warming and it probably produces far more ‘warming’ than CO2 ever could. Certainly in the business world, a culture of senior management wanting to hear only of the success of their ideas has lead to staff telling them what they want to hear. Dud ideas are put into action and fail, when a little truth at the beginning could have saved a lot of tears. There’s no reason to imagine the climate industry is any different.

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    • #
      JohnM

      Climate Data Online
      http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/data/?ref=ftr

      If you use Daily Max Temperature you’ll see the location of weather stations measuring temperature in Australia. It’s pretty obvious, NSW has the largest cluster by area.

      This alone presents an issue related to trends for Australia as a whole?

      Weather Station Directory
      http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/data/stations/

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      • #
        JohnM

        I was fishing on the net to see if BOM is using satellite data as well as surface data to fill in the weather station blanks and ran across this interesting post.

        Australia Surface Temperatures Compared to UAH Satellite Data Over the Last 40 Years [1979-2019]
        April 3rd, 2019 by Roy W. Spenser Ph. D.
        https://www.drroyspencer.com/2019/04/australia-surface-temperatures-compared-to-uah-satellite-data-over-the-last-40-years/

        Excerpt:s:
        Summary: The monthly anomalies in Australia-average surface versus satellite deep-layer lower-tropospheric temperatures correlate at 0.70 (with a 0.57 deg. C standard deviation of their difference), increasing to 0.80 correlation (with a 0.48 deg. C standard deviation of their difference) after accounting for precipitation effects on the relationship. The 40-year trends (1979-2019) are similar for the raw anomalies (+0.21 C/decade for Tsfc, +0.18 deg. C for satellite), but if the satellite and rainfall data are used to estimate Tsfc through a regression relationship, the adjusted satellite data then has a reduced trend of +0.15 C/decade. Thus, those who compare the UAH monthly anomalies to the BOM surface temperature anomalies should expect routine disagreements of 0.5 deg. C or more, due to the inherently different nature of surface versus tropospheric temperature measurements.

        I often receive questions from Australians about the UAH LT (lower troposphere) temperature anomalies over Australia, as they sometimes differ substantially from the surface temperature data compiled by BOM. As a result, I decided to do a quantitative comparison.

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    • #
      Ted O'Brien.

      Do they publish their methodology? I expect they would.

      Looking at our local reporting in recent times they publish at ten minute intervals plus sudden changes immediately. Those ten minute readings fluctuate sometimes by more than a whole degree. I can’t imagine a mercury in glass thermometer doing that, as I would expect that to get the necessary heat transfer it would take a difference of rather more than one or two degrees.. I do not know how sensitive other types of thermometers in use are, but I suppose many of the old thermometers were only asked to record daily max and min anyway.

      I shouldn’t be hard to reconcile the new thermometers to the old by simple averaging over an optimum period. But do they do this?

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      • #
        Graeme#4

        No they don’t Ted. The clue to this is the published reports of the review panel which last reported in 2017. In the last report, they noted that they had urged the BOM to publicise their processes, and noted that this hadn’t been done, and they still urged BOM to do this.
        Also these reports show that they had to call in the BOM to have them verbally explain parts of the homogenisation process, which to my mind strongly hints that the BOM hasn’t documented all the processes. If the processes aren’t documented, this would allow the BOM staff to do whatever they want to do at any time.

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    • #

      As reported before, that’s because the Bureau measures temperatures every second, with no averaging, so the hottest spike becomes the daily maximum. They won’t budge on this. Electronic probes have ruled since 1996.

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      • #
        Ted O'Brien.

        If so, wouldn’t that exaggerate both max and min by half a degree or more compared to a mercury thermometer?

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        • #

          Ted, it would, but the effect is not symmetrical. The maxima are more exaggerated. At 3pm there may be wandering packets of air heated over roads, but at 6am when the minimums happen there are unlikely to be many artificially cooled blobs of air wandering. In the cool part of the day the variations are proportionally smaller, and don’t have solar energy to amp up turbulence. Plus the bureau may chop the coolest seconds off Eg. Thredbo.

          Because the maxima are not averaged over 1 – 3 minutes, there is no compensating mix of overly hot and overly cool values at 3pm. It’s just the hottest second of the hottest hour. The coolest second of the hottest hour will vanish.

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          • #
            James Poulos

            That’s as may be, Jo. However the short burst temp anomalies can’t continue to increase the records forever. At some time they will plateau, and then even a small decline will look like a massive temperature drop against these manufactured warming trends.

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            • #
              WXcycles

              James Poulos
              November 15, 2019 at 2:42 pm · Reply
              That’s as may be, Jo. However the short burst temp anomalies can’t continue to increase the records forever. At some time they will plateau, and then even a small decline will look like a massive temperature drop against these manufactured warming trends.

              When urban-heat-Island-effect is an ever-growing feature (not a bug) of BOM’s temperature sensor locations you can forget about a ‘hiatus’ developing, James.

              Even if we returned to 1970’s like temperatures by 2035, they’d just asphalt around the Stevenson Screens, or paint nearby objects matt-black, or spread crushed basalt gravels around them. And if that didn’t work, they’d just edit the ‘data’, or alter the hardware, in any way they please, as they do right now, the official numbers change like the wind, they do it already.

              The basic problem is BOM complies with its own “Ethical Standards”, which is a pretty damning statement as they don’t even follow their own requirements for the valid placement of temperature sensors! Nor do they exclude sensors known to be strongly UHI affected.

              That’s willful organisational contempt for scientific measurement.

              They’re effectively “self-regulating“, there’s no real oversight, there’s no accountability at all to the tax-payers, everything is done is secret, there’s no punishment or deterrence for proven outright corruption of temperature data reporting, upon which billions of dollars are doled out to extreme left-wing orgs.

              And our ‘governments’ are totally gutless, useless, feckless and complicit with BOM, as since 1996 those governments have been mostly Liberal-Nationals! And Australia just voted-in another of these hopeless corrupt Lib-Nat governments who will again reveal their complicity through their total lack of effective action about BOM’s corruption. Clearly they quietly approve of it, via their deafening silence and complete lack of concern about it.

              It’s not even up for discussion!

              So there will be no temperature ‘hiatus’ within BOM’s “data” even if the globe does conspicuously drop back into a cooling-phase, especially if there’s a Liberal-National government in Canberra. The “quiet Australians” are the world’s biggest bunch of suckers and dupes.

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              • #
                James Poulos

                The UHI affect has it’s limits, Wex.

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              • #

                There’s something I would like to add here.

                Here at Joanne’s site, we might like to pride ourselves that we all, well, most of us, have our fingers on the pulse when it comes to most of the things that surround this climate change debate.

                However, when I am around ordinary people, there is no point at all in my even mentioning some of the things we regularly canvass here, as (a) it goes straight over their heads (and at altitude) or (b) most commonly, their eyes glaze over, indicating distinct lack of interest.

                That distinct lack of any interest is most prevalent in the young, and I have a grand daughter I am very close to, and she’s now 21. When she was in her last year of high school, I was visiting with our daughter and our grand daughter had six or so of her friends over. They were polite enough to include me in their conversation, a hang over from a number of years earlier when they were all into a music TV program, (Glee) and I knew all the songs, as they were all covers from when I was younger, and that gave me some ‘cred’ with them all, when I knew all about the songs that they perceived were only ones from their most recent era, so I actually was looked on as being somewhat ‘cooler’ than anyone else of my age, and ‘cool’ actually was a commonly used word, so what goes around comes around. I asked young Sav if I could (politely) bring up the subject of Climate Change. The look I got was one accompanied with ‘daggers’ and a stern, “Poppy, don’t you dare!” So, I didn’t mention it. I also had earlier asked her if they talked about it at school, and she told me that if anyone brought it up outside of the classroom, everyone would just walk away from whoever mentioned it in the first place.

                That was young people.

                When I have been with others, again, I kept away from the subject, but a couple of times, the subject actually did come up, and rather than inject myself into the debate, I really wanted to just hear what was being said about it, to see if there was any depth of understanding.

                The knowledge base of these ‘ordinary’ people is (severely) limited, almost in the extreme, but more than once, and with different groups of people, the one thing that did come up was the heat being generated by cities, and here it was not just monster Capitals but cities in general and the urban sprawl around said cities. When I injected the phrase Urban Heat Island, and then shut up, I got a polite thank you, and then I let them continue. That one thing, UHI, seems to me to be the thing that a lot of ordinary people ‘HAVE’ latched onto, and is perceived as having an effect.

                There’s also something about the general understanding of mathematics as well, when mentioning Climate Change, and asking about the concentration of CO2 in the Atmosphere. Among the people I was with, most could quote the 400PPM, but it was meaningless when I asked them what that actually meant in the form of a comparison. I always used the $100 bill for the sake of comparison, and when I asked them to devolve 400PPM from that $100, I would get some as high as $40, but the average was usually $4. When I mentioned that it was actually just 4 cents, the looks I got were astonishing, and some even told me I was flat out wrong. Luckily, every one of them had mobile phones, and I only needed to ask one of them to use the calculator function, and they were basically astounded when it worked out to be 4 cents, and a couple of comments following from that were well, why do we need to worry about it then.

                Now, that’s just a couple of things, because, seriously, the ordinary person out there has no concept at all, other than what they are fed on the nightly news.

                And that folks is why we, those of us here at Joanne’s site are in big trouble. We have no chance.

                And really. The vast populace actually could not care less really, from what I have seen close hand.

                Tony.

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              • #
                Kalm Keith

                Good outline Tony.

                People may sit up and take notice of details about Money, especially that which is being skimmed from us.

                Every Australian household, on average, is paying an extra $1,000 a year over and above the Justifiable cost.

                Someone is skimming Six Billion dollars a year out of the current arrangement and it’s evident that neither Libs nor Labs are mad keen to change this.

                This isn’t good news.

                KK

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              • #
                Kalm Keith

                And that “surcharge” , of course, relates to our electricity payments that most Australians would be unaware of.

                Why are we paying extra to China and Germany for the renewables hardware and various Australian institutions for systems management which includes unjustifiable support (profit) for renewables grid integration.

                KK

                10

    • #
      Maptram

      This is consistent with what I have seen in the BOM results of several places I look at. The maximum temperature recorded in the Climate Data Online site is always between 0.1°C and 1°C higher than the readings from the observations page. The minimum temperature in the climate data online page is usually between 0.1°C and 1°C lower than the observed minimum

      30

    • #

      “thingadonta November 14, 2019 at 5:07 pm”
      “So what you can get is say, a reading at 3.00pm of 40.0, at 3:30pm of 40.1, but what is recorded as the max for the day is a gust of hot wind of 42.3 at 3:13pm. This comes up immediately in the daily readings. What is then often recorded as the max is this hottest very short interval. The main trouble with this is that they didn’t do this in the past, meaning highest max’s would go up even without any warming.”
      No it is actually the other way around. In the long distant past self recording thermometers were used but half hourly measurements reports were not published nor was it possible to take and store readings of every second.
      Readings of the four thermometers in a screen were often taken only once or twice a day. Perhaps only at 9 in the morning. From this they took six readings. The recorded max, the recorded min, the 9 o’clock reading of the maximum, minimum, wet and dry thermometers. The maximum and minimum recording thermometers pushed a little slider to the extreme of the previous 24 hours. So they ONLY recorded the most extreme reading of the previous day and the duration of this extreme could well have been less than one second. They did this with no averaging at all.
      There are reasons why these maximums and minimums will not match the recordings of old but reading the thermometer more often is NOT one of them.
      One of the reasons is the change of positions of the thermometer in the box. For example it was not possible to have both min and max thermometers in the one place, at the same height. The were once at an angle of about 7 degrees to horizontal but are now vertical. They once had a large diameter but are now thin. There are many more differences but this post is about the abstract art like reflections of theory that are ACORN(s). Not about actual readings that the ACORNS only somewhat relate to.

      30

      • #

        One other popular myths that needs to be quickly forgotten is the confusing of response times and reading times. Sampling the thermometer at a rate of one second is just like taking a photo of it every second. A camera taking photos of a glass thermometer every second is the same thing as a sampling rate of 1 second.
        Response times are a completely different thing and this the BoM seem to have very poorly documented. They have made multiple changes doing who knows what. The faster the air moves past a thermometer the quicker it will change temperature to match that of the passing air. The response time at a given wind speed is the time it takes a thermometer to reach 63.2% of the difference to a step change in air temperature. So a response time quoted as 18 seconds at 5 meters per second air speed means that a step change from 10 degrees to 11 would measure 10.6 after 18 seconds. At high wind speeds it is far faster at low wind speeds far slower.
        It is not changed by sampling rate at all.

        20

        • #
          Kalm Keith

          I think that we had forgotten/weren’t aware that the government funded max and min reading thermometers for the Stephenson screens.

          KK

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          • #
            Kalm Keith

            Then it comes down to “response times” which may still see extremes missed by the mercury and alcohol.

            10

            • #

              Then it comes down to “response times”. They are a real issue but not the only one. Response times seem to have had a period of multiple changes over years of futzing the design.
              With so many changes we need a set of parallel comparisons between old methods in general and new in many different climates. Old methods including early screen designs with lead based paint, white wooden legs instead of a grey steel pole, wooden skirts around the base of the screen to prevent the entry of light etc and thermometer types compared to the modern. Toss the ACORN theory and compare the old to the new directly. No need to adjust via theory when real comparison data is easy enough to do.
              See how light or radiation from the ground is not able to make it into this old screen through the floor like the modern hopeless ones.
              http://soda.naa.gov.au/record/1973307/1
              See the big vertical gaps between the floor slats that let light in through the bottom of the new design.
              https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Stevenson_screen#/media/File:Interior_of_a_stevenson_screen_at_the_Darwin_Met_Office.jpg

              10

              • #
                Kalm Keith

                Yes, many factors.

                In real science the error of measurement is but one factor.

                The major problem with reporting “atmospheric temperature measurements” is in knowing what you are measuring.

                There are so many factors besides the measuring equipment that makes it almost irrelevant to compare another recording site a kilometer down the road.
                The error in equipment measurement may still be +/- 0.5 °C but there is a need to acknowledge that site factors/location etc can make reporting results involves uncertainty of another 1° either way.

                For a scientist it is not hard to see a total relevance/equipment variance allowance of +/- 1.5 C° being required.

                Accuracy of equipment is of no use if what you are actually measuring invariable in the extreme and unknown.

                On top of this is the issue that combining two or more different streams of data acquired via different methods is not science.

                KK

                10

      • #

        Ken and Jo above both mentioned that the electronic thermometers should be averaged instead of just recording the most extreme seconds. This is what the World meteorological organisation recommends also. It solves a multitude of problems. Some of these are new problems that arrived with the use of electronics. One of the problems being electrical noise.

        The BoM instead of closely following the world standard have gone their own way and tried to match PRTD thermometers warming and cooling times to mercury maximum thermometers.
        This means they can’t also match the different warming and cooling times of alcohol minimum thermometers and may not have dealt with electrical noise well at all. Some of the minimums and maximum recordings now could well be the results of electrical noise like nearby lightning strikes etc and have little to do with temperatures, if they happen to randomly fall within the error detection range.

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  • #
    yarpos

    Depressing how easy it is and how likely they are to get away with it. The adjustments are on narrative so telling people what they want/expect to hear. Only a tiny % of the population even notices, politicians only care about being re-elected, the ABC and BOM roll on.

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    • #
      OriginalSteve

      I notice in the main MSM papers there is a relentless and shrill push to cower the PM and harass the govt into buckling to the climate mafioso demands.

      Long may he tell the clinate mafioso to get lost amd stick to the science.

      At the core if it, what we talk about here the climate mafioso are absolutely petrified about, as they know we are right *and* that word is getting out, so they have doubled down and throwing everything at the sceptics. I think they watch this blog carefully to guage how to react.

      Bad news for the mafioso – it isnt going to work. The whole climate circus is such a joke now, no one with even half a brain takes it seriously. You lose …

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      • #
        OriginalSteve

        But wait…theres more…. NAB commits corporate suicide?

        https://www.canberratimes.com.au/story/6494321/nab-to-stop-lending-to-coal/?cs=14350

        “The National Australia Bank says it take no new thermal coal customers and wind down lending to existing customers to zero by 2035, an announcement that had NSW Liberal MP Craig Kelly accusing the bank on Friday of putting “a black line” through a legal industry.

        “Incoming NAB chairman Philip Chronican appeared before a parliamentary inquiry in the big four banks on Friday.
        Mr Kelly accused him of virtue signalling, asking whether there were any other legal activities to which the bank would refuse to lend.

        “Would the bank refuse to loan to someone who presented a business plan for making X-rated videos? he asked.

        “Mr Chronican said the bank was required to make a risk assessment for customers in high risk sectors, including those where there was a risk of involvement with money laundering, human trafficking or organised crime.

        “That meant X-rated video lending would have “a higher threshold than lending to the corner store”, but it wouldn’t be ruled out like coal.

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  • #
    robert rosicka

    Ahhh Bom the gift that keeps giving , changing the past to line the pockets of the future !

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  • #

    The BOM is like Their ABC, they snub their noses at those who they are supposed to serve and push their progressive views at the expense of the country.

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  • #
    WXcycles

    I hold Scott Morrison 100% responsible.

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  • #
    David Maddison

    Surely tampering with data in this manner with no scientific basis and only a political motivation is illegal?

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    • #
      William Astley

      It should be grounds for losing one’s job.

      This is an organized, government sponsored attempt to create a crisis, maintain a crisis, …

      It is immoral, politically motived, in no manner related to science.

      It is actually anti-science, big brother propaganda. Lie about the data, lie about the analysis, and lie about the effectiveness of the forced solution.

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    • #
      Anto

      And now you know the true source of anthropogenic global warming.

      10

  • #
    Mal

    Why are they deliberately manipulating data to show a warming trend???
    UN agenda 21??
    Some other global conspiracy??
    Some internal bias by pro green activist within the BOM hierachy??
    Or pure incompetence???
    Some combination of the above ??
    Any other reason??

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    • #
      David-of-Cooyal-in-Oz

      I’d leave out incompetence, but use the rest.
      Cheers
      Dave B

      60

    • #
      Graeme#4

      Trewin and others have written many papers explaining why they homogenise the temperature readings. And the statistical methodologies employed have been analysed by an expert panel of statisticians. I believe that the statistics used are ok, but what I question is both the need to homogenise at all, and all the other undefined decisions that have been taken to merge temperature records or not merge them. even when they say they have good-quality base records, they homogenise these with other poor-quality records, which to my mind immediately destroys the base record quality.

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    • #
      Anto

      In a time when most science funding is grant-based, you want to keep producing alarming results. The moment you produce a null study, your funding dries up.

      10

  • #
    Peter Fitzroy

    I’m guessing that confusion between weather and climate will dominate comments here.

    http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/data/acorn-sat/#tabs=ACORN%E2%80%90SAT

    BOM clearly states that ACORN is an adjusted dataset, and it is peer reviewed, and has Government oversight. It is also not the weather data, that dataset is maintained using different methods. Neither the weather, or climate data sets are the raw data, which is also maintained.

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    • #
      Greg in NZ

      “adjusted… peer reviewed… Government oversight”.

      Or as others would say: hook, line and sinker.

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    • #
      Yonniestone

      Yeah Jo got this one wrong too Peter.

      @I’mawarmisttrollandeveryexperthereisanidiotcauseblablabla.

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    • #

      Yes and “extensive peer review” is so meaningful that the BOM won’t even publish their methods in full. In other words, it’s a secret guild, it’s not science. Are they running scared of being exposed? Their behaviour fits that bill…

      They admitted no one can replicate their methods:
      http://joannenova.com.au/2015/06/if-it-cant-be-replicated-it-isnt-science-bom-admits-temperature-adjustments-are-secret/.

      That was 2015 and the “government oversight” has not so much as squeaked.

      In other words, there is no auditing. No peer review, and the only government oversight is there to shield them from scrutiny.

      There are people willing to fog up excuses with jargon. None of them can answer our questions. None of them can explain the methods.

      With UHI, micrositing issues, non-compliant siting, one-second-records, smaller screens, electronic sensors, missing meta-data, and mystery adjustments — the BOM can make the Australian trends “whatever they want”.

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      • #
        Peter Fitzroy

        Last report listed was 2017, not 2015’

        Methods for Acorn sat 2
        https://cawcr.gov.au/technical-reports/CTR_049.pdf
        Source Cade form mailto:[email protected]?subject=ACORN-SAT%20Python%20code%20request
        Published methods
        https://rmets.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/joc.3530
        For WA
        http://www.waclimate.net/raw-acorn-records.html#methods

        So I don’t understand your position

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        • #
          AndyG55

          Methods are DESIGNED to allow for fabrication of an URBAN, bad site trend to try to match the FARCE of the AGW agenda

          TRUTH is that there has been NO ATMOSPHERIC WARMING over Australia in 20 years

          LIES and fabrication are what PF worships.

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        • #

          Peter, your loyalty and faith is sweet. Did you even click the first link you were sent:

          Techniques involved in developing the Australian
          Climate Observations Reference Network – Surface Air
          Temperature (ACORN-SAT) dataset
          CAWCR Technical Report No. 049
          Blair Trewin
          March 2012

          So this is Methods for ACORN 1 which I’ve listed on the site many times.
          Bob Fernley-Jones has been writing to the BOM Helpdesk for years. He just isn’t fooled as easily as you are.

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          • #

            BTW: Your second link is also from 2012, and the third link is to one of our own BOM audit team’ sites, and indeed Chris Gillham (waclimate.net) is the man who created the animated gif in this post, and helped write it.

            How embarrassing? Seriously?

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          • #
            Peter Fitzroy

            My bad, it’s still smoky here, and we are still on alert for fires today,

            I thought I’d posted this link
            http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/change/acorn-sat/documents/BRR-032.pdf
            Which the 2018 reference
            The 2017 reference was about the technical oversight committee.

            And the python script for the adjustments is available, and thus can be audited

            The last 2 were to show that external audit and result analysis can be done

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          • #
            Bob Fernley-Jones

            And the python script for the adjustments is available, and thus can be audited
            Apparently, Mr Fitzroy did not read REFERENCES at the foot of my post.

            As for the BoM’s so-called Helpdesk, I gave up on them long ago.

            Back in early 2018 I read that the Bureau’s CEO Dr Andrew Johnson did declare to senator Di Natale at Senate Estimates committee:

            “I don’t regard correspondence with the community as chewing up my time; I think it’s an important part of my job. The community has a range of perspectives on what’s happening with the weather and the climate. As Senator Birmingham said, we welcome the feedback; it makes us a better organisation.”

            So, I took up the offer in a series of emails that attemped to describe problems in various BoM data. All major issues were evaded in his responses and he later delegated to his Dr Rea who was even more dismissive. In my email to Dr Johnson of 29/08/2019 here are two of the follow-up questions:

            2) Another problem that is typically demonstrated in the example animation is that v2 temperatures have been increased over v1 in very recent years, even as late as in 2018. However, the 104 ACORN-SAT specially selected non-urban weather stations involved have reputedly reached an optimum standard long before 2018, thus rendering recent homogenization a thing of the past.
            3) Simple questions have remained unanswered. For instance, Dr Rea has twice dismissed my citizens advice apparently on the grounds that; “…the Bureau has an external Data Integrity Advisory and Assurance Committee…” I advised him that an advanced Google search failed to discover it and asked for a link (The nearest such being the TAF that only ran 2015 to 2017). Since the Bureau seems to be uninterested in advice of facts such as in 1) & 2), I still seek contact information for that committee.

            Question 2) relates to the animation in Part 1 of this series which shows an incontrovertible conflict in BoM data.

            Question 3) was partly because since the bureau has apparently ignored advice of problems in their online data, I wanted to ask the same questions of the alleged committee and I wanted a link.

            There has been total silence from both Dr Johnson and Dr Rea and also from the Chief Scientist Dr Finkel who was CC’d

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              OriginalSteve

              I have experienced similar response when requesting infectious disease incidence within the community and related statistics. I was repeatedly fobbed off and directed to an “ethics committee” black hole more than once and occasionally treated like a child who had the temerity to ask his “superiors” for the basis of thier decisions, despite being respectful and reasonable in my requests.

              I came to the conclusion that some matters of govt are more a religious-like topic which can never be questioned. Needless to say, that just made me more wary and hardened my stance against it. I figured if you wont release data, you have somethingvto hide. Over time my thoughts have been proven correct. The govt holds this patriachal line on some things which flies in the face of basic freedoms and truth.

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            • #

              No look, don’t ever bother with references when it comes to Fitzroy.

              (sarc) Demanding references is straight out of the playbook given to him by his Greens Party ‘handlers’.

              At every chance he should ask for references. What that does is (supposedly) to tie up the responder with the time taken to go searching for references, and then supplying them. Either way, Fitzroy NEVER reads any link you might supply, again, also from that Greens Party handbook.

              The same applies with the references he provides. He is supposed to supply references himself every so often, and include three or so of them, and the purpose of them is to again tie up the responder, who then has to read usually totally meaningless pap, taking up their time.

              Fitzroy has a standard response (also from that Greens Party handbook) when asked for references himself, and that is to angrily reply that you have the Internet go look for yourself, again taking up time.

              He has done all these things so often now, that it’s SOP.

              The main aim of it all is to distract from the main thrust and divert away from it onto his agenda, usually with a number of diversionary one liners, also from that same Greens Party handbook.

              He doesn’t believe a single word we say, naturally assuming that ALL of us are just flat out liars, again, that accusation straight from the Greens Party handbook as well.(/sarc)

              So, don’t give him links to references. He never reads them anyway.

              Tony.

              [Thanks Tony. This is useful. My advice is to thank Peter for helping us show how incompetent the BOM is and to always provide the references, not for Peter, but for other readers. See my comment at the bottom of this thread for ways to handle commenters who appear to be polite but use indirect tactics to bait and disrupt a thread. — Jo]

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              • #

                Sorry Joanne, I just couldn’t help myself. He just infuriates me, well most of us I suppose, with the way he does things.

                Tony.

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              • #

                He never reads them anyway.

                do you have evidence for that?

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                Serp

                That’s a fair analysis of the Peter Fitzroy behaviour TonyfromOz; I cannot recall the last time he posted an item of interest, or if he ever has for that matter, and seldom do more than skim through his contributions. As I’ve said before his relentless niggling makes it hard to maintain the live and let live maxim by which most of us are guided.

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                PeterW

                Gee Aye
                November 15, 2019 at 9:35 am
                He never reads them anyway.

                do you have evidence for that?

                Yes…. His posts.

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              • #

                Tony, he(they) has(have) come up with the very novel suggestion of seeking support from GetUp for our “activism”. I bet you would never have thought of that. Certainly never crossed my mind. Goes to show how clever he(they) can be.

                And it seems we should be taking inspiration from Greta. So I’ve decided to contact my family full of theatrical performers and their media friends and see if they have a few film crews, PR agencies and talent managers to help discover me. I must say…stardom is taking me longer than Greta’s three weeks.

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              • #
                el gordo

                ‘ … do you have evidence for that?’

                * chuckle *

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              • #
                el gordo

                ‘ … his relentless niggling …’

                Wish he would discuss paleo climate history, its my strength. He bogs people down in irrelevancy, splits hairs and data until nobody has a clue what is going on.

                Memo to Mr Fitz: Lift your game or risk losing the job of resident troll, Leaf wants it back.

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              • #
                robert rosicka

                Ahh gee can I quote you from your well read blog on this subject of distraction .

                “I have had so many requests from my legions of fans to post more blogs. No really, there are a surprising number of people out there that read and re read my pastes… I mean posts … and check in to see if I have added anything new.
                So today’s, and possibly this year’s, new post should satisfy those fans. Basically it is this link about scientific theories.
                Yep, this is another placeholder in case I need to move someone on from their argument by distraction. You know the one where they write, “it is only a theory”. Amazingly, people still try to slip that one into an argument. They are often the same people who distract with, “it is only a model”, without understanding that their lives would soon come to an end without models.”

                Having worked with Marlene Zuk many years ago I was drawn to read her book. This article gives a pretty good indication of the nature of the contents and I share the critique that it is sometimes trying to crack a nut with a sledgehammer. And here is an example of a paleofantasist with a poor grasp of the mechanics of natural selection and the details of human evolution.”

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              • #
                peter

                ” He never reads them anyway.

                do you have evidence for that?

                Too right FigLeaf. Fitzy’s critics should supply peer reviewed references that prove he doesn’t red them.

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              • #

                that’s the spirit peter

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          • #
            sophocles

            Ah. So they’ve been ‘conspiring’ for years! 🙂

            30

        • #
          Bob Fernley-Jones

          star comment
          Concerning peer review, the BoM currently has on its website for ACORN-SAT version 1 (2011):

          “The Bureau ensures that all its datasets, and the methods used to develop them, are rigorously reviewed. The ACORN-SAT methodologies are subject to the expert peer review process required for publication in scientific journals.”

          What is different here is that this describes an internal review process. It is not an independent review as it would be if it were submitted to a scientific journal. They go on to admit:

          “Recognising the importance of the integrity of long-term homogenised datasets as the basis for climate change analysis, the Bureau initiated an additional international peer review of the ACORN-SAT processes and methodologies.”

          However, this was also a self-organised review and while the report of 2011 was signed by a panel of three PhD’s and an AO Chair, the institutions and expertise that they represent are undeclared.

          There is no mention of it on the webpage, but It would seem that the latest version 2 report of October 2018 has only been subjected to an internal peer review. Unusually, both v1 & v2 reports are under the sole authorship of Dr Blair Trewin whereas most papers published in scientific journals have multiple authors, sometimes many. It is only an outline description that does not enable replication of the full methodologies employed by the BoM. One major mystery for instance is that there is nothing in the report to describe how and why national and regional average temperatures have increased in version 2 in recent years, and yet paradoxically, the individual temperatures of the 104 stations involved remain unchanged. (Re the third figure above)

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          • #
            Peter Fitzroy

            Comparing the two methods documents, there are more similarities than differences. (hence the V2 flag I guess)
            Comparing the BOM with Met office, there are also more similarities than differences (but england has a denser network)

            While I would prefer it to be a published document as you suggest, it is still available for analysis and critique, which to date only you have done.

            the python script is available.

            I think the changes you mention are the result of the gridding process, itself subject to doubt.

            The grid size and the paucity of stations make it less representative, and with a higher margin for error, than the Met office one.

            I would suggest that this (the gridding of the data) that is the major problem here, not the method and not the actual measurements.

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            • #
              Graeme#4

              Peter, I believe that one of the main problems is not related to the Python script or the grid sizes. It’s the undocumented human interventions that the BOM uses to select temperature datasets and to make final adjustments to the datasets. These processes appear to be undefined and therefore subject to the whims of the operators.

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              • #
                OriginalSteve

                Its called fiddling the books….

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              • #
                Peter Fitzroy

                The python script is the ‘missing’ method – analysis of the script will tell if results match the the summary provided in 2018.
                As to the interventions – how would we uncover those?

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              • #
              • #
                Graeme#4

                Peter, I pointed out to you that it’s NOT the Python scripts that are being questioned – it’s the entire faulty process. And yet back you come, talking about the Python scripts again. When are you going to accept that the ENTIRE process is faulty?

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            • #
              Bob Fernley-Jones

              @ Peter Fitzgerald

              Thanks for your wisdom. Perhaps you can help me with this mystery involving the iconic Alice Springs station which has one of the highest area-weighting impacts, so is important.

              In the peer reviewed version 1 there was a Statistical adjustment of -0.56 C on 1/01/1997 that employed the standard number of ten comparator stations; by their station numbers:

              15602 15643 15511 15528 15660 15635 15603 38002 16085 15135

              In the assumedly peer reviewed (not publicly claimed) version 2 there was a Statistical adjustment of -1.35 C on 1/01/1997 that employed only three stations; by their station numbers:

              15511 16085 15635

              Strangely, in v2 they used ten stations for another Statistical adjustment on 1/01/1989.

              Back to v1 and we find that they also made a Statistical adjustment using ten stations on 1/01/1989 but they did it in two steps with an additional adjustment in 1994. That’s a statistical adjustment of only a three-year timespan of noisy data to establish a separate step-change.

              The Technical Advisory Forum (that comprised largely statisticians) described v1 as among world’s best practice in their final report in 2017

              Can you explain for us why at only 13 months later the quietly released v2 is so different versus the previous multi-reviewed v1 perfection?

              I can’t find anything in the Second Book of Trewin to help.

              There are many more mysteries with Alice Springs.

              60

              • #
                Bob Fernley-Jones

                Sorry, I meant Peter Fitzroy

                10

              • #
                Michael

                Presumably, v1 was deemed to be “among world’s best practice” because its methods are similar to those of NOAA, NASA, NIWA etc. This would be like claiming a new climate model to be “among world’s best practice” because it produces results similar to other models.

                BTW the “peer review” process claimed by BoM is not the same as blind peer review undertaken by most journals. You cannot choose your own reviewers, for obvious reasons of bias.

                60

              • #
                Peter Fitzroy

                Nope Bob – I have nothing to which I could help you with. I do see the V2 as an incremental update to V1, which means you should only have to review the delta between the two. I also understand from the BOM site, that the V2 methods were as a result of the review in 2017 (at least in the response, it seemed to indicate that). Sorry that I could not help further.

                13

              • #
                Bob Fernley-Jones

                Thanks Peter,

                Unfortunately, as I’ve shown, it’s a complete waste of time to ask the BoM for an explanation

                20

    • #
      PeterW

      “It is peer-reviewed and has government oversight……….. aaaaaand the moon is made of green cheese”.

      His own words.

      Failing the standard he demands of everyone else.

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      • #
        Peter Fitzroy

        I provide a link, something you have not done so far.

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        • #
          Graeme No.3

          Peter Fitzroy:

          You were born too late. Think how useful you would have been to Napoleon in 1812 “It’s not really cold, keep marching mes enfants”.
          Or possibly the Retreat from Kabul in the First Afgan War (you know the one, where the sole survivor staggered into the fort with the Regimental Colours wrapped aroud him). You could have issued the press release about the victory.

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        • #
          Kalm Keith

          LINK.

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        • #
          Graeme#4

          As Jo and Bob F-J have pointed out, the BOM papers and reports still don’t adequately explain what’s going on and why the BOM is doing certain things, many of which are not normal temperature reporting practice in other parts of the world. Also some of the BOM’s internal reviews have resulted in “nothing to worry about” results, which appear to differ somewhat from similar practice reviews overseas.

          40

        • #
          PeterW

          PF…. not an applicable link and not until you were called on it.

          More green cheese from you..

          20

    • #
      Tel

      It is also not the weather data, that dataset is maintained using different methods

      Evidently so, but you would hope that at some stage at least one thermometer was involved … possibly as a paperweight.

      140

    • #
      Travis T. Jones

      “I’m guessing that confusion between weather and climate will dominate comments.”

      Peter Fitzroy is stuck in “a thing of the past.”

      Didn’t get the 97% memo, PF?? Weather is now climate …

      “A few years ago, talking about weather and climate change in the same breath was a cardinal sin for scientists.

      Now it has become impossible to have a conversation about the weather without discussing wider climate trends, according to researchers who prepared the Australian Climate Commission’s latest report.

      Previously, ”weather is not climate” was the mantra, but now the additional boost from greenhouse gases was influencing every event.

      It might even be the case that the mantra chanted after every catastrophic weather event – that it can’t be said to be caused by climate change, but it shows what climate change will do – has become a thing of the past.
      – Will Steffen, the report’s lead author and director of the Australian National University’s Climate Change Institute.

      https://www.theage.com.au/national/climate-change-a-key-factor-in-extreme-weather-experts-say-20130303-2fefv.html

      Please adjust your failed UN climate memes appropriately asap.

      Thank you.
      You’re welcome.

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      • #
        PeterW

        Travis…

        You misunderstand.

        “Weather is not climate” only applies to weather that does not fit the narrative.

        As soon as we are discussing fire weather, Fitz starts yelling that it IS climate.

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      • #
        Geoffrey Williams

        Travis, I am in total agreement with you; trying to explain the difference between weather and climate is something espoused by academics who wish to show their superior of understanding over ordinary folk.
        In truth there is hardly a sentance or phrase where one word could not be interchanged with the other, and not effect any difference in the meaning.
        Mostly it is a question of the scale of atmospheric existence.
        GeoffW

        30

      • #
        Greg in NZ

        Weather Change – or for Dinosaur Peter, Climate Change – not only caused Venice to go under water again (though not as bad as 60 years ago) it’s causing freezing snow in North Africa, Scotland, the Euro Alps, Siberia (I’m shocked!) as well as Tasmania and NZ (nothing out of the ordinary, but with all this CO2-induced ‘heating’ I thought we at least might hit 20°C today but no, still a chilly 17°).

        Some lovely photos on Roy Spencer’s blog of the rare Alabama frostweed, or frost flowers, caused by the recent ‘catastrophic weather’ which froze the Deep South all the way to the Gulf of Mexico:

        https://www.drroyspencer.com

        C’mon BoM, tell us 2019 was your ‘wormiest’ year EVAAAAH!

        60

    • #
      R.B.

      The only way to justify the stupid “weather not climate” comment is the weighting of the temperature data has changed. They previously used Cook’s map and have since updated their methods?

      20

  • #
    Lawrie

    I mentioned it before but here goes again. Is it of use to seek an FOI on both data and method used by BoM to achieve these variations? If so I am willing to help fund such an FOI.

    Email coming…. Jo

    230

    • #
      Bob Fernley-Jones

      star comment
      Here is my experience of FOI during my lengthy exchanges with the BoM “Helpdesk” (abbreviations from my email of 11/Apr/2018):

      Dear Helpdesk, … [Re:] …past controversy over homogenization of the raw data for Darwin, including the instrument ‘Move’ from the Post Office after it was bombed in 1942, to the Airport… … have already advised you of some significant ACORN-SAT data integrity problems for Darwin … …That advice was confined to pure data issues because in our earlier exchanges you have indicated a necessity for prolonged journal peer review, if methodology or hypothesis is to be considered… …I had attempted to replicate the calculations in that big site move and found it to be impossible. It was not helped because there were substantial conflicts between the three main sources of BoM information…
      I thus raised an FOI request for supply of the BoM documents of record of the actual calculations together with clarification of the conflicts between the various sources of BoM information. Regrettably however, on 10/April the FOI officer declined by email with this concluding statement (my underlining):
      “…if the Bureau were to proceed with your request it is likely that you would be issued with a practical refusal decision… This decision would be issued on the basis that the Bureau does not hold any documents which explicitly identify the very specific information in your request.”
      Please advise:
      Has the Bureau discarded all of its records of the calculations and the related logical applications available in the various alternative defined methodologies, for all of the 112 ACORN-SAT stations?

      Helpdesk’s ultimate response was unusually helpful and quite different to the FOI Officer’s response! In effect, Helpdesk explained that the calculations are invisible because they are achieved in computer code and not recorded. In this case though, the data used in what is called a Merge calculation employed only three remote comparator stations,(not the standard ten), namely Katherine, Windham and Port Keats. These data were in my view inadequate and contradictory, and it seems to me that what might with difficulty be subjectively assessed would be impossible to code sensibly for its uniqueness. It would be pointless to ask the BoM about these issues.

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  • #

    Throw another shrimp on the trend line.

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  • #
    Sceptical Sam

    Peter Fitzroy,

    Do you have a document that better outlines the form that this so-called “Government oversight” takes?

    Which agency of Government has responsibility for the oversight? Which minister signs off on the accuracy. If no minister signs off on it who does?

    What is the process that is followed?

    Is there an additional oversight entity to the Technical Advisory Forum which is mentioned at the website? Or is the Technical Advisory Forum it?

    Who appoints the members of the Technical Advisory Forum and who recommends them to the person who appoints them?

    I’m a sceptic. I know my way around government and its agencies. I smell a rat.

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    • #
      Peter Fitzroy

      Then do your own research, there is plenty of information on the the links I provided. You will find, however, that most of the appointments were made by the LNP, who have held power for 17 of the las 23 years. You could, blame the greens, who have never held cabinet posts, and only sit as minority members on some of the government committees.

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      • #
        Sceptical Sam

        As usual Peter, you are all piss and wind.

        Nothing substantial at all.

        A cop out. You just don’t know, do you.

        Your persistent “I’m not your Google” demonstrates you know bugger all.

        Why people waste their time and expertise on you is a thing of wonder.

        But we’ll persist; even with your psychopathic tendency.

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      • #
        Graeme#4

        I also have looked at the so-called “information” Peter, and it just appears to make the situation worse. There are far too many assumptions and “let’s try this to see if it works” aoproaches. In any other field of science, this would be regarded as disastrous. 100% agree with Sam – it really smells.

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        • #
          Peter Fitzroy

          G4 – you have the data, and you have the method (it is the python script) what more do you want?

          017

          • #
            Graeme#4

            For the third time Peter, it is NOT the Pyhton script that I believe is the main cause for concern. You appear to have a fixation on this script, similar to a previous fixation on the grid sizes. It’s the entire whole mess, to put it politely, that needs fixing.

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            • #
              Peter Fitzroy

              N0 – try to understand – gridding and the method by which the climate data is constructed are standard and mediated by the world meteorological association – they set the basic parameters, and if you have doubts go after them. What the issue is here is about how these standards are implemented by the BOM, tied into an idea that somehow there is a deliberate falsification of the data

              03

              • #
                Graeme#4

                No Peter, the BOM are NOT adhering to the standards set by the WMO. For a start, they are not recording temperatures using their automated stations based on WMO standards – they are simply “doing their own thing”. Same with their undefined internal processes – they aren’t following any world standards, and are certainly not based on ISO 9000.
                I don’t believe that it’s deliberate data falsification, but their processes result in corrupted data. The end result is the same.
                And then they have the hide to become politically involved by making far too many alarmist statements, even though these statements are based on corrupted data.

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              • #
                bobl

                Peter

                The issue is simple, in spite of code being available there are manual interventions and there is insufficient information to take the raw readings and get Acorn V2 – it doesn’t matter which bits are made available it only matters whether the Acorn Data set can be replicated from the raw data with it. As I understand it – this can’t be done.

                In my opinion there is no basis for adjusting a value from an automatic weather station up or down, there are supposed to be accurate, nothing from an AWS should be adjusted unless its old data after a move being adjusted for location. This should be done with a side by side comparison and a calibration table. IE at Temp X if site 1 reads A then site 2 reads B, from a year or so of data you should be able to build a calibration with mean and variance, and even prove the correlation between the sites. The overlap data MUST be kept as this is the proof of integrity.

                If the sites are not correlated then they must not be maintained as a single site ID.

                There is no basis for using surrounding sites 1000km away to do this.

                10

  • #
    robert rosicka

    I’m pretty sure this is going to be the hottest year evahhhhhhh .

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    • #
      Slithers

      200 days with-out a sun spot. Snowing in both hemispheres at the same time.
      It is going to get Hotter and it is going to get Colder!
      The seasons are changing, longer colder winters, shorter hotter summers.
      More snow less rain so more drought. less evaporation in summer so yet hotter summers.
      Shorter growing periods make for poor crops and even crop failure, stock up your pantry.
      WE could be in for a very rough few years if the sun does not wake up!

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  • #
    Kalm Keith

    The Monkey Business outlined above which was done under government supervision is neither correct science nor statistical recording and treatment.

    In a nominal democracy how can such obvious distortions be allowed to happen.

    This is not science, it is not statistics and it is not acceptable and Must be investigated.

    KK

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    • #
      Peter Fitzroy

      Well, I doubt than any politician has the scientific understanding to interpret what their departments and agencies are saying to them. However, thoughts and prayers are offered for victims of completely avoidable events both here and in America. So to answer your question – to ask our elected officials to do a task that is clearly beyond their ken, will not achieve anything.
      You could, of course protest, if that is not banned yet. Or start a boycott of BOM products, by saying to farmers (as an example) do not trust the BOM for your forward planting decisions.

      Activism, you know you want to

      024

      • #
        Brian

        Having taken up farming when I “retired” I can say in complete honesty that I would never use the BOM for planning hay making. I have found the Norwegian meteorology site to be more accurate.

        270

      • #
        Farmer Gez

        I’m a farmer and the seasonal forecasts by the BoM are worse than useless, they are misleading.
        In a meeting them and the CSIRO twenty years ago I told them this and very little has improved in their forecast models to change my opinion. Getting it right 50% of the time is no better than an each way bet.
        They cannot tell within weeks if an ENSO event will occur on any given year and yet we are expected to believe they can forecast climate ten years into the future. That defies logic. BoM needs display more skill in the weather before it delves into climate.

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        • #
          Another Ian

          At a recent meeting there was the example given of a successful marginal farmer’s risk weighting.

          One factor was “seasonal outlook”, which started as

          “rainfall decile – 1” which has now become

          “rainfall decile – 4”

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  • #
    Lionell Griffith

    Yet all we do is complain.

    40

    • #
      Peter Fitzroy

      Start a Go Fund me page, wee if Getup will support you.

      Activism, you know you want to

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      • #
        william x

        Peter Fitz you have posted comments previously that have been the intent of trashing my professional reputation and integrity. I am a leading professional in my field. I have responded to your defamatory posts, yet you have ignored them. Why is that?

        If I knew whom you really are I would sue you for defamation.

        Fitz you seem to use the misery and death of others to push your agenda whilst the emergency services are willing to put their own lives on the line.

        People lose their lives and yet you post that the fires are due to climate change. Not the fuel loads. I am sure that you will never put your life at risk as I and others have done. Imho you are a coward and a grub. It is easy to push an agenda behind a keyboard. Without any risk to your life.

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        • #
          Peter Fitzroy

          How can I rash the reputation of a screen name? Gore a pair

          015

        • #

          Sue me too William. All you’ve done is spout an opinion little different from that of many people but you want it to be held above others, not because of any evidence you provide, but because of who you claim you are.

          010

        • #
          Peter Fitzroy

          By the way – I do use my real name, and my location has been revealed over the last few weeks. Both of these facts could have been checked by looking at social media. Now I did a scan for x (lower case) william (also lower case) no luck there and visa versa also no luck

          011

          • #
            OriginalSteve

            Of course…you ve to be a bit keen ( or need to be visible to connect to people ) to use your real name on social media.

            I have zero social media presence by choice, as I think social media has way more downsides than upsides…..

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            • #

              Steve – this is social media

              08

              • #
                OriginalSteve

                I consider social media to be thinks like facebook, instagram, and other fluff etc.

                This is just a basic bulletin board ( in the old parlance)

                30

              • #

                They were the social media of the past but their lack of sophistication does not demote them to something else. I used to dial into bbs nodes which sent all posts and replies once or twice a day to the OS board. Dial in the next day and someone might have replied or commented.

                03

      • #
        el gordo

        Fitz this is no laughing matter, a Royal Commission is urgently needed.

        CRU climatologist/programmer, Ian (Harry) Harris, wrote: “Getting seriously fed up with the state of the Australian data. So many new stations have been introduced, so many false references … so many changes that aren’t documented.”

        150

        • #

          “…if Getup will support you.”

          Sure. And then we’ll ask Dracula to give blood.

          100

        • #
          Peter Fitzroy

          100% in agreement el gordo, what do you think the terms of reference should be?
          The reason I ask that question is that without an adequate set of terms – the result might not be enlightening.
          My suggestion would be “is there any evidence that the BOM did not follow its published methods, including calibration, site selection, missing values and gridding

          110

          • #

            is there any evidence that the BOM did not follow its published methods, including calibration, site selection, missing values and gridding

            is no reason for a royal commission. This is:

            is there any evidence that the BOM deliberately did not follow its published methods, including calibration, site selection, missing values and gridding. If so why.

            07

            • #
              Graeme#4

              Sigh… Their processes and methodologies are NOT published. Not sure why this is something folks don’t fully comprehend.

              80

              • #

                not sure who you are directing this comment to. A royal commission can compel them to release and explain.

                07

              • #
                Peter Fitzroy

                G4 – yes they are – it’s all in the Python script.

                09

              • #
                Graeme#4

                I think a royal commission was started Gee, but was abruptly terminated. I don’t believe that the TAR was scoped to investigate all the issues that have been raised here. In any case, the majority of the TAR were accomplished statisticians, and they seemed to do a good job of checking that part of the process. I’m not sure how anybody could hold any government body accountable for their actions.
                And Peter, this is now the FOURTH that I have stated that this discussion is NOT about the Python script.

                20

              • #

                I think a royal commission

                ?

                A senate inquiry maybe? I found nothing

                01

            • #
              Peter Fitzroy

              good point.

              06

          • #
            el gordo

            Term of reference, something like BoM cools the past to warm the present?

            50

          • #
            el gordo

            Fitz before the RC we’ll need a BoM audit, so that we can see when and where the rot set in.

            80

    • #

      Yes Lionell, what about gratitude? Eshew scurvy bitterness and blame. Western civilisation ending famine in the west, giving us universal suffrage, free speech, equal rights of INDIVIDUALS before the law – and moah – literature, arts and music, oh!
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kbJcQYVtZMo

      50

      • #
        Lionell Griffith

        I do much more than complain and have significantly contributed to technological civilization. I helped it work better, faster, and more cheaply in many different technological areas. I simply don’t publicize it all that much.

        Unlike PF, I don’t seek to have power over people. I simply provide needed technological artifacts for others to choose to use or not. I do not force them to do so at the point of governments gun.

        90

        • #
          Peter Fitzroy

          Greta Thunberg – started as a person protest on Fridays, for a year. So surely you could do that?

          Where did I ever seek power, tosh, “yet all we do is complain” – how is that an technological artifact?

          09

          • #
            Serp

            What say, under your expert tutelage, we have Greta Thunderbox debug the BOM python script on the other six days of the week?

            30

            • #
              OriginalSteve

              Do you think if she stood there and shouted “how dare you” the python script would then work correctly?

              Just askin’…. 😉

              50

          • #
            Lionell Griffith

            PF: attempted to say something but didn’t quite succeed. Mostly verbal white noise.

            Actually, protesting is a particular noisy form of complaining. It fails to contribute anything to change the situation for the better. It is, at best, a plea that someone else must do something that the protestor cannot or will not do.

            How about attempting to do something that actually makes things better rather than simply being in the way? Unfortunately, you have to know what better is and how to achieve it before you can make the attempt.

            No? Protesting is so much easier. All you need to do is copy someone else who is protesting, make a lot of noise, and carry a badly made sign. You don’t have to think or know anything. All that does is increase entropy without accomplishing anything useful with the energy expended.

            20

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    Reasonable Skeptic

    It has always seemed to me that a statistical analysis of the changes to outputs of the homogenization process over time would reveal tampering. Eventually, the stats would say that the changes are lies.

    These are temperatures so changes should be equally distributed over time and space, but the pattern seems to be cool the distant past, warm the recent past and each changes adds to this. Eventually, statistically speaking, the repeating patter would prove “tampering” is happening. I doubt “tampering” is deliberate, I just think it is like a swarm of ants each moving a grain of sand. Not much on their own, but cumulatively, the change says there are ants working away.

    60

    • #
      Kalm Keith

      True Science.
      Politicians are responsible for the debasement of true science which was once to be found in the formerly great Australian institution, the CSIRO. The BOM has not demonstrated that it can properly record and store data from just one site so any claim to “Scientific” benefit from analysis of thousands of sites is nonsense.

      Real Science.
      The use of temperature measurements to describe local weather conditions is of an indicative nature only and certainly not reproducible science. Comparison of measurements from one location with those of any other location brings with it the scientific requirement to find and acknowledge every factor which can affect measurement. This is not done and yet the BOM ridiculously reports temperatures to an unrealistic level of accuracy.

      Useful Science.
      As several farmers have commented here on this thread, BOM forecasts are not of any use to farmers. Conclusion: BOM should cease making pointless predictions and close down that section. More reliable forecasts are apparently available elsewhere.

      If any further confirmation is needed of the Unscientific nature of BOM activity we need look no further than the “integration” of different sets of temperature measurements from satellites, ground thermometers and newer electronic constant monitoring systems.

      The abuse of data and science is mind boggling and becoming close to peak stupidity when “weather” temperature is reported to the nearest tenth of a degree.

      The abuse of data by modern politics and the BOM is a scandal.

      KK

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    graham dunton

    A link via wuwt- The True Cost of Renewables are Hidden Due to a Lack of Market Transparency

    Testifying before Indiana’s 21st Century Energy Task Force, electricity markets expert and regulatory attorney, Mike Nasi, warns Indiana policymakers of the significant indirect costs and risks renewables have placed on the Texas grid.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tQT7kawwBOg&feature=emb_logo

    other links within the video
    [email protected]
    http://www.lifepowerd.org

    60

    • #
      Serp

      Pity Andrews and D’Ambrosio can’t be tied to chairs and forced to watch this; oh yeah, it’s all about investment in renewables, the money, not generation of reliable power –momentarily took my eye off the ball, sorry.

      30

    • #
      Graeme#4

      Thanks Graham. A very good summary of both the problems with renewables and also privatising the energy market.

      10

  • #
    ArchivesActBreach

    I’m still shocked that BOM was able to get away with destroying pre-1910 historical records. Its a breach of their 2007 records authority which specifies measurements are to be retained as national archive. They have basically broken the law.

    60

    • #
      Serp

      Are you certain that this is true? Charles Todd’s work must still exist somewhere.

      10

      • #
        el gordo

        ‘Some colonial meteorological records are held in the Archives’ Adelaide Office. Most records about meteorology in South Australia are held in Melbourne, where the Commonwealth Bureau of Meteorology Head Office is located. Records held by the Archives relating to meteorology in South Australia include rainfall registers, station journals, sea temperature records, and files about noteworthy weather events.’

        National Archives Australia

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    • #
      Graeme#4

      But have they broken any law? I looked into this some time ago and couldn’t find any federal government law that explicitly said that government entities have to retain all records forever. The BOM have already admitted to losing whole sets of temperature recordings from some sites.

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        ArchivesACTBreach

        Not all Commonwealth records are kept for ever. How long you keep a record is defined by retention schedules called record authorities. The most current record authority covering the functions of BOM is Records Authority Department of Industry, Tourism and Resources 2007/00307997 http://www.adri.govt.nz/naaresources/ra/2007-00307997.pdf. This authority covers a wide range of agency functions not just those of BOM. Records managers use these schedules to sentence agency records (i.e. dispose of short term value records or transfer permanent records to the National Archives) once their useful business life is over. In reality the usefulness of records may never cease. A good example is the Australian War Memorial which has various databases of information relating to its vast war related collection. This information would be considered retain as national archive but the Memorial would never transfer those records to the Archives because that information is still supporting its collection management, research and educational functions. If the Memorial were to start destroying some of its permanent historical records, let’s say because some of those records were politically incorrect (e.g. some primary source records might refer to Japanese as “Japs) there would be an outcry by historians.

        The 2007/00307997 records authority does not specifically say climate raw data collected by BOM must be kept forever at least not directly. Unfortunately, modern day record schedules are not as comprehensive, logical or well written as the used to be so there is a real subjective “gut feel” element to a way a records manager might interpret them and apply them. In the case of climate data my guess is it would be reasonable to draw on entry 17713 Under Space Weather Prediction which states: “Raw scientific or technical data acquired directly via collecting stations or through external sources” is “Retain as national archives.”

        The National Archives explains its rational for what it keeps here on this page at its website: “What we keep: Principles for selecting the Australian Government’s national archives” http://www.adri.govt.nz/information-management/selecting-national-archives/index.aspx. In a section called Other Considerations it states:
        “Best available source – where several sources of the same information are available we will keep the best available source. That is, the content of the highest value in the most concise form. For example, the best available source may be a register or dataset that summarises the significant information or it may be a complete run of case files, whichever most effectively provides the best value information. In some instances we may choose to keep more than one source of information.”
        BOM says the pre-1910 data is a unreliable but even if that were the case, surely it could be argued it the best available source as there is no alternative.
        Section 24 of The Archives ACT 1983 deals with the destruction of Commonwealth records:
        Division 2—Dealings with Commonwealth records
        24 Disposal, destruction etc. of Commonwealth records
        (1) Subject to this Part, a person must not engage in conduct that results in:

        (a) the destruction or other disposal of a Commonwealth record; or

        (b) the transfer of the custody or ownership of a Commonwealth record; or

        (c) damage to or alteration of a Commonwealth record.

        Now this is the sobering part, I don’t think anyone has ever been charged under the Archives Act. Generally people destroying or falsifying records get charged under the Public Service Act or the Crimes Act 1914.

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  • #
    Travis T. Jones

    In reality, these are numbered acorn 2 and acorn 3.

    Acorn 1 was undertaken in 2003 on Australia’s high quality data sets.

    “The primary purpose of this data set was to establish the reliable monitoring of climate trends and variability at annual and decadal time-scale.

    Generally the high-quality records were homogenised from 1910, by which time most stations are believed to have been equipped with the current standard instrument shelter.

    The dataset ended in 1993.”

    http://www.cmar.csiro.au/e-print/internal/braganza_x2004a.pdf

    There was no warming on any long term records until CSIRO started adjusting historical data.

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  • #
    Drapetomania

    Beige Reef – Presented By Dr Jennifer Marohasy

    “We filmed this reef because, according to a scientific report in the journal Nature, there are no longer any Acropora corals at this location. The peer-reviewed article, coauthored by David Wachenfeld who is the chief scientist at the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority,  claims the corals at Stone Island have been destroyed by global warming and declining water quality.
    Yet we found about 25 hectares of Acropora in the north-facing bay at Stone Island. ”  

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HqFFqBuFVqU&feature=youtu.be

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    el gordo

    Its been a decade since Climategate and apparently the BBC is planning a whitewash.

    https://judithcurry.com/2019/11/12/legacy-of-climategate-10-years-later/

    40

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    Travis T. Jones

    “Mullins and 22 emergency services chiefs earlier penned a chilling warning to the Prime Minister about impending bushfires and catastrophic weather in Australia.”
    https://7news.com.au/sunrise/on-the-show/this-is-climate-change-former-fire-chiefs-chilling-bushfire-warning–c-553989

    Whoa! Wait. What?

    If trace CO2 causes more moisture in the atmosphere, why should we expect droughts and bushfires to get worse?

    A warmer atmosphere holds more moisture—about 7 percent more per 1.8°F (1°C) of warming.
    https://www.climatesignals.org/climate-signals/atmospheric-moisture-increase

    70

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    Another Ian

    Stop the press! Full panic mode everyone!

    “Sweden Central Bank Sells Australian, Canadian Bonds because of Climate Policy Risk”

    https://wattsupwiththat.com/2019/11/14/sweden-central-bank-sells-australian-canadian-bonds-because-of-climate-policy-risk/

    30

  • #
    A Crooks

    At this rate by 2100 Australia is going to have an Ice Age in 1900. The past is cooling faster that the future is warming!!!!

    70

  • #

    […] more vandalism by our Bureau of Meteorology. The Bureau of Meteorology did what to February? Wow, just wow. Look […]

    00

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    Carp

    News from UK

    I’ve just watched a bucketful of whitewash. “Climategate: Science of a scandal” on BBC 4 TV. Thursday, 14 Nov 2019, 21:00 to 22:00 GMT. It is available on BBC iplayer but I’m not sure if you can get it in Oz.

    40

    • #
      Carp

      I’ve just had another bucket of whitewash. Same channel, 23:20 to 00:35 GMT. “Climate change by numbers”. Don’t worry, it’s perfectly all right to fiddle old temperature readings – it’s called Data Homogenization.

      20

  • #
    Kim

    How does the BoM take into account a hot sun combined with a strong cold Antarctic wind?!!! that occurred frequently in SW WA last summer.

    50

  • #
    pat

    BBC whoppers – segment begins 27min12sec:

    52min59sec: 14 Nov: BBC OS – Flood and wildfires blamed on climate change
    The mayor of Venice has blamed climate change for severe flooding in the city. This week we’ve been talking about bushfires in Australia as well but how much are they about climate change? Our Environment correspondent Matt McGrath explains.
    https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/w172wrvwd3hktkl

    summary:

    27min12sec to 34min20sec: McCormack not CAGW/Venice mayor, it’s CAGW.
    Matt McGrath on connection between CAGW and floods in Venice & UK, bushfires in Australia, California, Amazon fires also mentioned in intro promo-ing this segment (BUT not the freeze in US). McCormack again/Morrison quote. BBC presenter claims 85 deaths when speaking of recent California wildfires, but that figure is for the 2018 Camp Fire. McGrath at least mentions forest management in Calif has caused fuel load to build up. doesn’t credit Trump for being correct. 33min29sec BBC presenter says we’ve had many reports come out in the past few months, especially about this one report that came with 11,000 scientists
    backing it.

    TWEET: Donald J. Trump
    The Governor of California, @GavinNewsom, has done a terrible job of forest management. I told him from the first day we met that he must ‘clean’ his forest floors regardless of what his bosses, the environmentalists, DEMAND of him. Must also do burns and cut fire stoppers.
    3 Nov 2019

    Wikipedia: Camp Fire (2018)
    The fire caused at least 85 civilian fatalities, with one person still missing…

    in another version of this online, the segment begins with audio of a BBC listener – a Venetian aged 50 – who says the water level is unprecedented in her lifetime. of course, it’s 53 years (1966) since it was higher, but BBC doesn’t do the right thing and speak to a Venetian who has memory of that event.

    MUST-WATCH FOR THOSE WHO HAVEN’T SEEN IT AS YET:

    Youtube: 5min21sec: Sky News: New ‘big global warming scare’ is simply a ‘con’
    Sky News host Andrew Bolt says we have experienced “another day, another big global warming scare”, one which he describes as being nothing more than a “con”.
    FROM THE APPROX 2,500 COMMENTS:
    ben witt: The media didn’t buy it, they were selling it.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ps0qpv5RVWo

    Andrew Bolt: Latest big climate scare is a sham
    Herald Sun – 11 Nov 2019
    Global warming hysteria is now so manic that I don’t trust a thing journalists say until I’ve checked for myself. … Consider last week’s reports on the latest big climate scare. The ABC: “Climate emergency declared by 11,000 scientists worldwide who warn of ‘catastrophic threat…

    BTW I have not seen or heard a single report on the US freeze on broadcast media in Australia. of course, I could have missed some coverage, as I never, or rarely ever, turn on free-to-air stations and, mostly, only monitor theirABC online.

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    • #
      Graeme#4

      Venice is flooding today because, to increase freight movements to a nearby port, the Italian government cut wider channels through the chain of outer lagoon islands. Originally there was only one main narrow channel, so the tidal flows in and out of the lagoon were slowed. Now the tidal changes sweep right into Vemice.
      Also in the 60s, Venice pumped far too much water out of the underlying aquifers, thus increasing their land settling rates. When they realised this was happening, they stopped pumping from these aquifers but the damage had been done.

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  • #

    And remember…

    It is of zero importance if there has been some global warming in recent decades. It proves nothing. It means nothing. And any global cooling, so long as it remains slight like recent supposed warming, will have no importance beyond its natural effects. And it too shall pass. Even as the world descends toward the next and inevitable glaciation, there will be variations of cooler and warmer.

    Apart from going up and going down, what else are temps supposed to do? Tap dance? Play badminton? Collect Pokemon cards?

    What’s important here are the contortions and deceptions used not just to prove warming but to magnify it. The warming itself is to be expected after the chill and lower sea levels of the 1700s. The climatariat’s role is not to reveal but to distract from the known, the acknowledged, the established and the obvious. Amazingly, it seems to work on some.

    So keep in mind that we should be concerned with the scientific fudging, which matters greatly, not the warming, which matters not in the slightest.

    Lastly, whatever the grass-roots and unpaid GeeUppers may be thinking, their globalist masters have no interest whatever in climate. Branson might share a yacht or a platform with Greta…but his planes fly in greater numbers. Gupta preaches green while he buys up the coal mines and smelters made cheaper by green preaching. Gore’s spare Christmas tree would power ten villages.

    So remember, any global warming matters not in the slightest and berating those behind the climate beat-up is futile because they are not interested and do not care.

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  • #
    Steve B

    It is with interest that the BoM have been able to claim that average temps have increased without the need for regular increases in new high temp records especially in places that have long term records. For instance Adelaide has not set a new monthly high temp record since 1975, in fact 8 of the 12 monthly records are pre 1950. For that matter Australia’s highest temp record is still from Jan 1960, and for the life of me I cannot see how averages can rise (particularly at the rate they claim) without records being broken, especially those that are 50 to 100 years old in places like Adelaide.
    I suspect the BoM actually know that average temps are not rising, but are committed to proving it, but those pesky long term records remain. Wait for the “adjustments” for stubborn records in the near future.

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  • #
    TdeF

    The BOM management must be under incredible pressure from the WMO/IPCC. It is up to little Australia to rescue Global Warming because we own the South Pacific, the Southern Ocean and even 1/3 of the globe where only 2% of people live.

    These little fiddles are not hard but mean a great deal to a lot of people here and overseas. Investors, retired people on superannuation, struggling German windmill manufacturers, Chinese solar panel companies, Lithium battery manufacturers, Elon Musk and real Australian entrepreneurs like Dr. John Hewson, kangaroo scientist Tim Flannery, innumerate Al Gore and the original fiddler Hockey Stick Michael Mann and hundreds of thousands of rent seeking underpaid academics who live off this stuff. Fudging Australian data is honorable work to benefit a lot of people and prevent a world wide recession. Go fiddle!

    Remember if the world gets cooler, millions are out of a job. A lot is at stake and for the BOM, man made Global Warming is the best thing that’s ever happened to Meteorology. And it that fails, there’s just Climate Change which is so silly without Global Warming.

    So come on, BOM, you can do it!

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    • #
      TdeF

      I have to say the task ahead of them is daunting. Prof Weiss’ great fit to the last 2500 years predicts a certain rapid drop in world temperature in the 2020s. It’s going to make life very hard for the BOM and they are going to have to freeze the 19th century and the start of the 20th but to no avail with those pesky satellites.

      As for the switch in the 1980s/90s from thermometers to electronics, clearly that has done nothing but good for global warming. You can always blame the electronics for reading too low and the people for reading too high. Still when you claim the world’s hottest year by an infintesimal 0.004C, it’s all at stake. That must have been a very hard year for the data fiddlers and they all had to pull together. A minus figure would have meant disaster. And I hope they had a great party when they just made positive and went to press.

      110

      • #
        TdeF

        And as has been pointed out, you can always take the instantaneous highs from the modern electronics instead of the slow averages from the old thermometers and even the satellites. That should be good for a degree or two when needed.

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    pat

    14 Nov: AP: EU bank to stop funding fossil fuel projects in 2 years
    By FRANK JORDANS
    BERLIN: The European Investment Bank said Thursday that it will stop financing fossil fuel energy projects from the end of 2021 as part of an effort to fight climate change.
    The decision, which ends fossil fuel funding a year later than initially proposed, follows lengthy negotiations among European Union member states, the bank’s shareholders.

    “We will stop financing fossil fuels and we will launch the most ambitious climate investment strategy of any public financial institution anywhere,” the EIB’s president, Werner Hoyer, said in a statement.
    Calling climate “the top issue on the political agenda of our time,” Hoyer noted scientists’ warnings that the planet is heading for a 3-4 degrees Celsius (5.4°-7.2° Fahrenheit) increase in global average temperature by the end of the century.
    “If that happens, large portions of our planet will become uninhabitable, with disastrous consequences for people around the world,” he said…

    Earlier Thursday, Germany’s Foreign Minister Heiko Maas told diplomats and scientists in Berlin that “Europe must lead, because only then other countries such as China or India will stay the course too.”
    He backed a proposal by the incoming European Commission for the 28-nation bloc to agree a Green New Deal that would see economic programs linked with efforts to reduce carbon emissions…

    Separately, Sweden’s central bank said Wednesday that it has ditched bonds issued by the Canadian province of Albert and the Australian states of Queensland and Western Australia because authorities there are not doing enough to reduce carbon dioxide emissions.
    On Thursday, the European Commission announced that vehicle tires will have to come with clearer energy labels from 2021, to help consumers choose those that are most efficient.
    The EU executive estimates that high rolling friction can increase fuel consumption by up to 30%, and more efficient tires could have the same effect as 4 million fewer cars on the roads.
    https://apnews.com/81c2cf82d96848a197758d7b8c629785

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  • #
    TdeF

    As long as you can keep the public scared of the widespread species extinction which would come from another +1C in temperature in 100 years.

    A bit like the last hundred years of rapid 1C warming where billions of unrecorded new species apparently went extinct. Like the Dodo. And those 250,000 caribou lost in Canada which were found the next valley, as expected. Or the 400millions of Indians dead from thirst by 2035 which turned out to be a peer reviewed typo. Or the Polar bears who are at record numbers. Or all those starving people in India and China and Africa. And the drowned islands of the Pacific, wherever they are. And the bushfires in Australia deliberately lit by Climate Change.

    And there is no hope of adaption by any species, even man. We know +1C is not survivable, a doomsday result. Apparently.

    60

  • #
    Rick Kinsman

    From my own observations I note that the summers of 2017 and 2018 in Perth were much cooler than previously. This particularly applies to 2018/19 where I carefully noted that only twice in the whole summer in Perth did temperatures reach above 37C. TWICE! The usual February/March three-week heatwave was conspicuously absent.
    I didn’t rely on BOM’s records after the event, when they had had time to “adjust” the data. I simply observed the live temperatures on a daily basis myself and drew the obvious conclusion from the raw data. That is; is it hotter than previously or is it cooler than previously? At this level it is really pretty simple stuff – it seems to be getting cooler, not hotter.

    100

    • #
      el gordo

      Good observation Rick, the collapse of the subtropical ridge in July 2017 was the beginning of climate change. So the situation is for a continuation in midlatitude, two hot days followed by a longer period of cold air outbreak, then hot again etc.

      When summer draws to a close the variability may simply show up as average temps, but on the ground the casual observers are unnerved by the unseasonal weather.

      50

    • #
      el gordo

      Correction, four hot days for Perth.

      ‘Temperatures have been soaring over Western Australia this week, with Perth on track to register four consecutive days at or above 35 degrees by Saturday. This feat hasn’t happened during November since 1933.’

      20

      • #
        Graeme#4

        Here we go again, the BOM changing its reference temperature range depending the level of alarmism required.
        Their monthly temperatures are now only referenced against temperatures recorded at the newer and hotter Mt Lawley site. This site reads hotter than the two previous sites, a fact that the BOM has partially acknowledged.
        So the 1933 temperature would have been measured at the much cooler Mt Eliza site above Perth, a site so different to Perth that it was standard practice to quote two daily maximum temperatures in summer – one from the Mt Eliza site and one from the Perth CBD.
        If it was a hot day in 1933, that temp would have been MUCH hotter than the current temps.

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    • #
      Graeme#4

      Rick, I have also kept records of the monthly average temperatures for 2019, and when the December records are provided, we will see whether it’s been a cool year.
      However, I’m now going to say that this summer will be hotter, purely based on the finger of hot water pointing at the SW corner. This “finger” has been cooler than normal in the last couple of years – this year it has changed.

      30

  • #
    JCalvertN(UK)

    Same raw data; different adjustments?

    50

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    Carp

    Forgive me, for I have sinned. I’ve just bought some hexamine fuel tablets for a model steam engine. How much does that add to my carbon footprint?

    100

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    Speedy

    What the BOM is doing is nothing short of [snip]! Those responsible need to explain themselves.
    Cheers,
    Mike

    30

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    OriginalSteve

    Hubble bubble……a cauldron!!

    I had to laugh at the idea that climate science reminds me of the laugh out loud witch scene in Monthy Python and the Holy Grail….

    “Peasants: We have found a witch! (A witch! a witch!)
    “Burn her burn her!

    Peasant 1: We have found a witch, may we burn her?
    (cheers)
    Vladimir: How do you known she is a witch?
    P2: She looks like one!
    V: Bring her forward
    (advance)
    Woman: I’m not a witch! I’m not a witch!
    V: ehh… but you are dressed like one.
    W: They dressed me up like this!
    All: naah no we didn’t… no.
    W: And this isn’t my nose, it’s a false one.
    (V lifts up carrot)
    V: Well?
    P1: Well we did do the nose
    V: The nose?
    P1: …And the hat, but she is a witch!
    (all: yeah, burn her burn her!)
    V: Did you dress her up like this?
    P1: No! (no no… no) Yes. (yes yeah) a bit (a bit bit a bit) But she has got a wart!
    (P3 points at wart)
    V: What makes you think she is a witch?
    P2: Well, she turned me into a newt!
    V: A newt?!
    (P2 pause & look around)
    P2: I got better.
    (pause)
    P3: Burn her anyway! (burn her burn her burn!)
    (king walks in)
    V: There are ways of telling whether she is a witch.
    P1: Are there? Well then tell us! (tell us)
    V: Tell me… what do you do with witches?
    P3: Burn’em! Burn them up! (burn burn burn)
    V: What do you burn apart from witches?
    P1: More witches! (P2 nudge P1)
    (pause)
    P3: Wood!
    V: So, why do witches burn?
    (long pause)
    P2: Cuz they’re made of… wood?
    V: Gooood.
    (crowd congratulates P2)
    V: So, how do we tell if she is made of wood?
    P1: Build a bridge out of her!
    V: Ahh, but can you not also make bridges out of stone?
    P1: Oh yeah…
    V: Does wood sink in water?
    P1: No
    P3: No. It floats!
    P1: Let’s throw her into the bog! (yeah yeah ya!)
    V: What also floats in water?
    P1: Bread
    P3: Apples
    P2: Very small rocks
    (V looks annoyed)
    P1: Cider
    P3: Grape gravy
    P1: Cherries
    P3: Mud
    King: A Duck!
    (all look and stare at king)
    V: Exactly! So, logically…
    P1(thinking): If she ways the same as a duck… she’s made of wood!
    V: And therefore,
    (pause & think)
    P3: A witch! (P1: a witch)(P2: a witch)(all: a witch!)
    V: We shall use my largest scales.
    (V jumps down)

    https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-11-15/wa-hot-air-mass-will-head-to-the-east-coast-bushfire-zone/11705750

    “A cauldron of extreme heat developing in WA is heading straight for the east coast bushfire zone

    “A build-up of intense heat that will see temperatures in WA soar into the mid 40s this weekend will be dragged across the country next week, right into parts of New South Wales and Queensland devastated by bushfires this week.

    “The NSW and Queensland bushfires have already burnt through more than a million hectares of land, killing four people and destroying more than 300 homes.

    “Bureau of Meteorology spokesman Neil Bennett said milder temperatures were expected to provide some relief to parts of NSW where fires continue to burn over the next few days, but the bushfire threat was far from over with the heat expected to ramp up again.

    “”The problem that we have with the fires on the east coast is that there will be this break now … there are some cooler temperatures, but the heat from WA could push across over the course of the middle part of next week,” Mr Bennett said.

    “While early forecasts suggest areas in eastern parts of New South Wales and south-east Queensland will nudge 40C by Tuesday, forecasters will keep a close eye on the winds to determine whether to issue fire weather warnings.
    …………

    “The WA cauldron

    “The extreme heat brewing in WA could see November records tumble over the weekend.

    “”We are going to see a number of places away from the west coast getting very warm temperatures and in some parts approaching records for November,” Mr Bennett said.

    “”[It is] all because of a high pressure system that’s sitting in the Bight that is going to direct hot north-easterly air over the region.”

    “Perth is in the midst of a hot spell, with a string of four days over 35C expected — a phenomenon that has not happened in November since 1933.

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    Terry

    How is this not blatant [snip]?

    There must be a Royal Commission into not only the BoM and their nefarious practices, but into the Minister responsible (right up to the Prime Minister if necessary) and their bureaucrats that have knowingly allowed this [snip] to be perpetrated on Australian citizens, all while sucking down buckets of taxpayer dollars.

    It’s a scientific crime. Heads (and plenty of them) must roll over this. [snip]

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    OriginalSteve

    The Elite cranking up pressure on Morrison.

    FWIW – since when are fire chiefs knoweldgeable climate? Fires yes, climate …er…nope…..

    Its a bluff…..

    https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-11-15/scott-morrison-should-listen-to-fire-chiefs-on-climate-change/11707096

    “When five former fire chiefs held a news conference on Thursday to urge the Federal Government to take more action on climate change, it was a challenging moment for Scott Morrison.
    Those who fronted the cameras represented a group of 21 men and two women, who make up the Emergency Leaders for Climate Action. These people have led fire and emergency services all around the nation.

    “They’re powerful voices, because they are advocates with compelling experience and expertise.

    “The group’s messages are that we’re in “a new age of unprecedented bushfire danger”, climate change is the key reason things are getting worse, and the Government needs to respond with more resources and a better policy to reduce emissions and move to clean energy.

    “The problem is, as group founder Greg Mullins, former Fire and Rescue NSW commissioner, put it succinctly, “this Government fundamentally doesn’t like talking about climate change”.

    Yep – why bother talking about fairy dust and unicorns, when we could be talking about lack of hazard burning?

    This is just a double bluff.

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    • #
      Kalm Keith

      Self importance and self interest above all else.

      “that we’re in “a new age of unprecedented bushfire danger”, climate change is the key reason things are getting worse, and the Government needs to respond with more resources and a better policy to reduce emissions and move to clean energy.

      I’m assuming that those who made this statement were all previously political appointees, and that’s a sad indictment of Australian politicians .

      KK

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      • #

        your assumption would be wrong.

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        • #
          Kalm Keith

          I agree.

          It would be wrong if I was wrong but these “former” vips are political appointees put there by enviro stooges who used the environment to get votes.

          In the meantime, we burn ferociously.

          KK

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          • #

            IC… you mean tactically political, not actual politicians. They are a self formed group and they are a group because they agree with each other. And people who agree with them will invite them to speak at meetings or rallies or whatever. I’m not sure where the self interest comes into it? Maybe they get airfares and nice meals or something?

            It’s not what I’d call mysterious and underhanded politicking.

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            • #
              Kalm Keith

              I agree.

              In the face of such strong argument what choice do I have.

              I’m sure that this group of goo dooders is all self funded and not receiving any external cash for their “incidentals”.

              One thing to be careful of though during the booshfire emergency.
              The combined energy from their importance may lead to spontaneous combustion if too many were gathered together in the one spot.

              Best if they were spread out at intervals of 664.2 metres.

              KK

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            • #
              el gordo

              ‘The group’s messages are that we’re in “a new age of unprecedented bushfire danger”, climate change is the key reason things are getting worse …’

              They are wrong in thinking these bushfires are unprecedented and that its caused by AGW, but I agree that global cooling will resurrect problems long forgot.

              Extreme weather variability in midlatitude, accompanied by wind storms, is not in the global warming script.

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  • #
    OriginalSteve

    You cant make this stuff up…..

    https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/australia/what-next-hardcore-vegans-take-aim-at-bunnings-iconic-sausage-sizzle-and-demand-it-cancels-a-nationwide-barbeque-to-raise-money-for-bushfire-victims/ar-BBWKkBA?li=AAgfYrC&ocid=mailsignout

    “Hardcore vegans have lashed out at Bunnings for holding a sausage sizzle to raise money for bushfire victims.
    The hardware giant will be holding a nationwide fundraiser on November 22, with all stores across Australia raising money for those affected by bushfires that have ravaged the eastern states.

    “The hardware store will host its famous sausage sizzle, and also give customers the option to donate to the victims in store.

    “But the fundraiser has drawn criticism from the vegan community.

    ” ‘Why oh why are people selling sausages to raise money when it’s known that meat is a contributing factor to climate change? Which is a contributing factor to these fires!’, a post read on a vegan Facebook page.

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  • #

    Banning disruptive commenters is not the best option

    People who disagree with us ask the dumb questions we’d never ask. They say what the silent readers might be thinking and give us the chance to answer those questions. Rarely, they even test us. Their presence shows we are not afraid of debate, and unlike believers, don’t need to censor commentary. They are also useful target practice.

    The point of replying to a disruptive commenter is not for their benefit but for the 100 or 1000 readers who want to know the answer.

    Commenters that disagree also may act as an unofficial conduit to the institutions. Officials who won’t publicly answer our questions may answer email questions from sympathizers who then provide them here. (Notice how some commenters switch from knowing nothing and making basic errors to suddenly discussing intricate details of procedures?)

    The point of allowing dissent is not for the dissenter’s sake, but for all the other people reading a thread. When we stay calm, we win.

    The best way to deal with baiting comments is not to take the bait but to use it to expose their techniques to disrupt a conversation. Trolls want to make commenters angry. They want the conversation to be “about them”, not about the BOM. It’s both attention seeking and diversionary.

    Go “meta” in your replies. Attack the tactic not the man.

    Short comments pointing out the tactics / methods / patterns of comments are useful and will be published, but empty ad hom comments are not and will be snipped. They are off topic and after repetition, boring. Please don’t turn threads into long discussions of people who have no public profile, no importance, and no official role in the travesties that matter. If you see an ad hom (from either side) please report it to the mods — support AT joannenova.com.au/

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    • #

      Agree.

      I do find the sensitivity of some commenters perplexing and contradictory. Disagreement is immediately called disruption. Presenting evidence is labelled distraction and is dismissed without being countered. Not following the script is a tactic. Writing something that is provocative to the receiver is baiting.

      I could but I wont but I can if you want, find and label disruptive, distracting, tactic driven and provocative comments who agree completely with the blog topic. They are frequent. This is why I find the objections to such comments perplexing. Can they really not see how this is manifest in comments of posters who they agree with? The labeling of the disagreeable posts as disruptive or whatever is often an empty and tactical attempt to shut down debate. It is tedious and transparent.

      Even more frequent are the off topic ones, sometimes at post #1 which is really just rude.

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    • #
      gee aye

      “If you see an ad hom (from either side) please report it to the mods — support AT joannenova.com.au”

      I was counting that at 15-20 per post; and that from just one individual. Would you like them all in one email or separately?

      I hope he’s ok.

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      • #
        Kalm Keith

        I’m sure Peter Fits will survive. It’s been a hard week chasing Koalas.

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      • #
        Peter C

        Settle down and enjoy the Ride.

        There is plenty of provocation from a few people on this blog. There are one or two who have decided that “enough is enough” and are pushing back.

        I for one will not be troubling the moderators.

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        • #
          Peter C

          I will however be supporting the blog in the best way (tip jar).

          —Thank you! And very generously too. :- ) Really appreciate your help! – Jo

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      • #
        robert rosicka

        Ahh gee do I have to post your distracting technique from your blog again , you can’t block me from your blog I can cut and paste at will now .
        You talk of evidence but the links you and your mate Fitz provides are worthless distractions , give us a link to something that contains the words “will” , “does” , not could maybe etc etc etc .
        A good example is the safety data sheet on your blog .
        May , could , we suggest is evidence of an opinion and as soon as I see these Weasley garbage words I know your links are also garbage .
        Evidence is what we are begging for but your kind have absolutely nothing and you in particular seem to have a fetish about models , even though they are also garbage with no accuracy that I have ever seen in any field they’re used in .
        A theory is just that until proven and is proof of an assumption again not science .

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    • #
      Peter C

      What does Meta Mean?

      Go “meta” in your replies. Attack the tactic not the man.

      That is brilliant.

      “Meta” means “above and beyond”.
      In Anatomy there are metacarpal bones – they are distal to the carpal bones.

      For a full explanation check out this short excerpt from Yes Minister. (1.5 minutes)
      Note especially when Bernard reminds Sir Humphrey that “there is no ablative in Greek” LOL. If only our public servants had a full classical education!
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5FRVvjGL2C0

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    • #
      Michael262

      I think you stand for the quiet scientists. The ones that want their facts filtered just right.

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    Jacques Lemiere

    well ..it is not corrections but hypothetical ones.
    so …what errors bars should be given?

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    • #
      robert rosicka

      They don’t like putting error bars on most of their graphs when the error margin is usually greater than the subject at hand .

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  • #
    Ivan Wainwright

    Sorry folks. I am just a sill old civil engineer. When I was a student in the sixties, we learned about tolerances and rounding errors in measurement. My question is; how the hell can you state air temperature to one hundredth of a degree? To do that, you would have to measure it to ONE THOUSANDTH of a degree to ensure the one-hundredth figure was soundly based.

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    • #
      robert rosicka

      You model it that’s how ?

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    • #
      Kalm Keith

      Exactly

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    • #
      sophocles

      to think that the Apollo craft were all designed by slide rules — accurate to one decimal place and interpolable to two. As the operator, you had to keep careful track of your magnitudes (powers of 10).

      I still have my slide rule and it still works smoothly.

      I also have three casio fx82 programmable calculators — two of which work perfectly, the third being still a little temperamental but functional. I fished all three of them out of rubbish bins at work, and carefully washed and cleaned the keyboards. To do that needed a small cross-headed screwdriver available in a $5.00 set of jeweller’s screwdrivers, a bottle of iso-propyl alcohol (meths works just as well) and half a dozen cotton buds.

      But rounding errors? Significant digits? I wonder if their original owners would have understood let alone paid them any heed?

      I advertised their resurrections and resuscitations but was not contacted by the owners so I still have them — still operable.

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    robert rosicka

    You model it thats

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    • #
      robert rosicka

      WordPress came up with an error message when I posted saying ” slow down you’re posting too fast” , what the – then split the message into two .
      Sorry Jo I broke it .

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    Another Ian

    “170 Years of Earth Surface Temperature Data Show No Evidence of Significant Warming”

    https://wattsupwiththat.com/2019/11/14/170-years-of-earth-surface-temperature-data-show-no-evidence-of-significant-warming/

    “Cum grano salis:” by some suggestions in comments

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  • #
    WXcycles

    I ran out of teabags today. I think it may have been climate-change related. Beverages are at risk, we don’t know what it will do next. I’ve noticed my tire-pressure has been falling in one tire, plus my screen door has developed a worrying creak. I’m also finding that band-aids just don’t stick (this has definitely been getting worse with time). And then there’s the shopping trolleys … and you all know what I mean. So I’ve decided to start a daily climate-change journal to document these peculiar goings-on.

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    el gordo

    ‘The starting point, after a week like this, doesn’t have to be who wins the culture war on climate, who concedes the “gotcha” moment of shifting ground. The starting point is being able to shift to say “yep, things have changed and we need a strategy for dealing with it”.

    ‘That’s all people want. That’s what you are supposed to do if you are a leader.’

    Laura Tingle (ABC)

    ——-

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  • #
    el gordo

    They did the rotation centred on the cooler 1950s and 60s.

    https://s3.amazonaws.com/jo.nova/guest/aust/bom-audit/bob-fernley-jones/feb-changes/feb-aust-adjustments-bobfj-1.png

    We want a BoM audit and we want it now.

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    angech

    Understanding adjustments to temperature data
    Posted on July 7, 2014 by curryja | 2,044 Comments
    by Zeke Hausfather

    Changing the Past?

    Diligent observers of NCDC’s temperature record have noted that many of the
    values change by small amounts on a daily basis. This includes not only
    recent temperatures but those in the distant past as well, and has created
    some confusion about why, exactly, the recorded temperatures in 1917 should
    change day-to-day. The explanation is relatively straightforward. NCDC
    assumes that the current set of instruments recording temperature is
    accurate, so any time of observation changes or PHA-adjustments are done
    relative to current temperatures. Because breakpoints are detected through
    pair-wise comparisons, new data coming in may slightly change the magnitude
    of recent adjustments by providing a more comprehensive difference series
    between neighboring stations.

    When breakpoints are removed, the entire record prior to the breakpoint is
    adjusted up or down depending on the size and direction of the breakpoint.
    This means that slight modifications of recent breakpoints will impact all
    past temperatures at the station in question though a constant offset. The
    alternative to this would be to assume that the original data is accurate,
    and adjusted any new data relative to the old data (e.g. adjust everything
    in front of breakpoints rather than behind them). From the perspective of
    calculating trends over time, these two approaches are identical, and its
    not clear that there is necessarily a preferred option”

    There are two ways of adjusting data. The preferred one is to take all new readings as gospel then compare and adjust the past down. This approach is presumably used by Bom to fit their observations in with the world data base. The consequence is repeatedly recalculated and downwardly revised Februaries. Not an air fact. Part of the algorithm.

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    Matheus Carvalho

    Excellent post. I have taken one of the figures and made a poster, I hanged it around the university where I work, and also posted it at imgur:
    https://imgur.com/gallery/TdIPiLc

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    Ataulf

    I increasingly understand why the Believers™ call it Manmade Global Warming Climate Change – I mean on paper the climate has changed by people

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