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Quarter-Degree Fix Fuels Climate Fight

By ANDREW C. REVKIN,
The New York Times
Posted: 2007-08-26 13:51:58
Filed Under: Science News
(Aug. 26) - Never underestimate the power of the blogosphere and a quarter of a degree to inflame the fight over global warming.

A quarter-degree Fahrenheit is roughly the downward adjustment NASA scientists made earlier this month in their annual estimates of the average temperature in the contiguous 48 states since 2000. They corrected the numbers after an error in meshing two sets of temperature data was discovered by Stephen McIntyre, a blogger and retired business executive in Toronto. Smaller adjustments were made to some readings for some preceding years.

All of this would most likely have passed unremarkably if Mr. McIntyre had not blogged that the adjustments changed the rankings of warmest years for the contiguous states since 1895, when record-keeping began.

Suddenly, 1934 appeared to vault ahead of 1998 as the warmest year on record (by a statistically meaningless 0.036 degrees Fahrenheit). In NASA's most recent data set, 1934 had followed 1998 by a statistically meaningless 0.018 degrees. Conservative bloggers, columnists and radio hosts pounced. "We have proof of man-made global warming," Rush Limbaugh told his radio audience. "The man-made global warming is inside NASA."

Mr. McIntyre, who has spent years seeking flaws in studies pointing to human-driven climate change, traded broadsides on the Web with James E. Hansen, the NASA team's leader. Dr. Hansen said he would not "joust with court jesters" and Mr. McIntyre posited that Dr. Hansen might have a "Jor-El complex" -- a reference to Superman's father, who foresaw the destruction of his planet and sent his son packing.

Blogs are still reverberating, but Mr. McIntyre, Dr. Hansen and others familiar with the initial data revisions are clarifying what is, and is not, at issue.

One thing not in question, Mr. McIntyre and Dr. Hansen agree, is the merit of shifting away from energy choices that contribute heat-trapping greenhouse gases to the atmosphere.

Mr. McIntyre said he feels "climate change is a serious issue." His personal preference is to shift increasingly to nuclear power and away from coal and oil, the main source of heat-trapping carbon dioxide.

Mr. McIntyre and Dr. Hansen also agree that the NASA data glitch had no effect on the global temperature trend, nudging it by an insignificant thousandth of a degree.

Everyone appears also to agree that too much attention is paid to records, particularly given that the difference between 1934, 1998, and several other sets of years in the top 10 warmest list for the United States are so small as to be statistically meaningless.

Mr. McIntyre said that when he posted the revised list under the heading "A New Leaderboard at the U.S. Open," "I just was sort of having some fun with it as much as anything."

He added: "The significance of things has been misstated by Limbaugh and people like that."

the new york times
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Dr. Hansen and his team note that they rarely, if ever, discuss individual years, particularly regional findings like those for the United States (the lower 48 are only 2 percent of the planet’s surface). "In general I think that we want to avoid going into more and more detail about ranking of individual years," he said in an e-mail message. "As far as I remember, we have always discouraged that as being somewhat nonsensical."

Jay Lawrimore, a scientist at the National Climatic Data Center of the Commerce Department who works on assembling the climate records that NASA analyzed, said his agency could probably do a better job of emphasizing the uncertainty surrounding its annual temperature announcements.

Indeed, there is enough wiggle room in the numbers that the center has a different list of the 10 warmest years than those produced using NASA’s and Mr. McIntyre’s analyses. By the climate center’s reckoning, 1998 remains the warmest year for the 48 states (with 2006 second and 1934 third).

Dr. Lawrimore, Dr. Hansen and other experts said that trends are far more important than particular years, and the recent widespread warming trend has been clear — and very distinct from the regional hot spell that drove up United States temperatures in the 1930s.

Mr. McIntyre and the government scientists do agree on at least one more thing: the need to improve the quality of climate data gathered around the world, including in the United States, which has by far the planet’s biggest network of meteorological stations.

Mr. McIntyre is not alone in pointing out that the need to adjust and revise such data -- with the attendant risk of mistakes -- would be reduced with more care and consistency taken in collecting climate data.

The National Academy of Sciences has repeatedly called for improvements in climate monitoring. An independent group of meteorologists and weather buffs is compiling its own gallery of American weather stations at www.surfacestations.org, with photographs showing glaring problems, like thermometers placed next to asphalt runways and parking lots.

Dr. Lawrimore said that the government is preparing to build a climate reference network of more sophisticated, and consistent, monitoring stations that should cut uncertainty in gauging future trends.

In any case, he said, the evidence for human-driven warming remains robust. "Saying what they're saying has just provided an opportunity for them to create doubt in people's minds," he said of the bloggers.

Copyright © 2008 The New York Times Company
2007-08-26 10:58:16
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lostpilgrim69 02:04:31 AM Sep 10 2007

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oh please flytristar you are the most ignorant person on the face of the planet. its fact that the climate is changeing and that its getting hotter and hotter. i dont even care if you never see this and try to explain your backwards thinking. stupid. watch " the day after tomorrow". i bet thats ganna be similar scenario, but without the whole tidal wave into NYC. anyway get the facts about something befor you bash scientist about keeping track of temp, also not all people in africa are uneducated. i so wanna load this with curse words and eveything mean... then it would be deleted. damn i hate you so

flytristar 11:12:02 PM Sep 01 2007

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Since 1942 when a flight of P-38s heading for England got lost and landed on Greenland, 160 ft. of ice and snow has accumulated on top of those airplanes.. Go to Glacier Girl.com and you will read the story of how one of these a/c was removed from this ice. Its restored. And the bearded nuts tell us that the glaciers are melting on Greenland and elsewhere. Empire building.

flytristar 10:41:20 PM Sep 01 2007

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Theres no way in heck that the temerature of the planet can be recorded accurately. It has to be taken regularly all over the world and those folks in Africa can't read a thermometer, let alone convert Celcius to Fahrenheit; without losing a degree or two. On top of that thermometers are notorious for being inaccurate and these numbers supposedly date back 100 years. Gimme a break Al Gore. You're full of that smelly bad stuff.

m0120 10:26:47 PM Sep 01 2007

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Bwahaaahhaaahaa thats funny the person who said that, Hope you dont mind if i use it

KZERRIEN 03:05:00 PM Sep 01 2007

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YOU GO INTO A CLOSED, SEALED. IF IT FILLS UP WITH TOXINS AND CARBON DIOXIDE, SHOULDNT WE FIND A WAY TO CONTROL IT, EVEN IF THERE IS NO GLOBAL WARMING?

G75Kafka 12:43:23 PM Sep 01 2007

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While I do agree that we humans do provide some impact on changing the climate of planet earth, I do Not agree that the sum total cause of the changes are Only caused by our use of Hydrocarbon fuels.
If anyone believes that we humans can stop climate changes on Planet Earth, then they are a Total Fool.

Should we attempt to conserve the natural resources which exist on planet earth? Yep. That would be a Conservative thing to do.
Waste Not. Want Not.

In all of the Global Warming Theorists equations and calculations, they do NOT include water vapor as a gaseous substance in Planet Earth's Atmosphere. Why Izzat??

G75Kafka 12:15:27 PM Sep 01 2007

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>>2200: An Earth day is 0.12 milliseconds shorter, as rising temperatures cause oceans to expand toward the poles, speeding up the planet's rotation.<<

As the speed of rotation increases the centripetal acceleration of will form the waters of the earth toward the equator of the earth like a disc.

G75Kafka 11:55:25 AM Sep 01 2007

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One think is certain, that Planet Earth's Climate has been changing from Day one of it's existance.

If one is to believe Darwin's Theory of Evolution, then all species of critters will change to adapt to the environs.

Thus the Doom Sayers Logic is totally convoluted at best.

G75Kafka 11:50:18 AM Sep 01 2007

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>>2100: A quarter of all species of plants and land animals -- more than a million total -- are driven to extinction.<<

This exact same argument was heard in 1900 that a quarter of all species of plants and land animals would be driven to extinction by 2000.
Now scientists are busy cloning critters. Who woulda ever thunk it??

G75Kafka 11:41:59 AM Sep 01 2007

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>>2085: The risk of dengue fever from climate change increases to 3.5 billion people.<<

Shoot those Daaayum Mosquitos!!

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