Climategate Update 22: Hiding The Raw Data, Gore's Mosquitos, & The Smart Grid

Double click on the graph above, showing Orland GISS data plotted in June 2007, to see how it is plotted today, showing data recently deleted from the public record maintained by NASA.

The more global warming rocks are kicked over, the more the stench of corruption rises to our collective noses. Several days ago, we learned about how the AGW cabal had "adjusted" the raw data for the temperature monitoring station at Darwin, a station that is now in a "heat island." Thus, any adjustments to Darwin's raw data should have been downward. Instead, a correction was applied that raised the temperature significantly in the past few years. True, that could have been an anamoly. But now as more attention is drawn to this issue, the more we see similar fraud being repeated:

For the past six days, several climate scientists have discovered an alarming trend: clear evidence of alteration of historical data at weather stations around the world, in order to support the contention of anthropogenic global warming (AGW).

The changes appear to affect the Global Historical Climate Network (GHCN), a project of the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration's National Climate Data Center. Note that this is the same agency that employs Dr. Eugene Wahl, who might be implicated in the research misconduct allegations made against Michael E. Mann at Penn State University.

Richard Keen at the University of Colorado was the first to notice the changes. On December 5, he published this report comparing his own research into the climate of Alaska with the official version of the UN Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change (IPCC). He found no evidence of warming in Alaska over the past three decades, and no substantial difference in average temperature between 1935-1944 and the present time. Overall he found a warming trend of 0.69 Kelvin per century over the span of the twentieth century--while the GHCN dataset projects a warming trend of 2.83 K/century. (The Kelvin is the International System equivalent of a Celsius degree.) . . .

Today, Anthony Watts himself reported on a comment by a reader on the most disturbing finding yet: several GISS station datasets have been altered. The only reason why Watts and his commenter could detect the deletion is that Watts had saved the data from two of the affected weather stations (Orland, CA and Fairmont, CA) two years ago. The alteration at Orland is more serious: prior temperature records (between ca. 1880 and 1900), clearly warmer than subsequent temperatures, are now missing. Those data were in place as recently as 29 December 2008 and are not present today. [Double-click on the graph at the top of this post]. By way of explanation, the GISS data selector (captured by Watts) says this:

Note to prior users: We no longer include data adjusted by GHCN and have renamed the middle option (old name: prior to homogeneity adjustment).

Watts suggests that the problem might be not with the GISS data but with the GHCN dataset upon which GISS depends for historical data.

Developing...

Developing indeed. And much more on this from Joseph D'Aleo writing at PJM:

Climategate has sparked a flurry of examinations of the global data sets — not only at CRU, but in nations worldwide and at the global data centers at NOAA and NASA. Though the Hadley Centre implied their data was in agreement with other data sets and thus trustworthy, the truth is other data centers are complicit in the data manipulation fraud.

The New Zealand Climate Coalition had long solicited data from New Zealand’s National Institute of Water & Atmospheric Research (NIWA), which is responsible for New Zealand’s National Climate Database. For years the data was not released, despite many requests to NIWA’s Dr. Jim Salinger — who came from CRU. With Dr. Salingers’ departure from NIWA, the data was released and showed quite a different story than the manipulated data. The raw data showed a warming of just 0.06C per century since records started in 1850. This compared to a warming of 0.92C per century in NIWA’s (CRU’s) adjusted data.

Willis Eschenbach, in a guest post on Anthony Watts’ blog, found a smoking gun at Darwin station in Australia. Raw data from NOAA (from their GHCN, Global Historical Climate Network, that compiled data that NASA and Hadley work with) showed a cooling of 0.7C. After NOAA “homogenized” the data for Darwin, that changed dramatically. . . .

He found similar discrepancies in the Nordic countries. And that same kind of unexplainable NOAA GHCN adjustment was made to U.S. stations.

In this story, see how Central Park data was manipulated in inconsistent ways. The original U.S. Historical Climate Network (USHCN) data showed a cooling to adjust for urban heat island effect — but the global version of Central Park (NOAA GHCN again) inexplicably warmed Central Park by 4F. The difference between the two U.S. adjusted and global adjusted databases, both produced by NOAA NCDC, reached an unbelievable 11F for Julys and 7F annually! Gradually and without notice, NOAA began slowly backing off the urban heat island adjustment in the USHCN data in 1999 and eliminated it entirely in 2007.

Anthony Watts, in his surfacestations.org volunteer project “Is the U.S. Surface Temperature Record Reliable?”, found that of the 1000-plus temperature recording stations he had surveyed (a 1221-station network), 89% rated poor to very poor – according to the government’s own criteria for siting the stations.

Perhaps one of the biggest issues with the global data is station dropout after 1990. Over 6000 stations were active in the mid-1990s. Just over 1000 are in use today. The stations that dropped out were mainly rural and at higher latitudes and altitudes — all cooler stations. This alone should account for part of the assessed warming. China had 100 stations in 1950, over 400 in 1960, then only 25 by 1990. This changing distribution makes any assessment of accurate change impossible.

No urbanization adjustment is made for either NOAA or CRU’s global data, based on flawed papers by Wang (1990), Jones (1990), and Peterson (2003). The Jones and Wang papers were shown to be based on fabricated China data. Ironically, in 2008 Jones found that contamination by urbanization in China was a very non-trivial 1C per century — but that did not cause the data centers to begin adjusting, as that would have eliminated global warming.

Continent after continent, researchers are seeing no warming in the unprocessed data (see one thorough analysis here).

Just as the Medieval Warm Period made it difficult to explain why the last century of warming could not be natural (which the hockey stick team attempted to make go away), so did the warm spike in the 1930s and 1940s. In each of the databases, the land data from that period was adjusted down. And Wigley suggested that sea surface temperatures could likewise be “corrected” down by 0.15C, making the results look both warmer but still plausible.

Wigley also noted:

Land warming since 1980 has been twice the ocean warming — and skeptics might claim that this proves that urban warming is real and important.

NOAA complied in July 2009 — removing the satellite input from the global sea surface temperature assessment (the most complete data in terms of coverage), which resulted in an instant jump of 0.24C in ocean temperatures.

Is NASA in the clear? No. They work with the same base GHCN data, plus data from Antarctica (SCAR). To their credit, they attempt to consider urbanization — though Steve McIntyre showed they have poor population data and adjust cities warmer as often as they do colder. They also constantly fiddle with the data. John Goetz showed that 20% of the historical record was modified 16 times in the 2 1/2 years ending in 2007. . . .

Some have suggested that confirmation bias may be responsible for the multiplicity of questionable data and studies that we are seeing. But things such as the changed historical data, Mann's Hockey Stick, hiding Briffa's decline, the Yamal tree ring data, the Rothera Station study - these are acts of knowing fraud. These are things that any non-scientist can look at and, when shown the sleight of hand involved in their creation, can grasp immediately how they have been conned. These are obviously not the work of mere unconscious bias.

And speaking of knowing fraud . . . entymologist Paul Reiter takes Gore - and in particular his advisors - to task for their complete misstatements of fact in his area of expertise - malaria. According to Gore, global warming means that the "tropical" disease of malaria will explode throughout the world due to global warming. This from Paul Reiter writing in The Spectator:

. . . I am a scientist, not a climatologist, so I don’t dabble in climatology. My speciality is the epidemiology of mosquito-borne diseases. As the film began, I knew Mr Gore would get to mosquitoes: they’re a favourite with climate-change activists. When he got to them, it was all I feared.

In his serious voice, Mr Gore presented a nifty animation, a band of little mosquitoes fluttering their way up the slopes of a snow-capped mountain, and he repeated the old line: Nairobi used to be ‘above the mosquito line, the limit at which mosquitoes can survive, but now…’ Those little mosquitoes kept climbing.

The truth? Nairobi means ‘the place of cool waters’ in the Masai language. The town grew up around a camp, set up in 1899 during the construction of a railway, the famous ‘Lunatic Express’. There certainly was water there — and mosquitoes. From the start, the place was plagued with malaria, so much so that a few years later doctors tried to have the whole town moved to a healthier place. By 1927, the disease had become such a plague in the ‘White Highlands’ that £40,000 (equivalent to about £350,000 today) was earmarked for malaria control. The authorities understood the root of the problem: forest clearance had created the perfect breeding places for mosquitoes. The disease was present as high as 2,500m above sea level; the mosquitoes were observed at 3,000m. And Nairobi? 1,680m.

These details are not science. They require no study. They are history. But for activists, they are an inconvenient truth, so they ignore them. Even if Mr Gore is innocent, his advisers are not. They have been spouting the same nonsense for more than a decade. As scientists, we have repeatedly challenged them in the scientific press, at meetings and in news articles, and we have been ignored.

In 2004, nine of us published an appeal in the Lancet: ‘Malaria and climate change: a call for accuracy’. Clearly, Mr Gore didn’t read it. In 2000, I protested when Scientific American published a major article loaded with the usual misrepresentations. And when I watched his animated mosquitoes, his snow-capped mountain was oddly familiar. It took a few moments to click: the images were virtually identical to those in the magazine. The author of the article, Dr Paul Epstein, features high in Gore’s credits.

Dr Epstein is a member of a small band dedicated to a cause. And their work gains legitimacy, not by scholarship, but by repetition. While they publish their work in highly regarded journals, they don’t write research papers but opinion pieces and reviews, with little or no reference to the mainstream of science. The same claims, the same names; only the order of authors change. I have counted 48 separate pieces by just eight activists. They are myth-makers. And all have been lead authors and/or contributory authors of the prestigious IPCC assessment reports.

Take their contention, for example, that as a result of climate change, tropical diseases will move to temperate regions and malaria will come to Britain. If they bothered to learn about the subject, they would know that in a period climatologists call the Little Ice Age, when Charles II held ice parties on the Thames, malaria — ‘the ague’ — was rampant in the Essex marshes, on a par even with regions in Africa today. In the 18th century, the great systematist Linnaeus wrote his doctorate on malaria in central Sweden. In 1922-23 a massive epidemic swept the Soviet Union as far north as Archangel, on the Arctic circle, killing an estimated 600,000 people. And malaria was only eliminated from the Soviet Union and large areas of Europe in the 1950s, after the advent of DDT. So it’s hardly a tropical disease. And yet when we put this information under the noses of the activists it is ignored: ours is the inconvenient truth. . . .

Another good read out today is from Dafydd ab Hugh at Big Lizards. Dafydd hypothesizes that the "environmentalist" movement . . . [is] anti-human insanity. He then sets to proving his hypothesis. It's an excellent post I strongly recommend.

Lastly, one of the pushes of the environmentalist movement is to adopt the "smart grid" technology. The smart grid does not create a single new kilowat of power, nor, for that matter, does it make the power grid necessarily more secure. It involves installing computer controlled utility meters in individual houses and businesses. These meters are able to show individuals, in real time, how much electricity they are using. It also feeds information directly back to the power company so that they have no need to send out meter readers. But it comes with serious issues. Some where discussed in WaPo today:

. . . Customers in California are in open revolt, and officials in Connecticut and Texas are questioning whether the rush to install meters benefits the public.

Some consumers argue that the meters are logging far more kilowatt hours than they believe they are using. And many find it unfair that they will begin to pay immediately for the new meters through higher rates, when the promised savings could be years away.

Wapo goes on to discuss numerous customers complaining of being overcharged in light of their past electric usage history. But Wapo ignores perhaps the most fundamental issue with these "smart grid" meters - the power companies now control your thermostat and other electric usage. This are some of the comments to a PJM article on the smart grid, extolling its virtures. The commentors did not share the joy:

HoosierHawk:

Another writer pushing something that they have no understanding of. Why can’t authors self limit themselves to things that they know about? Probably because they don’t know what they don’t know.

Now why would a “smart” grid be better than a “stupid” grid? If ever there was an obvious case of marketing duping the uninformed this is it. Smart is better than stupid, it has to be better! Smart is good, we all know that.

Ask a few smart questions, like, is there going to be more generating capacity? No, it’s not about that. Are there going to be higher capacity transmission routes installed? Ah, no that’s not going to occur. Will it prevent terrorists from causing problems? Well actually it may enable them to do so, as it will create many more avenues for causing trouble, and allow them do remotely, what they now need to do in person, like shutting down a transformer.

What exactly is a smart grid all about? They call it smart because they will be transmitting encoded information over the power lines. Bear in mind that power lines don’t have shielding to prevent RF leakage for the high frequency signals required, so there will be all kinds of interference to radio transmissions, particularly in the shortwave bands.

What are the advantages? It will enable real time monitoring of electrical usage by individuals, and allow the control of that usage. It doesn’t create any more of what we need nor does it create the pathways needed to bring it to us. It allows them to control us.

We already have smart grid technology where I live. The power company doesn’t have to send anyone out to read our meter every month, they know exactly what we are using all the time. Our electric company doesn’t have any generating capacity of their own, they only buy it, and distribute it. When the price of electricity rises during times of peak usage, they send a signal that shuts off our water heater, it saves them money. Oh don’t worry you’ll get used to a cold shower, may not like it, but you will get used to it, we have. I have a 7 year old, modern house, but don’t have a choice about the temp of my shower. Progress is wonderful.

The next step is to make more appliances smart – air conditioning for example. You don’t really need it and hey the power company can make more money if you let them control it. It’s not that they don’t have power, they would just rather not sell it right now, it saves them money.

The final step is to start billing based on WHEN you use the power. That way when the factory miles away starts pulling more juice, and generating stations have to start using less efficient “peaking” capacity, they can bill you for it. That way you will learn to shut down your house, so that they can supply the factory using cheaper power.

Personally, I would rather see cheaper generating stations, like nuclear, being built. Instead they want to invest in ways to control and monitor an individuals usage, rather than creating more of what we need. I don’t call that smart, it’s a step backwards.

Chris:


As wife to a former Electrical Engineer in the power industry, now a Production Manager, this article is sheer idiocy. A national power grid does nothing to keep power on. All it does is redistribute power. Which is what most companies are already doing. Only now, the companies are paid for excess production. Once you nationalize the grid, who is in charge of where the power is going? The government employee. How do they determine who pays whom for the load? All it does is allow the government the ability to deny energy to a certain sector or area. And likewise, feed that load to some other area. Sound like wealth redistribution to anyone else?

But most of all, if the grid fails, everyone will be affected. Not just a state or city who rely on a ill run energy company. Poorly run power plants will benefit while those that are well run will be punished. Do we see a pattern here

You can read the entire article and all comments here. More on this issue from a post at Instapundit.

Prior Posts:

- - Climategate and Surrealism
- - More Climategate Fallout
- - Climategate Update 3
- - Climategate Update 4: CRU Records Worthless
- - Climategate Update 5: IPCC's Chairman Mao
- - Climategate Update 6: Climategate In Video
- - UNEP, Green Religion & Global Governance
- - Climate Update 7: IPCC's Chairman Mao Plays The Obama Card, Peer Review Analyzed, Scientific Method Explained For Paul Krugman
- - Climategate Update 8: The NYT Reports
- - Climategate Update 9: CRU Head Phil Jones Steps Down During Investigation, An MIT Prof Explains The Holes In AGW Theory, And Climate Fraud Is Everywhere
- - Climategate Update 10: Climategate Reverberates From The UK To Down Under
- - Climategate Update 11: Finally An AGW Consensus, "Hockey Stick" Mann Attacks Jones, Gore Goes To Ground
- - Climategate Update 12: The AGW Wall Starts To Crumble, The Smoking Code & The Tiger Woods Index
- - Clmategate Update 13: Hack Job Alert - Washington Post Leads With Climategate and A Complete Defense Of Global Warming
- - Climate Update 14: A Tale of 4 Graphs & An Influential Tree, Hide The Decline Explained, Corrupt Measurements, Goebbelswarming at Copenhagen
- - Climategate Update 15: Copenhagen, EPA Makes Final Finding On CO2, Courts & Clean Air
- - Climategate Update 16: Copenhagen'$ Goal$, Palin Weighs In, As Do Scientists Obama Holds American Economy Hostage Over Cap and Trade
- - Climategate Updage 17: What Greenland's Ice Core Tells Us, The EPA's Reliance On The IPCC, & The Left's War On Coal
- - Gorebbelswarming
- - Krauthammer On The New Socialism & The EPA's Power Grab
- - Climategate Update 18: Ice Core Flicks, Long Term Climate, Anti-Scientific Method Then & Now, Confirmation Bias Or Fraud
- - Climategate Update 19: The Daily Mail Hits The Bulls Eye On Climategate; The AP Spins
- - Climategate Update 20: Snowing Around The World, But Warming In Antarctica?

- - Climate Update 21: AGW Investigation Begins? 100 Reasons AGW Is Natural, Green Profiteers, Conflict Of Interest & Arctic Sea Ice