Climate Commission Fudges Hot Day Data
Posted by jennifer, May 14th, 2012 - under Information, News.
Tags: Climate & Climate Change
IF you believe Australia’s Climate Commissioner, Tim Flannery, it is getting hotter and hotter in Western Sydney.[1]
But scientist Basil Beamish noticed that in the Climate Commission report they only show the trend of the number of hot days from 1970-2011. There is data for Sydney, measured at Observatory Hill, back to 1890.
Dr Beamish noticed that if you use all of the hot days data back to 1890 it is clear there is a different long-term pattern in play (see blue line in chart). In fact the year with the greatest number of hot days for Sydney is 1926 (12 days) and this has not been beaten since.
But instead of reporting on the long term trend for Sydney as measured at Observatory Hill from 1890, Professor Flannery has chosen to just focus on Western Sydney and in particular use only the data for Parramatta North (see red line in chart). This data set begins in 1970, which was a low point in the hot days cycle. By choosing Parramatta and beginning in 1970, Professor Flannery can make the upward trend in hot days look dramatic.
Parramatta is further inland than the Observatory Hill site and so the summers are warmer and the winter’s colder. But if there were data for Parramatta back to 1890 it would almost certainly show the same pattern as Observatory Hill. Indeed it was almost certainly hotter in Parramatta, in Western Sydney, in 1926 than anytime since.
Once again the observational data does not support the nonsense claims made by Australia’s Climate Commissioner, Professor Flannery.
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Basil Beamish provided the chart and many of the words. Thank you.
1. http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-05-14/heatwaves-bushfires-predicted-to-hammer-nsw/4009006
You’re just cherry picking and nit picking Debbie. If you don’t get it by now you never will.
What am I not getting Luke?
What precisely is ‘IT’ ?
What am I specifically cherry picking and nit picking?
I’m not a regular reader but it’s been pointed out to me that in this article, the author postulates that the urban heat island effect (UHI) doesn’t exist.
I’d be interested in reading more about that. Maybe a follow up article by Dr Marahosey or Dr Beamish would be handy. An article by a climate scientist with expertise in global surface temperature trends would be even better.
My understanding is that as urbanisation increases the surface temperature goes up disproportionately to surrounding areas. Once the urbanisation stabilises the rate of increases also stabilises. This has been observed or postulated going back decades in the literature (Google scholar has papers going back to at least the 1960s that discuss the urban heat island effect, and it’s been accounted for in all the global temperature data sets for years).
Could someone point me to another source of information that, like the article above, shows that the UHI doesn’t exist after all?
Thanks.
“You’re just cherry picking and nit picking Debbie. If you don’t get it by now you never will.”
… and neither will anyone with a firm grasp on reality and not climate models, on unjustified conclusions, who don’t accept the never-ending recipe of “high end” scenarios, who don’t orgasm over every doom-laden prediction. “Summer ice [may|could|might] be gone by 2012″. It’s 2012 right now, try swimming to the North Pole.
Last year, some crackpot “researchers” announced that thousands of species that haven’t yet been discovered have already become extinct. Beat that for sheer nonsense.
No, we DON’T get it, because there’s NOTHING to “get”. We’re told that pine-forests are dying out because of “climate change”, yet in the small print at the bottom is mentioned, just mentioned, bark beetles, rust and forest mismanagement leading to more dead trees for the beetles to breed in, and fires in uncleared brushwood.
The Great Barrier reef is “doomed” because doom-merchants have checked a few hundred sq. metres and found some bleached coral, because the oceans are “acidifying”, when 99.999% of their area is unexplored, let alone studied, and when pH changes several time the “tipping point threshhold” occur daily. The GBF has been “doomed” many times over the past decade. Some scientists have very short memories. How convenient.
Researchers clinging to grants submit coral polyps and fish to extreme conditions of acidity (hydrochloric) and temperature, imposed suddenly, studied for hours or days, and “predict” the future in decades and longer. Long-term studies by hard-working “real” researchers show just the opposite, that stress and mortality initially increase, but offspring carry forward the resistant genes of their parents who survived. They (the real researchers, not the fauna) are ignored by the media, by alarmists in general, and the other worthless short-term studies are hailed as “conclusive evidence”.
The only thing that’s conclusive is the level of gullibility of unthinking and credulous “does my carbon footprint look big in this?” greenies, so-called environmentalists who love everything natural except mankind, who want and need to believe the worst, want to believe that mankind is to blame for everything from rain to drought to earthquakes and tsunamis. “I’ve seen the enemy and it’s US!” – well they’re right about that at least, THEY ARE the enemy. Enemies of human advancement, enemies of progress. enemies of reason and the getting of knowledge.
From a friend who’s done his research regarding the GBR: “Actually, the Barrier Reef authority’s own data show that there has been no statistically-significant warming of the seas surrounding the reef in the past two or three decades, so, even if the reef were in decline, global warming could not possibly be the cause. And so-called ocean “acidification” could not be the cause either, because every time the Brisbane River floods, as it did eight times from 1840-1900 and only four times since, vast quantities of rainwater (strongly acid, with a pH of just 5.4) pour into the ocean within the reef, which has nevertheless survived.”.
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Sou,
I am not sure how you came to that conclusion or the person who pointed it out to you did. The plot shows exactly the opposite. The Parramatta situation is totally dominated by the UHI effect in this case, which is what some of the other bloggers have been pointing out and several people have commented on to me personally with their own analysis of other NSW sites. What we are saying is that there is an underlying natural trend in hot days (the observable long term trend shown by Observatory Hill and many other sites in NSW and Qld with century old temperature records), but in this case for Parramatta superimposed on that is the exaggerated localised UHI effect. It is just unfortunate that the Parramatta record is not long enough to show the complete picture.
Also please note the Koala’s post from yesterday re-emphasised the point of time perspective. I well remember the “Global Cooling” theory of the 70′s being matched to the drop in temperatures for the previous 30-40 years. It was flavour of the month at nearly every Uni. Then we had the “Global Warming” theory as shown in the Koala’s plot and that is how we end up where we are today. Too many people look at things within their own lifespan and lose sight of the bigger picture. Cause and effect still has a long way to go on this one.
By the way not sure if you are having a go at me on the climate scientist bit, but believe it or not I have some background in that area. I studied and obtained an honours degree in Geology, when Geology was still called Geology and not the softer version Earth Science. I was privileged to have been taught by the late Professor Samuel Carey who always taught us to question everything and if the theory doesn’t fit the observational data then look for a new theory. I have found this a very useful strategy throughout my professional career.
cheers, Basil
The ABC page links to the links to the overall report, not the NSW report, which is here:
http://climatecommission.gov.au/wp-content/uploads/NSW-report_final_web.pdf
Population growth in Parramatta has outstripped that for Sydney as a whole – not an insignificant statistic IMHO.
http://www.parracity.nsw.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0019/103456/Parramatta_Population_Growth-fact_sheet.pdf
Dunno where “sou” gets his impressions from. The CC/NSW report describes it in detail, and the ABC report doesn’t mention it (surprise?).
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