U.S. Climate Change Data Reliable, Study Says

Yale Environment 360 — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 13:30:10 +0000

A study by scientists from the U.S. National Climatic Data Center refutes claims from climate change skeptics that data from U.S. weather stations was seriously flawed and exaggerated the rate of temperature increases.

The study, published in the Journal of Geophysical Research, says that U.S. weather stations may have actually slightly underestimated temperature increases.

Anthony Watts, a former meteorologist who publishes the WattsUpWithThat blog, compiled photo evidence of what he considered poorly-located weather stations across the United States, including locations that could be influenced by artificial heat, such as those near parking lots and air conditioning systems. He concluded that the U.S. records were unreliable, and thus called into question the data used in climate research worldwide.

But scientists at the National Climatic Data Center suggest that the data collected at the stations Watts classified as poor were actually more likely to be cooler since they generally used sophisticated measuring equipment known as a Maximum-Minimum Temperature System (MMTS), which tends to be biased toward marginally cooler readings.

“These methods have proven time and again to be robust at removing these biases and providing a true climate signal in regional to global temperatures, and we are highly confident in our results,” said Scott Hausman, NCDC’s director.

Article appearing courtesy Yale Environment 360.

photo: NASA Visible Earth

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U.S. Creates Office to Handle Climate Change Data

Yale Environment 360 — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 17:33:06 +0000

The Obama administration is creating an office to coordinate and report the latest climate change data, a unit analogous to the National Weather Service that officials hope will help planners, businesses, and the public better understand and prepare for the effects of global warming.

The office, which will be part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, will assemble about 550 scientists already working on climate issues under one roof. All data will be accessible on a website, www.climate.gov.

“As the realities of climate change become more obvious to more people, farmers, businesses, government agencies and public health officials are going to be turning to us for credible, useful and relevant information,” said Jane Lubchenco, administrator of NOAA (picture above).

Lubchenco said that while the new office is not a response to recent controversies surrounding climate science and the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the government does want to build public confidence in the science and better explain what information is well-established and what research needs to be done.

Below, Lubchenco speaks about the challenges of tackling climate change in Oct. 2009.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Article appearing courtesy Yale Environment 360.

photo and video: Elsa Wenzel

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U.S. Climate Change Data Reliable, Study Says

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