cc: "Jones, Phil" , "Kennedy, John" date: 25 Jan 2008 10:57:19 -0500 from: Gavin Schmidt subject: Re: [Fwd: FW: Attn: Hadley Centre] to: David Parker David, Phil, Don't make any particular deal about this - I'm sure it was just a slip of the pen. However, these are high profile analyses and having emails like this floating around could result in unnecessary controversy. A little more care could be warranted. Gavin On Fri, 2008-01-25 at 08:10, David Parker wrote: > Phil > > I have chased this up. Sarah is on night-shift tonight (you are right > about the shift-working!) and one of her colleagues has left her a > message to find out who provided the words she sent - Sarah isn't a > climate scientist and will have consulted someone else. I wouldn't have > provided such words! > > Regards > > David > > On Fri, 2008-01-25 at 09:14 +0000, Phil Jones wrote: > > Gavin, > > No real idea what's going on here. I would like to believe that Sarah at > > the Met Office Customer Centre has had some discussions with the > > Hadley Centre people on this, so cc'ing John Kennedy and David Parker to > > see if they can find out. > > What could be a factor is that the Customer Centre has to respond > > to questions and in a certain time frame. I would have thought that this > > related to MO and MOHC datasets and what is said on the MO web site, > > so shouldn't cover datasets from other groups. > > CRU wouldn't have responded like this, but would have been > > along the lines > > of an email I sent to you and Jim a week ago. There are issues in the Arctic > > with warming and little data from the Arctic Ocean that I've > > mentioned before. > > There has been a lot of discussion on numerous blog sites about > > differences > > between the various datasets on the ranking of recent warm years. One simple > > thing I thought about a few days and then didn't have time to do > > was to compare > > the HadCRUT3, NCDC and GISS analyses of global T with Pearson and > > Spearman-rank correlations. All three groups getting the ranks > > exactly the same > > is the most strict test I can think of given the uncertainties that > > exist in all three > > analyses. > > Another non-scientific issue is that Sarah is probably part of > > a group working shifts, > > so responses from different members could be variable depending who > > you get. The > > range of questions could be large, so some or all may not be aware of all the > > history of the issue. I can't keep up with all this and don't look > > at most of the > > blog sites that discuss the temperature record - nor do I want to! > > I would have sent this paper as well - attached. NCDC has a new paper > > coming out in J. Climate, with a newish method. When this appears this > > will reopen the debate, as they will raise (but not allow for) the issue that > > SSTs may be 0.1 to 0.2 too cold recently due to recent dominance of buoys > > vs ships. NCDC are also doing more infilling, but I think keeping > > clear of sea-ice areas. > > > > As an aside, I think HadCRUT3 could be underestimating recent > > warming - but > > only because the Arctic sea ice is disappearing quickly. I've a few > > ideas of how > > to address this - using ERA-40 possibly? I may have said earlier > > that with the figures > > for Ch 3 of WG1 AR4 we noticed that HadSST2 is biased warm in the Arctic seas > > north of 65N - so the plot just shows Arctic land N of 65N. > > > > I am away all next week. > > > > Cheers > > Phil > > > > >Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2008 12:48:39 -0500 (EST) > > >Subject: [Fwd: FW: Attn: Hadley Centre] > > >From: contrib@realclimate.org > > >To: enquiries@metoffice.gov.uk > > >Cc: "Phil Jones" , > > > akasket@hotmail.com > > >User-Agent: SquirrelMail/1.4.5 > > >X-UEA-Spam-Score: 0.8 > > >X-UEA-Spam-Level: / > > >X-UEA-Spam-Flag: NO > > > > > >I was passed this email that you sent in response to a query from a member > > >of the public. While pointing out correctly the differences between the > > >procedures used in the GISTEMP product and the Had/CRU analysis, I am a > > >little puzzled as to why you felt the need to suggest that the GISTEMP > > >analysis was not 'honest'. This seems to go beyond the normal bounds of a > > >professional response. > > > > > >Do you have any substance to back up such a claim? My colleagues at GISS > > >on the contrary seem to be exemplary in pointing out the differences in > > >techniques and their consequences. For instance, the graph available here: > > > > > >http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs/ArcticEffect.pdf > > > > > >shows the increasing impact of changing temperatures in the Arctic on the > > >analysis. The statements in http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/2005/ > > > > > >"Our analysis differs from others by including estimated temperatures up > > >to 1200 km from the nearest measurement station (7). The resulting spatial > > >extrapolations and interpolations are accurate for temperature anomalies > > >at seasonal and longer time scales at middle and high latitudes, where the > > >spatial scale of anomalies is set by Rossby waves (7). Thus we believe > > >that the remarkable Arctic warmth of 2005 is real, and the inclusion of > > >estimated arctic temperatures is the primary reason for our rank of 2005 > > >as the warmest year. " > > > > > >also seem clear enough. Further discussions are made in the technical > > >literature that is available at the GISS site. > > > > > >I hope that you can correct a possibly misleading impression that could be > > >left. > > > > > >Cordially, > > > > > >Gavin Schmidt > > > > > >PS. I am not connected with the GISTEMP group except through working in > > >the same building. > > > > > > > Subject: FW: Attn: Hadley Centre > > > > Date: Tue, 22 Jan 2008 15:10:55 +0000 > > > > From: enquiries@metoffice.gov.uk > > > > To: akasket@hotmail.com > > > > > > > > Dear Alan, > > > > > > > > Thank you for your email. > > > > > > > > Your comment #221 in the RealClimate tread was in response to #218. > > > > This particular thread was concerned with the observations of > > > > temperature rise and not with the Hadley Centre climate model. The HC > > > > climate model of course has polar amplification just as every other > > > > climate model does. > > > > > > > > The point was the interpolation of existing observational data over the > > > > polar regions. If you look at the raw observations that GISS uses you > > > > can see how little data they are basing an interpolation on. > > > > > > > > Regardless of what they consider the correct spatial length scale for > > > > observations, the Arctic sees large regional changes in temperature, > > > > which are being glossed over with a large correlation length. > > > > > > > > The Had/CRU treatment of the observations simply states that the error > > > > is greater due to lacking data, something GISS are not honest about. > > > > There are no EXTRA observations that GISS has access to, that Had/CRU > > > > does not. Thus there is no reason to believe GISS' observations vs > > > > Had/CRU observations of recent global temperature rise when the errors > > > > are taken into account. > > > > > > > > Kind Regards, > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > Sarah > > > > > > > > Customer Centre, Met Office, FitzRoy Road, Exeter, Devon, EX1 3PB, > > > > United Kingdom. Tel: 0870 900 0100 Fax: 0870 900 5050 Email: > > > > enquiries@metoffice.gov.uk > > > > Prof. Phil Jones > > Climatic Research Unit Telephone +44 (0) 1603 592090 > > School of Environmental Sciences Fax +44 (0) 1603 507784 > > University of East Anglia > > Norwich Email p.jones@uea.ac.uk > > NR4 7TJ > > UK > > ----------------------------------------------------------------------------