I am surprised nobody has posted

[skierinvermont]

This has caused quite a stir on the blogosphere with a heated argument breaking out between authors Ryan O'Donnell (new paper) and Eric Steig (old paper) although Steig largely seems to admit the O'Donnell paper is an improvement over his.

Normally a lot of things posted at WUWT and Climate Audit are garbage, but this is a case where they are covering an actual peer-reviewed paper. The paper is by Ryan O'Donnell and it makes some major corrections to some serious flaws in a a 2009 analysis by Eric Steig of Antarctic temperatures. As some of us suspected, the upwards revisions that were made a couple years ago to Antarctic temperatures were incorrect. As you can see from below, it appears that the Steig paper used poor statistical techniques that "telleconnected" warmth from the Peninsula of Antarctica to west antarctica and the south pole. The primary problem is Steig retained only 3 EOFs but the new O'Donnell paper argues that 5 EOFs should be retained.

This is a classic case of mistakes being made in the peer-reviewed literature, and then subsequently being corrected in an open review process. Contrary to claims that skeptics can't get published or funding, good papers with solid methods and contributions are published all the time even if they go against rapid warming. The new paper has been published in the leading climate journal (The Journal of Climate).

It should be noted that on a whole, Antarctica warmed slightly 1957-present, but not as much as in Steig 2009. The trend in the new O'Donnell paper for the continent as a whole is +.06C/decade, which is half the trend found in Steig 2009 of +.12C/decade.

Here is a graph of the two studies side by side for what I believe is the period 1957-2006:

http://climateaudit....eig-et-al-2009/

[skierinvermont]

Just for comparison.. here is GISS to compare to. The image below is the temperature of the last 15 years of the O'Donnell analysis (1991-2006) minus the first 15 years (1957-1971). This allows one to approximate a trend for GISS over the period.. I would eyeball it as roughly a .2C-.3C warming over the 50 year period.. or .04-.06C/decade which is the same as the O'Donnell study (.05C/decade). So the O'Donnell study is roughly in agreement with GISS. It's different spacially with GISS being too cold along much of the coastline but too warm west of the Peninsula.

You can also see the zonally averaged warming... from 70-90S there was 0-.3C of warming which confirms my estimate of .2C, or .04C/decade for GISS in Antarctica. So the O'Donnell study indicates to me that GISS is actually biased a little cool in Antarctica.

[BethesdaWX]

All we need for the Antarctic is UAH, it has been 32yrs of measurement in the Antarctic already.

[Clifford]

skierinvermont, your images don't seem to be showing up.

One of the problems with land-based temperature records is that they end up with horrible contamination.

http://data.giss.nas...p/station_data/

When you look at the South Pole Station, there does seem to be a slight upward trend in temperature records, from the beginning.

However, somewhere around 1981 to 1983... something CHANGED.

In fact, in 1956, the original station began as a small 18-man underground bunker.

By the early 80's the original station had been abandoned and they were building a new "dome"... which has now been replaced by a 80,000 square foot building.

It sounds to me like they've changed from a location with virtually nothing... to a small city down there.

You don't imagine they turn off the heaters at night?

I'm not quite sure where/how their weather station located, but I don't think these records are designed for the half-degree comparative record analysis carried out over decades.

With the exception of a couple of weather stations, most of the Antarctic Weather Stations seem to have an upward trending temperature. And in fact, those that don't... for example the Halley Station

Something big seems to have changed between 1991 and 1992.

The Pre-1992 trend and the Post-1992 trend both appear to be upward.

Again, it is a small metro area where people had never been before, until about 1956.

The manned weather-posts in Antarctica all seem to have a significant long-term warming trend. Whether or not that is an artifact, or is representative of the entire Antarctica is impossible to know. As mentioned, some of the stations show horrible contamination from construction and instrumentation changes.

[Clifford]

If they are actually serious about monitoring weather down there...

There needs to be a set of weather stations at least 10 miles from the nearest human outpost. Perhaps even further. Keep the snow cats away from them too.

Power?

Solar wouldn't be sufficient in the winter unless the batteries can winter over.

Perhaps one could design a low power Stirling Engine, but it would still need to be isolated from the weather stations.

I'm sorry...

Antarctica is the most pristine wilderness in the world.

We're seeing a gradual temperature increase since the 1950's.

But, I have to ask if the measurements are contaminated with the Urban Effect.

[BethesdaWX]

If they are actually serious about monitoring weather down there...

There needs to be a set of weather stations at least 10 miles from the nearest human outpost. Perhaps even further. Keep the snow cats away from them too.

Power?

Solar wouldn't be sufficient in the winter unless the batteries can winter over.

Perhaps one could design a low power Stirling Engine, but it would still need to be isolated from the weather stations.

I'm sorry...

Antarctica is the most pristine wilderness in the world.

We're seeing a gradual temperature increase since the 1950's.

But, I have to ask if the measurements are contaminated with the Urban Effect.

Antarctica cooling on UAH

[nzucker]

Antarctica cooling on UAH

I don't see the problem with just using UAH data for Antarctica, ignoring the surface stations.

Contrary to what you say, Skier, the Stiegel/O'Donnell debate actually shows the flaws in the peer-reviewed process. Stiegel's work, which showed the .12C warming trend in Antarctica, should never have been published given the satellites don't support such an increase in temperatures. The publication of this paper led to a mass craze in NASA and the media that "Antarctic was warming all along," once again contributing to climate hysteria. Also, O'Donnell faced more than the usual series of hurdles in getting his paper published just because it was a refutation of AGW extremist...he dealt with a very drawn out review process with dozens of arguments/comments etc that took hours to resolve.

[tacoman25]

This has caused quite a stir on the blogosphere with a heated argument breaking out between authors Ryan O'Donnell (new paper) and Eric Steig (old paper) although Steig largely seems to admit the O'Donnell paper is an improvement over his.

Normally a lot of things posted at WUWT and Climate Audit are garbage, but this is a case where they are covering an actual peer-reviewed paper. The paper is by Ryan O'Donnell and it makes some major corrections to some serious flaws in a a 2009 analysis by Eric Steig of Antarctic temperatures. As some of us suspected, the upwards revisions that were made a couple years ago to Antarctic temperatures were incorrect. As you can see from below, it appears that the Steig paper used poor statistical techniques that "telleconnected" warmth from the Peninsula of Antarctica to west antarctica and the south pole. The primary problem is Steig retained only 3 EOFs but the new O'Donnell paper argues that 5 EOFs should be retained.

This is a classic case of mistakes being made in the peer-reviewed literature, and then subsequently being corrected in an open review process. Contrary to claims that skeptics can't get published or funding, good papers with solid methods and contributions are published all the time even if they go against rapid warming. The new paper has been published in the leading climate journal (The Journal of Climate).

It should be noted that on a whole, Antarctica warmed slightly 1957-present, but not as much as in Steig 2009. The trend in the new O'Donnell paper for the continent as a whole is +.06C/decade, which is half the trend found in Steig 2009 of +.12C/decade.

Here is a graph of the two studies side by side for what I believe is the period 1957-2006:

http://climateaudit....eig-et-al-2009/

That's 1957-present...but if you look at the 30 year trend (as we often do for the Arctic), more cooling is evident.

[Clifford]

I don't see the problem with just using UAH data for Antarctica, ignoring the surface stations.

I think I'm more convinced by the Satellite images too.

Unfortunately we've spent millions of dollars building and maintaining the Antarctic weather stations, but there is too much risk of confounding the data with changes in recording methods, and the "Urban Effect".

However,

Anybody know what UAH defines as the polar regions?

RSS lists:

South: -70 to -60

North: 60 to 85

That is a big range for the North, and it misses most of Antarctica for the South.

Never mind... I think this is for UAH:

Polar +/- 60 to +/- 85 latitude

So, if they exclude the Ocean... that should be most of Antarctica.

UAH Trend (per UAH, (PER DECADE))

UAH: SPole Land/Ocean Trend: -0.08

UAH: SPole Land Trend -0.09

UAH: Spole Ocean Trend -0.06

All pretty close to ZERO.

On RSS Data, (-70 to -60) (calculated, slope(), OpenOffice (PER YEAR))

Land+Ocean +0.0003

Ocean -0.0005

Land +0.0059

Now, a half degree a century, or a half a degree a millennium must fall below the statistical accuracy.

Got it...

UAH reports their trends per decade.

My calcs were per year... multiply by 10 to get the per decade trend.

[BethesdaWX]

Yes UAH covers basically the Entire Antarctic, RSS misses about 50-60% of it.

UAH cooling trend is the best data we have for the Antarctic.

[skierinvermont]

I don't see the problem with just using UAH data for Antarctica, ignoring the surface stations.

Contrary to what you say, Skier, the Stiegel/O'Donnell debate actually shows the flaws in the peer-reviewed process. Stiegel's work, which showed the .12C warming trend in Antarctica, should never have been published given the satellites don't support such an increase in temperatures. The publication of this paper led to a mass craze in NASA and the media that "Antarctic was warming all along," once again contributing to climate hysteria. Also, O'Donnell faced more than the usual series of hurdles in getting his paper published just because it was a refutation of AGW extremist...he dealt with a very drawn out review process with dozens of arguments/comments etc that took hours to resolve.

You seem to have this fascination with using satellite based estimates to check ground based estimates. I have explained to you why this is just laughable to anybody in the field multiple times:

1) It defeats the purpose of the measurements as an independent data source. One of the principles of science is that multiple independent data sources should be used and then comparisons can be made.

2) The surface trend may be substantially different from the tropospheric trend. This is true in other places such as North America, South America, and Australia where UAH shows more warming than GISS over the 1979-present period. Should we throw GISS out for being too cold there? No, surface trends may be different, they are an independent measure (see 1) and satellite analysis has substantial error and uncertainty (see 3).

3) There are substantial issues with the satellite analysis, especially in the arctic and antarctic where there is less satellite data available. I have provided you links to papers which show that the UAH, and even the RSS analysis are probably biased cold.

Your refusal to recognize these basic facts (or even respond to them in a significantly meaningful manner) reeks of bias and denialism.

Finally the process was not more drawn out, multiple reviews and edits are standard operating procedure for these journals. Perhaps you should read the recent thread on the subject of peer review to familiarize yourself with the process before jumping to conclusions. The fact that it was a major revision to an already published paper, and one of the reviewers was the author of that previous paper, naturally lends itself to a serious review process.

[tacoman25]

You seem to have this fascination with using satellite based estimates to check ground based estimates. I have explained to you why this is just laughable to anybody in the field multiple times:

1) It defeats the purpose of the measurements as an independent data source. One of the principles of science is that multiple independent data sources should be used and then comparisons can be made.

2) The surface trend may be substantially different from the tropospheric trend.

3) There are substantial issues with the satellite analysis, especially in the arctic and antarctic where there is less satellite data available. I have provided you links to papers which show that the UAH, and even the RSS analysis are probably biased cold.

Your refusal to recognize these basic facts (or even respond to them in a significantly meaningful manner) reeks of bias and denialism.

Finally the process was not more drawn out, multiple reviews and edits are standard operating procedure for these journals. Perhaps you should read the recent thread on the subject of peer review to familiarize yourself with the process before jumping to conclusions. The fact that it was a major revision to an already published paper, and one of the reviewers was the author of that previous paper, naturally lends itself to a serious review process.

2) When you compare maps of the satellite-derived temps and the surface-based maps, they agree for the most part. It's not like there's any reason the data should disagree significantly. When GISS shows warm painted over an area (often extrapolated) that the satellites show much cooler, there's no reason to believe that's because the satellites aren't measuring the same exact thing.

[skierinvermont]

2) When you compare maps of the satellite-derived temps and the surface-based maps, they agree for the most part. It's not like there's any reason the data should disagree significantly. When GISS shows warm painted over an area (often extrapolated) that the satellites show much cooler, there's no reason to believe that's because the satellites aren't measuring the same exact thing.

UAH (and especially RSS I would assume since RSS is spatially similar but +.02C/decade warmer than UAH) show more warming over North America, South America, and Australia. It shows slightly less warming over the antarctic than GISS. The regional trends show significant differences between the two data sources which are entirely possibly due to differences between what is occurring at the surface and what is occurring in the troposphere.

I agree if the difference is especially large and it is a data sparce region for GISS, then perhaps the conclusion should be that GISS's extrapolations were wrong. This may be the case in Africa. Africa fulfills both conditions - data sparse for GISS, and a large divergence from UAH.

Antarctica does not fulfill either condition, as the extrapolations are actually smaller than in Africa I believe (ie more data) and the divergence is MUCH much smaller. GISS = .04C/decade, UAH = -.01C/decade. The difference is even smaller if you account for the fact that UAH's calibration methods lead to a cold bias relative to RSS.

[skierinvermont]

One of the problems with land-based temperature records is that they end up with horrible contamination.

http://data.giss.nas...p/station_data/

Do you have any basis to claim that the thermometers are improperly cited or did the fairies tell you they are contaminated?

It's hilarious what passes for evidence in this forum.. all you have to do is post a few graphs and claim contamination and suddenly all the data is unreliable despite the decades 100s of researchers have spent ensuring data quality. Just throw it all out the window because somebody on the internet claims it's contaminated.

[BethesdaWX]

UAH (and especially RSS I would assume since RSS is spatially similar but +.02C/decade warmer than UAH) show more warming over North America, South America, and Australia. It shows slightly less warming over the antarctic than GISS. The regional trends show significant differences between the two data sources which are entirely possibly due to differences between what is occurring at the surface and what is occurring in the troposphere.

I agree if the difference is especially large and it is a data sparce region for GISS, then perhaps the conclusion should be that GISS's extrapolations were wrong. This may be the case in Africa. Africa fulfills both conditions - data sparse for GISS, and a large divergence from UAH.

Antarctica does not fulfill either condition, as the extrapolations are actually smaller than in Africa I believe (ie more data) and the divergence is MUCH much smaller. GISS = .04C/decade, UAH = -.01C/decade. The difference is even smaller if you account for the fact that UAH's calibration methods lead to a cold bias relative to RSS.

It is not a good idea to Use RSS for Antarctic temps, I would advise against it.

RSS only measures part of the Antarctic, UAH covers almost all of the Antarctic, that is the reason for the difference. The Interior Antarctic has been Cooling, while the Pennisula has been Warming....although alot of that warming is due to a UHI effect, which has a much larger impact on colder climates.

There are no "surface stations" in the interior antarctic, and that has been where the cooling has commenced.

[skierinvermont]

It is not a good idea to Use RSS for Antarctic temps, I would advise against it.

RSS only measures part of the Antarctic, UAH covers almost all of the Antarctic, that is the reason for the difference. The Interior Antarctic has been Cooling, while the Pennisula has been Warming....although alot of that warming is due to a UHI effect, which has a much larger impact on colder climates.

There are no "surface stations" in the interior antarctic, and that has been where the cooling has commenced.

Yes there are a half dozen stations in the interior (not on the coast) including a south pole station (Amundsen Scott) and the Vostok station.

I am not saying to use RSS -RSS doesn't cover it. I'm saying that UAH methodology is cooler than RSS methodology, so if one were to use RSS methodology in Antarctica, it would yield results slightly warmer than UAH. And both RSS and UAH are biased cold according to more recent analyses like STAR.

[BethesdaWX]

Yes there are a half dozen stations in the interior (not on the coast) including a south pole station (Amundsen Scott) and the Vostok station.

I am not saying to use RSS -RSS doesn't cover it. I'm saying that UAH methodology is cooler than RSS methodology, so if one were to use RSS methodology in Antarctica, it would yield results slightly warmer than UAH. And both RSS and UAH are biased cold according to more recent analyses like STAR.

Well....

Even if UAH is too cold, the Cooling TREND in the Antarctic will remain the same on UAH, even if the actual anoms as a whole are too Cold....

As for surface stations, they tend to be located in areas contaminated by human presence....In a Climate as cold as Antarctica's........even the slightest few buildings can yield major UHI influence. Even 1 heater/source ,building, etc, located near a station, can change temps by 1F or more.

[skierinvermont]

Well....

Even if UAH is too cold, the Cooling TREND in the Antarctic will remain the same on UAH, even if the actual anoms as a whole are too Cold....

As for surface stations, they tend to be located in areas contaminated by human presence....In a Climate as cold as Antarctica's........even the slightest few buildings can yield major UHI influence. Even 1 heater, a building, etc, located near a station, can change temps by 1F or more.

No what I am saying is that RSS methodology yields a higher TREND than UAH (.16C/decade vs .14C/decade) and therefore the RSS methodology applied to the antarctic would likely yield more warming.

And more recent studies indicated that both the RSS and UAH methodologies are biased cold.

[tacoman25]

UAH (and especially RSS I would assume since RSS is spatially similar but +.02C/decade warmer than UAH) show more warming over North America, South America, and Australia. It shows slightly less warming over the antarctic than GISS. The regional trends show significant differences between the two data sources which are entirely possibly due to differences between what is occurring at the surface and what is occurring in the troposphere.

I agree if the difference is especially large and it is a data sparce region for GISS, then perhaps the conclusion should be that GISS's extrapolations were wrong. This may be the case in Africa. Africa fulfills both conditions - data sparse for GISS, and a large divergence from UAH.

Antarctica does not fulfill either condition, as the extrapolations are actually smaller than in Africa I believe (ie more data) and the divergence is MUCH much smaller. GISS = .04C/decade, UAH = -.01C/decade. The difference is even smaller if you account for the fact that UAH's calibration methods lead to a cold bias relative to RSS.

Given Africa's huge size, and the fact that you're conceding extrapolation can lead to inaccurate results sometimes, you don't think this could be causing GISS to be biased warm?

By the way, I don't believe you ever responded to my challenge to see what the difference in trend between RSS and UAH is if you take out the unusually divergent starting year of 1979. Since you have been quoting that HUGE .02C/decade difference every other post lately.

[tacoman25]

Yes there are a half dozen stations in the interior (not on the coast) including a south pole station (Amundsen Scott) and the Vostok station.

I am not saying to use RSS -RSS doesn't cover it. I'm saying that UAH methodology is cooler than RSS methodology, so if one were to use RSS methodology in Antarctica, it would yield results slightly warmer than UAH. And both RSS and UAH are biased cold according to more recent analyses like STAR.

RSS and UAH have very similar anomalies most years.

And we get the point: you have repeated ad nauseum recently that there are other analysis that are a little warmer than RSS and UAH. Fine...I'm sure it would be easy to get an independent analysis of surface data that would show GISS biased warm. Why? Because you can always find differences based on different analysis'. Doesn't prove one is more right than the other.

[skierinvermont]

RSS and UAH have very similar anomalies most years.

And we get the point: you have repeated ad nauseum recently that there are other analysis that are a little warmer than RSS and UAH. Fine...I'm sure it would be easy to get an independent analysis of surface data that would show GISS biased warm. Why? Because you can always find differences based on different analysis'. Doesn't prove one is more right than the other.

If the trends are different - then clearly RSS and UAH don't have the same anomalies, by definition. If people here want to agree that none of the data sources have the precision to be exactly correct, and stop using UAH to refute GISS, I would happily stop posting the peer-reviewed literature that says UAH is biased cold. The claims of GISS bias and the criticism of their methodology is absolutely ridiculuous given 1) They have nearly the same end result as HadCRUT, with most of the difference being accounted for by the fact that HadCRUT does not include the rapid warming in the arctic 2) the criticisms of the methodology are incorrect, extrapolation doesn't cause a bias.

And it's not simply a matter of just finding random analyses.. the papers present actual reasons why UAH is biased cold and their newer methodology is the correct one.

[tacoman25]

If the trends are different - then clearly RSS and UAH don't have the same anomalies, by definition. If people here want to agree that none of the data sources have the precision to be exactly correct, and stop using UAH to refute GISS, I would happily stop posting the peer-reviewed literature that says UAH is biased cold. The claims of GISS bias and the criticism of their methodology is absolutely ridiculuous given 1) They have nearly the same end result as HadCRUT, with most of the difference being accounted for by the fact that HadCRUT does not include the rapid warming in the arctic 2) the criticisms of the methodology are incorrect, extrapolation doesn't cause a bias.

And it's not simply a matter of just finding random analyses.. the papers present actual reasons why UAH is biased cold and their newer methodology is the correct one.

Take out 1979 and tell me the trend difference for UAH/RSS.

You cannot deny that they are consistently quite close from year to year. Show me the last year they have diverged as much as GISS/HadCRU.

And any analysis can claim to be better just because it is newer. Scientific studies are constantly refuting each other, because different analyses will have different results. For you to claim these other analysis are absolutely correct is presumptive and naive, to be perfectly honest.

[skierinvermont]

Take out 1979 and tell me the trend difference for UAH/RSS.

You cannot deny that they are consistently quite close from year to year. Show me the last year they have diverged as much as GISS/HadCRU.

And any analysis can claim to be better just because it is newer. Scientific studies are constantly refuting each other, because different analyses will have different results. For you to claim these other analysis are absolutely correct is presumptive and naive, to be perfectly honest.

The difference is that the UAH/RSS divergence is a smaller long-term divergence , while the Had/GISS one is a sharper more short term one.

As you know, the longer the time period the narrower smaller error bars become. So a .02C/decade divergence for 30 years, is roughly comparable, statistically, to a .1C/decade divergence over 10 years. But it would be much harder to simply eyeball or to notice looking at individually monthly anomalies.

[BethesdaWX]

No what I am saying is that RSS methodology yields a higher TREND than UAH (.16C/decade vs .14C/decade) and therefore the RSS methodology applied to the antarctic would likely yield more warming.

And more recent studies indicated that both the RSS and UAH methodologies are biased cold.

There would not be a higher trend on RSS if it included more of the Cooling Interior regions in its analysis... that is the difference. If They are Biased cold, the trend would not change, just the anomaly.

Bottom Line, the Antarctic has been cooling.

[skierinvermont]

There would not be a higher trend on RSS if it included more of the Cooling Interior regions in its analysis... that is the difference. If They are Biased cold, the trend would not change, just the anomaly.

Bottom Line, the Antarctic has been cooling.

Even on UAH the antarctic is not cooling really .. it shows a trend of -.01C/decade which is essentially zero.

And you are not listening to what I am saying .. UAH methodology biases the TREND colder than the RSS methodology. Ergo, applying the RSS trend to the Antarctic would yield a trend slightly higher than UAH.

And of course other analyses of satellite data have even warmer TRENDS than RSS (Fu et al, Vinnikov et al, STAR).

[BethesdaWX]

Even on UAH the antarctic is not cooling really .. it shows a trend of -.01C/decade which is essentially zero.

And you are not listening to what I am saying .. UAH methodology biases the TREND colder than the RSS methodology. Ergo, applying the RSS trend to the Antarctic would yield a trend slightly higher than UAH.

And of course other analyses of satellite data have even warmer TRENDS than RSS (Fu et al, Vinnikov et al, STAR).

Links?

UAH shows a slight cooling trend. The continent itself has been in a deeper cooling trend, the Pennisula area has been warming due to UHI and natural influence.

RSS would be colder if it included the cooling interior....it would be cooler than UAH.

The TREND doesn't change if the satellite measurements have been biased, the anomaly changes.

[donsutherland1]

Antarctica cooling on UAH

BethesdaWx,

Do you have a link to the dataset for Antarctica. The only link I have shows the data for the South Pole (where there has been a slight cooling since 1981).

[BethesdaWX]

BethesdaWx,

Do you have a link to the dataset for Antarctica. The only link I have shows the data for the South Pole (where there has been a slight cooling since 1981).

http://www.climate4you.com/

Good site.

[skierinvermont]

Links?

UAH shows a slight cooling trend. The continent itself has been in a deeper cooling trend, the Pennisula area has been warming due to UHI and natural influence.

RSS would be colder if it included the cooling interior....it would be cooler than UAH.

The TREND doesn't change if the satellite measurements have been biased, the anomaly changes.

Yes the trend does change. That is why UAH has a trend of .14C/decade globally, while RSS has a trend of .16C/decade globally. And this is despite the fact that RSS doesn't include the arctic. If RSS included the arctic it would probably be more like .17C/decade.

The UAH graph of Antarctica you posted shows a cooling trend of only .01C/decade -- exactly what I said it was.

[BethesdaWX]

Yes the trend does change. That is why UAH has a trend of .14C/decade globally, while RSS has a trend of .16C/decade globally. And this is despite the fact that RSS doesn't include the arctic. If RSS included the arctic it would probably be more like .17C/decade.

The UAH graph of Antarctica you posted shows a cooling trend of only .01C/decade -- exactly what I said it was.

No the trend does not change, the anomaly base does.

Again, Links? The Antarctic has Been cooling.

UAH shows a slight cooling trend. The continent itself has been in a deeper cooling trend, the Pennisula area has been warming due to UHI and natural influence.

RSS would be colder if it included the cooling interior....it would be cooler than UAH.