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Mail Online: Scientist who said climate change sceptics had been proved wrong accused of hiding truth by colleague
Sunday October 30, 2011
Mail Online
Scientist who said climate change sceptics had been proved wrong accused of hiding truth by colleague
By David Rose
October 30, 2011
It was hailed as the scientific study that ended the global warming debate once and for all - the research that, in the words of its director, ‘proved you should not be a sceptic, at least not any longer'.
Professor Richard Muller, of Berkeley University in California, and his colleagues from the Berkeley Earth Surface Temperatures project team (BEST) claimed to have shown that the planet has warmed by almost a degree centigrade since 1950 and is warming continually.
Published last week ahead of a major United Nations climate summit in Durban, South Africa, next month, their work was cited around the world as irrefutable evidence that only the most stringent measures to reduce carbon dioxide emissions can save civilisation as we know it.
It was cited uncritically by, among others, reporters and commentators from the BBC, The Independent, The Guardian, The Economist and numerous media outlets in America.
The Washington Post said the BEST study had ‘settled the climate change debate' and showed that anyone who remained a sceptic was committing a ‘cynical fraud'.
But today The Mail on Sunday can reveal that a leading member of Prof Muller's team has accused him of trying to mislead the public by hiding the fact that BEST's research shows global warming has stopped.
Prof Judith Curry, who chairs the Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences at America's prestigious Georgia Institute of Technology, said that Prof Muller's claim that he has proven global warming sceptics wrong was also a ‘huge mistake', with no scientific basis.
Prof Curry is a distinguished climate researcher with more than 30 years experience and the second named co-author of the BEST project's four research papers.
Her comments, in an exclusive interview with The Mail on Sunday, seem certain to ignite a furious academic row. She said this affair had to be compared to the notorious ‘Climategate' scandal two years ago.
Like the scientists exposed then by leaked emails from East Anglia University's Climatic Research Unit, her colleagues from the BEST project seem to be trying to ‘hide the decline' in rates of global warming.
In fact, Prof Curry said, the project's research data show there has been no increase in world temperatures since the end of the Nineties - a fact confirmed by a new analysis that The Mail on Sunday has obtained.
‘There is no scientific basis for saying that warming hasn't stopped,' she said. ‘To say that there is detracts from the credibility of the data, which is very unfortunate.'
However, Prof Muller denied warming was at a standstill.
‘We see no evidence of it [global warming] having slowed down,' he told BBC Radio 4's Today programme. There was, he added, ‘no levelling off'.
A graph issued by the BEST project also suggests a continuing steep increase.
But a report to be published today by the Global Warming Policy Foundation includes a graph of world average temperatures over the past ten years, drawn from the BEST project's data and revealed on its website.
This graph shows that the trend of the last decade is absolutely flat, with no increase at all - though the levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere have carried on rising relentlessly.
‘This is nowhere near what the climate models were predicting,' Prof Curry said. ‘Whatever it is that's going on here, it doesn't look like it's being dominated by CO2.'
Prof Muller also wrote an article for the Wall Street Journal. It was here, under the headline ‘The case against global warming scepticism', that he proclaimed ‘there were good reasons for doubt until now'.
Media storm: Prof Muller's claims received uncritical coverage in the media this week
This, too, went around the world, with The Economist, among many others, stating there was now ‘little room for doubt'.
Such claims left Prof Curry horrified.
‘Of course this isn't the end of scepticism,' she said. ‘To say that is the biggest mistake he [Prof Muller] has made. When I saw he was saying that I just thought, "Oh my God".'
In fact, she added, in the wake of the unexpected global warming standstill, many climate scientists who had previously rejected sceptics' arguments were now taking them much more seriously.
They were finally addressing questions such as the influence of clouds, natural temperature cycles and solar radiation - as they should have done, she said, a long time ago.
Yesterday Prof Muller insisted that neither his claims that there has not been a standstill, nor the graph, were misleading because the project had made its raw data available on its website, enabling others to draw their own graphs.
However, he admitted it was true that the BEST data suggested that world temperatures have not risen for about 13 years. But in his view, this might not be ‘statistically significant', although, he added, it was equally possible that it was - a statement which left other scientists mystified.
‘I am baffled as to what he's trying to do,' Prof Curry said.
Prof Ross McKittrick, a climate statistics expert from Guelph University in Ontario, added: ‘You don't look for statistically significant evidence of a standstill.
‘You look for statistically significant evidence of change.'
The BEST project, which has been lavishly funded, brings together experts from different fields from top American universities.
It was set up 18 months ago in an effort to devise a new and more accurate way of computing changes in world temperatures by using readings from some 39,000 weather stations on land, instead of adding sea temperatures as well.
Some scientists, Prof Muller included, believe that this should provide a more accurate indication of how the world is responding to carbon dioxide.
The oceans, they argue, warm more slowly and this is why earlier global measurements which also cover the sea - such as those from the Climatic Research Unit at East Anglia University - have found no evidence of warming since the Nineties.
The usual way a high-profile project such as BEST would publish its results would be in a scientific journal, following a rigorous ‘peer review' by other experts in the field.
The more eminent journals that publish climate research, such as Nature And Science, insist there must be no leaks to the media until this review is complete and if such leaks occur, they will automatically reject the research.
Earlier this year, the project completed four research papers.
As well as trends in world temperatures, they looked at the extent to which temperature readings can be distorted by urban ‘heat islands' and the influence of long-term temperature cycles in the oceans. The papers were submitted to the Journal of Geophysical Research.
But although Prof Curry is the second named author of all four papers, Prof Muller failed to consult her before deciding to put them on the internet earlier this month, when the peer review process had barely started, and to issue a detailed press release at the same time.
He also briefed selected journalists individually. ‘It is not how I would have played it,' Prof Curry said. ‘I was informed only when I got a group email. I think they have made errors and I distance myself from what they did.
‘It would have been smart to consult me.' She said it was unfortunate that although the Journal of Geophysical Research had allowed Prof Muller to issue the papers, the reviewers were, under the journal's policy, forbidden from public comment.
Prof McKittrick added: ‘The fact is that many of the people who are in a position to provide informed criticism of this work are currently bound by confidentiality agreements.
‘For the Berkeley team to have chosen this particular moment to launch a major international publicity blitz is a highly unethical sabotage of the peer review process.'
In Prof Curry's view, two of the papers were not ready to be published, in part because they did not properly address the arguments of climate sceptics.
As for the graph disseminated to the media, she said: ‘This is "hide the decline" stuff. Our data show the pause, just as the other sets of data do. Muller is hiding the decline.
‘To say this is the end of scepticism is misleading, as is the statement that warming hasn't paused. It is also misleading to say, as he has, that the issue of heat islands has been settled.'
Prof Muller said she was ‘out of the loop'. He added: ‘I wasn't even sent the press release before it was issued.'
Prof Muller defended his behaviour yesterday, saying that all he was doing was ‘returning to traditional peer review', issuing draft papers to give the whole ‘climate community' a chance to comment.
As for the press release, he claimed he was ‘not seeking publicity', adding: ‘This is simply a way of getting the media to report this more accurately.'
He said his decision to publish was completely unrelated to the forthcoming United Nations climate conference.
This, he said, was ‘irrelevant', insisting that nothing could have been further from his mind than trying to influence it.
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What Scientists Are Saying about Professor Muller's Study
Professor Judith Curry:
"Of course this isn't the end of skepticism. To say that is the biggest mistake he [Prof Muller] has made."
"This is nowhere near what the climate models were predicting. Whatever it is that's going on here, it doesn't look like it's being dominated by CO2."
"There is no scientific basis for saying that warming [continues]...To say that there is detracts from the credibility of the data, which is very unfortunate."
Roger A. Pielke, Jr:
"Such a finding of a larger surface temperature trend, however, does not necessarily mean this is due to added greenhouse gases, since such a trend is not seen in the lower troposphere..."
"The BEST project provides an interesting new group to examine the land surface temperature record as applied to long term temperature trends and anomalies. However, they have failed to adequately consider the range of issues that are yet to be resolved and have prematurely reported their findings and conclusions both in their submitted papers and in their media interactions."
David Whitehouse:
"They present data covering more almost 200 years is presented with a short x-axis and a stretched y-axis to accentuate the increase. The data is then smoothed using a ten year average which is ideally suited to removing the past five years of the past decade and mix the earlier standstill years with years when there was an increase. This is an ideal formula for suppressing the past decade's data."
Read More:
IBD: The Climate Scam Continues (10/31/11) - Not so fast, says Professor Judith Curry, a distinguished climate researcher with more than 30 years experience and the second named co-author of the BEST project's four research papers. Curry, who chairs the Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences at prestigious Georgia Institute of Technology, says the project's research data show there has been no increase in world temperatures since the end of the 1990s. "There is no scientific basis for saying that warming hasn't stopped," Curry told Britain's Daily Mail on Sunday. Despite being the second named co-author, Curry was not informed of or consulted about either the release of any study data or of Muller's conclusions, which involved private briefings with selected media outlets. That may be for good reason, since an analysis of the data by other respected analysts shows Muller's conclusions to be wrong, and perhaps deliberately so. According to Dr. David Whitehouse of the Global Warming Policy Foundation, "The global temperature standstill of the past decade is obvious in HadCrut3 data, which is a combination of land and sea surface data. BEST is only land data from nearly 40,000 weather stations." As Whitehouse notes, using BEST's own data, the temperature record of the last 10 or so years "is a statistically perfect straight line of zero gradient." In laymen's terms, warming has stopped. The only hiccups in the graph Whitehouse and his group produced from BEST data is attributed to natural phenomena such as La Nina. Whitehouse states: "Could it really be the case that Professor Muller has not looked at the data in an appropriate way to see the last 10 years clearly? Indeed BEST seems to have worked hard to obscure it." As in Climategate, do we once again have the manipulation and distortion of data to "hide the decline" in temperatures?
Telegraph UK: Lying, cheating climate scientists caught lying, cheating again (10/30/11) Now, though, it seems that BEST is even worse than I thought. Here is what Muller claimed on the BBC Radio 4 Today programme: In our data, which is only on the land we see no evidence of [global warming] having slowed down. But this simply isn't true. Heaven forfend that a distinguished professor from Berkeley University should actually have been caught out telling a lie direct. No, clearly what has happened here is that Professor Muller has made the kind of mistake any self-respecting climate scientist could make: gone to press with some extravagant claims without having a smidgen of evidence to support them. Here, to help the good professor out, is a chart produced by the Global Warming Policy Foundation's David Whitehouse. It was plotted from BEST's own figures. Note how the 10 year trend from 2001 to 2010 - in flat contradiction of Muller's claims - shows no warming whatsoever. What's odd that BEST appears to have gone to great trouble - shades of "hide the decline", anyone? - to disguise this inconvenient truth.
Daily Mail: Scientist who said climate change sceptics had been proved wrong accused of hiding truth by colleague (10/30/11) - But a report to be published today by the Global Warming Policy Foundation includes a graph of world average temperatures over the past ten years, drawn from the BEST project's data and revealed on its website. This graph shows that the trend of the last decade is absolutely flat, with no increase at all - though the levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere have carried on rising relentlessly. ‘This is nowhere near what the climate models were predicting,' Prof Curry said. ‘Whatever it is that's going on here, it doesn't look like it's being dominated by CO2.'...However, he admitted it was true that the BEST data suggested that world temperatures have not risen for about 13 years. But in his view, this might not be ‘statistically significant', although, he added, it was equally possible that it was - a statement which left other scientists mystified. ‘I am baffled as to what he's trying to do,' Prof Curry said. Prof Ross McKittrick, a climate statistics expert from Guelph University in Ontario, added: ‘You don't look for statistically significant evidence of a standstill. ‘You look for statistically significant evidence of change.'
Fox News: Climate Scientist Accused By Colleague of Hiding Truth (10/31/11) - Now who's in hot water? A scientist and former global warming skeptic made international headlines with a study that claimed to prove the existence of global warming conclusively. Until his own colleagues accused the research team of hiding the truth. Professor Richard Muller of Berkeley University in California and his team members from the Berkeley Earth Surface and Temperatures program (BEST) released a study that illustrated continual warming since 1950 -- making the planet almost 1.6 degrees warmer overall, they claim. ... Not so fast. The results of the study are now being called into question not just by climate skeptics but by a leading member of Muller's own team. Prof. Judith Curry, head of the Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences at the Georgia Institute of Technology, said Muller's findings were a "huge mistake" with no scientific basis. "There is no scientific basis for saying that warming [continues]," Curry, who is listed as a co-author on the BEST reports, told The Daily Mail. "To say that there is detracts from the credibility of the data, which is very unfortunate."
Roger Pielke Sr.: BEST has overstated the completeness of their study (11/1/11) - They have not yet examined all aspects of station quality, homogenization, urbanization, and station selection. With respect to station quality, for example, BEST used the classification provided in Fall et al 2011, yet this was just a first evaluation and we are in the process of significantly improving its accuracy. BEST has prematurely assumed the siting quality issue has been adequately assessed. BEST also fails to acknowledge that land use change involves much more than urbanization. ...The BEST project provides an interesting new group to examine the land surface temperature record as applied to long term temperature trends and anomalies. However, they have failed to adequately consider the range of issues that are yet to be resolved. and have prematurely reported their findings and conclusions both in their submitted papers and in their media interactions.
Dr. David Whitehouse: Best Confirms Global Temperature Standstill (10/29/11) - It is a statistically perfect straight line of zero gradient. Indeed, most of the largest variations in it can be attributed to ENSO and la Nina effects. It is impossible to reconcile this with Professor Muller's statement. Could it really be the case that Professor Muller has not looked at the data in an appropriate way to see the last ten years clearly? ...Indeed Best seems to have worked hard to obscure the past decade. They present data covering more almost 200 years is presented with a short x-axis and a stretched y-axis to accentuate the increase. The data is then smoothed using a ten year average which is ideally suited to removing the past five years of the past decade and mix the earlier standstill years with years when there was an increase. This is an ideal formula for suppressing the past decade's data. When examined more objectively Best data confirms the global temperature standstill of the past decade. That the standstill should be present in land only data is remarkable. There have been standstills in land temperature before, but the significance of the past decade is that it is in the era of mankind's postulated influence on climate through greenhouse gas forcing. Predictions made many times in the past few years suggest that warming should be the strongest and fastest in the land data.
Express UK: Global Warming Is Over Says Expert (11/1/11) - She says that BEST's research actually shows that there has been no increase in world temperatures for 13 years. She has called Prof Muller's comments "a huge mistake" and has said that she now plans to discuss her future on the project with him. "There is no scientific basis for saying that global warming hasn't stopped," she says. "To say that there is detracts from the credibility of the data, which is very unfortunate." New research also seems to back up Prof Curry rather than Prof Muller. A report published by the Global Warming Foundation, which is based on BEST's findings, includes a graph of world average temperatures over the past 10 years and it is absolutely flat, suggesting that temperatures have remained constant. This issue is crucial because the levels of carbon dioxide in the air have continued to rise rapidly over the last decade and if temperatures have remained constant during that period it would suggest there is no direct link between carbon gas emissions and global warming.
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