«Robert Rohde1, Judith Curry2, Donald Groom3, Robert Jacobsen3,4, Richard A. Muller1,3,4, Saul Perlmutter3,4, Arthur Rosenfeld3,4, Charlotte Wickham5, ...»
We tested the method by applying it to the GHCN data based from 7280 stations used by the NOAA group. However, we used the GHCN raw data base without the “homogenization” procedures that were applied by NOAA which included adjustments for documented station moves, instrument changes, time of measurement bias, and urban heat island effects, for station moves. Rather, we simply cut the record at time series gaps and places that suggested shifts in the mean level. Nevertheless, the results that we obtained were very close to those obtained by NOAA using the same data and their full set of homogenization procedures. Our results did differ, particularly in recent years, from the analyses reported by the other two groups (NASA GISS and HadCRU). In the older periods (1860 to 1940), our statistical methods allow us to significantly reduce both the statistical and spatial uncertainties in the result, and they allow us to suggest meaningful results back to 1800. We note that we have somewhat lower average temperatures during the period 1880-1930 than found by the prior groups, and significantly lower temperatures in the period 1850 to 1880 than had been deduced by the HadCRU group.
We also see evidence suggesting that temperature variability on the decadal time scale is lower now than it was in the early 1800s. One large negative swing, around 1820, coincides with both the eruption of Mt. Tambora and the Dalton Minimum in solar activity.
In another paper, we will report on the results of analyzing a much larger data set based on a merging of most of the world’s openly available digitized data, consisting of data taken at over 39,000 stations, more than 5 times larger than the data set used by NOAA.
We are very grateful to David Brillinger for his guidance, key suggestions, and many discussions that helped lead to the averaging method presented in this paper. This work was done as part of the Berkeley Earth project, organized under the auspices of the Novim Group (www.Novim.org). We thank many organizations for their support, including the Lee and Juliet Folger Fund, the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, the William K. Bowes Jr. Foundation, the Fund for Innovative Climate and Energy Research (created by Bill Gates), the Ann and Gordon Getty Foundation, the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation, and three private individuals (M.D., N.G. and M.D.). More information on the Berkeley Earth project can be found at www.BerkeleyEarth.org.
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Table 1: Summary of the primary symbols used to describe the Berkeley Earth averaging method.