tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-82923701411348090762024-03-08T06:34:31.516-05:00Surface temperaturesModerated blog for issues relating to work on surface temperature records as part of an international effort.PeterThornehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02438826461353615177noreply@blogger.comBlogger99125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8292370141134809076.post-69507437595961359392016-05-25T16:06:00.002-04:002016-05-25T16:06:59.420-04:00Re-examining changes in Diurnal Temperature Ranges<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
A recently published <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/2015JD024583/full" target="_blank">pair</a> of <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/2015JD024584/full" target="_blank">papers</a> in JGR ($, sorry) reassessing changes in observed Diurnal Temperature Range changes has been recently highlighted in <a href="https://eos.org/research-spotlights/toward-a-reassessment-of-daily-temperature-range-trends" target="_blank">EOS</a> and <a href="http://rdcu.be/ircR" target="_blank">Nature Climate Change</a>.<br />
<br />
The analyses have been <i>extremely</i> long in the making. They started out back in 2010 as 'hobby' papers and never got explicit funding so trundled along very very slowly indeed. The release of the <a href="http://www.surfacetemperatures.org/databank" target="_blank">ISTI databank</a> provided an opportunity to create a new estimate of DTR changes and compare it to several pre-existing estimates.<br />
<br />
The first paper details the construction of the new dataset of DTR changes. This takes the version 1 release of the ISTI databank and applies the pairwise homogenisation algorithm (PHA) used by NOAA NCEI to these holdings. The paper deals with the homogenisation processing, analyses the resulting dataset estimates and discusses aspects of the underlying metrology (not a typo). Below are the gridded trends over 1951-2012 and the global timeseries. The 'raw' data is the basic data held in the databank. Directly adjusted is where the DTR series were presented to the PHA algorithm. Indirectly adjusted is where, instead, the adjustments to Tmin and Tmax are used.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSBFQK3Kp1vevXcDOkWD_WabmRgt5heEmsVyAOEHVxRSEkjpXaX_Hzp2QJgKXdP63BQbr0LoJ5u18mMWG9sqjQ2lMDvsM6vR3OKaOsxVrWo3paQBjrH0czCCeAO01p9S48uRqEPs8WQPA/s1600/paper1_figure10_v1.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSBFQK3Kp1vevXcDOkWD_WabmRgt5heEmsVyAOEHVxRSEkjpXaX_Hzp2QJgKXdP63BQbr0LoJ5u18mMWG9sqjQ2lMDvsM6vR3OKaOsxVrWo3paQBjrH0czCCeAO01p9S48uRqEPs8WQPA/s640/paper1_figure10_v1.png" width="346" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgCePKtOYXvOy28F341wlAIOQ3UYjlk7oJpWcKjGTDkcbGiofQJBLwFFrmkAswTiIH_OB7jEK0WiOa7OHmL3e4I1-jqKjH1rTHyW4kGLM_5qDu4GTgaNj8Nodcd5uiC-MapD-uPsZIxVho/s1600/paper1_figure12_v1.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="341" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgCePKtOYXvOy28F341wlAIOQ3UYjlk7oJpWcKjGTDkcbGiofQJBLwFFrmkAswTiIH_OB7jEK0WiOa7OHmL3e4I1-jqKjH1rTHyW4kGLM_5qDu4GTgaNj8Nodcd5uiC-MapD-uPsZIxVho/s400/paper1_figure12_v1.png" width="400" /></a></div>
We found that more breaks are returned for DTR than is the case for Tmax or Tmin, for which more breaks are returned again than Tmean. This has potential implications for future homogenisation strategies in that searching for breaks in Tmean appears sub-optimal. Potential reasons for this were detailed in a <a href="http://surfacetemperatures.blogspot.ie/2014/12/why-we-need-max-and-min-temperatures.html" target="_blank">prior ISTI blogpost</a> and are further elucidated upon in the paper itself.<br />
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The second paper takes the new analysis and compares it to several pre-existing analysis and then attempts to reformulate the findings on DTR from the IPCC Fifth Assessment Report (which assessed only medium confidence). The new analyses provide considerable confidence in a finding that DTR has decreased globally since the mid-twentieth Century, with most of that decrease occuring prior to 1980. Data are too sparse and uncertain to make meaningful conclusions about DTR changes prior to the mid-twentieth Century, at least globally. The compared datasets show very distinct coverage and somewhat divergent trends since the mid-twentieth Century:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCZd_R9EF24jq9nUNi-lk9bVYpGMxTHH9ovyfAtWbTWrFw0hTeBGbBYhlCoLAbPgsKT1YFG9-GTI99YWHcgrjNq8_8YTu6QJhFX4I-tWr2nP0fvoa9xvF7f-yFFO34KyStv8qp7IxF5qg/s1600/paper2_figure1_v1.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCZd_R9EF24jq9nUNi-lk9bVYpGMxTHH9ovyfAtWbTWrFw0hTeBGbBYhlCoLAbPgsKT1YFG9-GTI99YWHcgrjNq8_8YTu6QJhFX4I-tWr2nP0fvoa9xvF7f-yFFO34KyStv8qp7IxF5qg/s400/paper2_figure1_v1.png" width="362" /></a></div>
Much of the divergence between estimates results from the disparate approaches taken to accounting for incomplete sampling by the underlying data through interolating (or not) into data sparse regions. Using the native coverage (top) or the estimates restricted to common coverage (bottom) greatly alters the perceived degree of agreement between the independently produced products from various groups: <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAG2XE31bP-D2x93LQ0DdBMUJtg6GdoTyuIpPj3pqBVcOqG32_xCYY9Jz76D_ENj2Oi2ZNOqTLr-pDKae2wbMV-fmKwN5HCekxq39u-51eIOSPYwZ6-8VnrwSKnwTHSaMB3zVJF_URNyw/s1600/paper2_figure3_v2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAG2XE31bP-D2x93LQ0DdBMUJtg6GdoTyuIpPj3pqBVcOqG32_xCYY9Jz76D_ENj2Oi2ZNOqTLr-pDKae2wbMV-fmKwN5HCekxq39u-51eIOSPYwZ6-8VnrwSKnwTHSaMB3zVJF_URNyw/s640/paper2_figure3_v2.png" width="444" /></a></div>
The conclusion of the second paper was as follows:<br />
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<blockquote class="tr_bq">
The driving rationale behind this work was the lack of explicit progress in the literature in assessing DTR changes between the fourth and fifth assessment reports of the IPCC. Based upon the findings herein, where a new assessment to be performed by IPCC of the observational DTR record at this time the text might read as follows (use of IPCC carefully calibrated uncertainty language and italicization [Mastrandrea et al., 2010] is intended).<br />
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It is <i>virtually certain</i> that globally averaged DTR has significantly decreased since 1950. This reduction in DTR is robust to both choice of data set and to reasonable variations in station selection and gridding methodology. However, differences between available estimates mean that there is only <i>medium confidence</i> in the magnitude of the DTR reductions. It is <i>likely</i> that most of the global-mean decrease occurred between 1960 and 1980 and that since then globally averaged DTR has exhibited little change. Because of current data sparsity in the digitized records, there is<i> low confidence </i>in trends and multidecadal variability in DTR prior to the middle twentieth century. It is <i>likely</i> that considerable pre-1950 data exist that could be shared and/or rescued and used in future analyses. All assessed estimates of global DTR changes are substantially smaller than the concurrently observed increases in mean and maximum and minimum temperatures (<i>high confidence, virtually certain</i>).</blockquote>
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The datasets and code used are available via <a href="https://www.maynoothuniversity.ie/icarus/icarus-data">https://www.maynoothuniversity.ie/icarus/icarus-data</a></div>
PeterThornehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02438826461353615177noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8292370141134809076.post-18215290865330200112015-10-15T08:49:00.000-04:002015-10-15T08:49:56.880-04:00Global Land Surface Databank: Version 1.1.0 Release<div class="page" title="Page 2">
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<span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;">In June 2014, <a href="http://surfacetemperatures.blogspot.com/2014/06/global-land-surface-databank-version.html" target="_blank">the first version of the global databank</a> was released
(<a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/gdj3.8/pdf" target="_blank">Rennie <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">et al</i>., 2014</a>), which included
data from nearly 50 different sources and an algorithm to resolve duplicate
stations and piece together complete temperature time series. Since then, there
have been <a href="http://surfacetemperatures.blogspot.com/2014/09/the-databank-near-real-time-update.html" target="_blank">monthly updates</a>, appending new data to existing stations. Thanks to
user feedback, along with additional analysis described below, minor changes were introduced
and implemented to the merge program to ensure the most accurate data were
incorporated in the final product. This, along with updates to current sources
required a small change to the versioning system. The remainder of this post will highlight the changes implemented in the global land surface
databank, version 1.1.0. More information about the structure of the databank,
including sources, formats, and merge algorithm, can be found on the databank
website (<a href="http://www.surfacetemperatures.org/databank">www.surfacetemperatures.org/databank</a>) </span></div>
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<div class="CDRBodyText" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><u><b><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Updates to Stage 1 and Stage 2 Data </span></b></u></span> </span></div>
<span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="mso-bookmark: _Toc359182831;"><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; font-weight: normal; line-height: 150%; mso-bidi-font-size: 13.0pt;">The databank design includes six
data Stages, starting from the original observation to the final quality
controlled and bias corrected products. For the purposes of this update, only
three stages were modified: digitized data (Stage One), data converted to a
common format (Stage Two), and the merged dataset (Stage Three).</span></span></span><br />
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in; mso-list: none; text-indent: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="mso-bookmark: _Toc287275865;"><span style="mso-bookmark: _Toc359182831;"><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; font-weight: normal; line-height: 150%; mso-bidi-font-size: 13.0pt;">The highest priority source comes from the
Global Historical Climatology Network – Daily (GHCN-D) dataset (Menne <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">et al.</i> 2012). In June 2015, GHCN-D
underwent a large update, which included a new average temperature element
(TAVG), along with the addition of 1,400 stations that are a part of the World
Meteorological Organization’s (WMO) Regional Basic Climatology Network (RBCN).
Because these stations are important for real time updates, it was necessary to
include this new version in the latest merge.</span></span></span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="mso-bookmark: _Toc287275865;"><span style="mso-bookmark: _Toc359182831;"><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; font-weight: normal; line-height: 150%; mso-bidi-font-size: 13.0pt;">Further assessment was also done on one of
our sources known as “russsource.” This source contained over 36,000 stations
reporting maximum and minimum temperature. While the original format was
consistent across all stations, it was discovered that this source included 27 individual
sources. It was decided to split these sources up and place them individually
in the merge following the source hierarchy defined by the databank working
group. Because of some duplication with sources used in GHCN-D, only 20 of the
27 sources were included. In addition, station ID’s were brought into the Stage
Two data, so that the merge’s ID test could be implemented. The same was done
for the source known as “ghcnsource.”</span><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; font-weight: normal; line-height: 150%;"> </span></span></span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="mso-bookmark: _Toc287275865;"><span style="mso-bookmark: _Toc359182831;"><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; font-weight: normal; line-height: 150%;">Other
than the above, no additional sources were added to the source hierarchy. One source however was removed (crutem4), because it was determined that
the use of these stations as a last resort was causing stations to be unique
because of the data changes through bias corrections. Candidate stations from
crutem4 were matched with their respective target stations through metadata
tests, but were chosen as unique from the data tests, because of these
corrections. In order to avoid excessive station duplication, this source was
removed</span></span></span><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; font-weight: normal; line-height: 150%;">.</span></span>
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<span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><u><b><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Changes to Merge Algorithm</span></b></u></span><br />
<div align="left" class="Paragraph" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: left; text-indent: 0in;">
<span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">T</span><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 150%;">he merge algorithm, as described by Rennie <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">et al.</i> 2014, underwent no code changes.
However, a couple of thresholds were modified in order to maximize the amount
of data the final recommended product would have. The thresholds are
defined in a configuration file that is required for the program to run
successfully.</span></span></div>
<br />
<span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 150%;">The first step of the merge algorithm takes
into account the metadata between a target and candidate station, including the
stations latitude, longitude, elevation and name. A quasi-probabilistic
comparison is made and the result is a metadata metric between 0 and 1. In
version 1.0.0, this metric needed to pass a threshold of 0.50 in order to be
considered for merging. Analysis showed that too many stations were being
pulled through and forcing merges between stations that shouldn’t have. As a
result, a stricter threshold of 0.75 was applied, in order to avoid this issue.</span></span>
<br />
<div align="left" class="Paragraph" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: left; text-indent: 0in;">
</div>
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<div align="left" class="Paragraph" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: left; text-indent: 0in;">
<span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 150%;">In addition, once a candidate station is
chosen to merge with a candidate station, it needs to fill in a gap of at least
60 months (5 years) in order to be added to the target station. It was
determined that this gap was too large, and target stations with short gaps in
its data were not being filled in by qualifying candidate stations. This gap
threshold has been reduced to 12 months as a result. </span></span></div>
<div align="left" class="Paragraph" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: left; text-indent: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<br />
<div align="left" class="Paragraph" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: left; text-indent: 0in;">
<span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 150%;">Similar to version 1.0.0, all decisions made
were tested against an independent dataset generated from hourly data for US
stations available in the Integrated Surface Dataset (Smith <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">et al.</i> 2011). Results
only show a small change between the two versions</span></span></div>
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<br />
<b><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><u>Results</u> </span></span></b><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 150%;">Version 1.1.0 of
the recommended merge contains 35,932 stations (Figure 1), nearly 4,000
stations more than v1.0.0 (32,142). Figure 2 depicts that the addition of
stations reflect the most recent period, as there is relatively a 10% increase
in the number of stations since 1950. It should be noted that there is a drop
in coverage prior to 1950 with the new version. However it is the author’s
opinion that this was reflected by removing crutem4 as one of the sources.
Including this source had made candidate stations unique, due to differences in
its data as a result of the data providers bias corrections. While the number
of stations is lower during this time period for v1.1.0, it should be noted
that the number of gridboxes used in analysis (Figure 3) was either equal, or
slightly higher than v1.0.0.</span></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 150%;">Stage Three
normally includes a merge recommended and endorsed by ISTI, along with variants
showing the structural uncertainty of the algorithm. Due to time constraints,
these variants are not available, however will be provided at a later date.</span></span><br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEis6ZJs14E7-1IUCkVxgX1NLkBKlhG1dC2Vxm7F_sIGSXTfsPgQjDmQLALq_Hqvir852AZi3t9FAyOcX0TGNNTTfcCmdGK1Is7y5zCp1Ro8G0_hzJx_B1Wqrqdfr77VNijGTeQs0vXsp5RW/s1600/Figure1.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="308" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEis6ZJs14E7-1IUCkVxgX1NLkBKlhG1dC2Vxm7F_sIGSXTfsPgQjDmQLALq_Hqvir852AZi3t9FAyOcX0TGNNTTfcCmdGK1Is7y5zCp1Ro8G0_hzJx_B1Wqrqdfr77VNijGTeQs0vXsp5RW/s400/Figure1.png" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Figure 1: Location of all stations in the recommended Stage Three component of the databank. The color corresponds to the number of years of data available for each station. Stations with longer periods of record mask stations with shorter periods of record when they are in approximate identical locations.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVtYmunqMC15Y-4hvURCp_eBV5Qr7Hrchg62IAb8J45QDCWAloRjnFJyHOIfbu7YXYRrDETEbnBIw8XnB0yettqwLCAky90W0Y2N6QHE7iWhflJm3K96BVcHa1nGVkHRDfKL5aEOK3-iWA/s1600/Figure2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="281" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVtYmunqMC15Y-4hvURCp_eBV5Qr7Hrchg62IAb8J45QDCWAloRjnFJyHOIfbu7YXYRrDETEbnBIw8XnB0yettqwLCAky90W0Y2N6QHE7iWhflJm3K96BVcHa1nGVkHRDfKL5aEOK3-iWA/s400/Figure2.png" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Figure 2: Station count of recommended merge v1.1.0 by year from 1850 to 2014, compared to version 1.0.0, along with GHCN-M version 3.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhn3VUqdBaBYVVhW_3KSsucqKb-K3dXOY71hdwGu8oT_Qg4RjABYrcDdy0EBFYott6ky7WoVFau820dxPmqWZ7Eyp9QAWbczV3g355jELpfMuEDWKw5RD6AocZjTqoKFAn5P6pfZqlHqX0A/s1600/Figure3.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="281" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhn3VUqdBaBYVVhW_3KSsucqKb-K3dXOY71hdwGu8oT_Qg4RjABYrcDdy0EBFYott6ky7WoVFau820dxPmqWZ7Eyp9QAWbczV3g355jELpfMuEDWKw5RD6AocZjTqoKFAn5P6pfZqlHqX0A/s400/Figure3.png" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Figure 3: Percentage of global coverage with respect to 5 degree gridboxes for the recommended merger v1.1.0 by year from 1850-2014, comparted to version 1.0.0, along with GHCN-M version 3.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</div>
<br /></div>
</div>
</div>
<span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;">
</span>Jared Renniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13451784184430415799noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8292370141134809076.post-18898510541670558472015-06-06T16:11:00.003-04:002015-06-07T02:34:11.961-04:00Promotional flyers now available in German and Spanish<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
These have sat on my to-do-list for far too long but I have now finally found time to place the German and Spanish translations of the flyers that were taken to COP in Lima on the website. These can be found at <a href="http://www.surfacetemperatures.org/promotional_materials">http://www.surfacetemperatures.org/promotional_materials</a>. My thanks to Enric Aguilar, Stefan Bronnimann, Renate Auchmann and Victor Venema for the significant efforts to undertake these translations. Also a big thanks is due to NCEI graphics team for their efforts to re-render the original flyers in multiple languages.<br />
<br />
The promotional materials are freely available and encouraged for re-use in any forum that may help raise interest in and knowledge of ISTI and its aims. Please feel free to take copies anywhere and everywhere that is relevant.</div>
PeterThornehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02438826461353615177noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8292370141134809076.post-36827094311189856282015-06-04T14:00:00.000-04:002015-06-04T14:00:19.734-04:00The Karl et al. Science paper and ISTI<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Note: this post is partly personal opinion. <br />
<br />
I suspect when this is being posted at unembargo time there will be a whole slew of stories running on the news media and blogs about the Karl et al. paper in <i>Science</i> (I shall add a link to the actual paper if I remember later). But given the use of the <a href="http://www.surfacetemperatures.org/databank" target="_blank">ISTI databank</a> in the analysis - its first high profile use in anger and a testament to all those years of hard work by very many colleagues (principally Jared Rennie) - some may come towards this little quiet corner of the internet. So here are some quick thoughts.<br />
<br />
Karl et al. find greater recent period warming using a new set of land and sea surface temperature records than their operational versions used in NCEI's monitoring products to date. They conclude that there is no statistical evidence for a slowdown in the rate of warming in the new estimate calling into apparent question the much discussed 'hiatus'.<br />
<br />
Firstly, to be clear, most of the change in trend documented in Karl et al. arises not from the land (the focus of ISTI) but rather from the sea surface temperature dataset changes. These changes relate to their now calculating ship bias adjustments throughout the record, and accounting for the transition from predominantly ships to predominantly buoys since the 1980s. There is no doubt that buoys read colder than ships (attested to in multiple published analyses) - so in not previously accounting for this the prior NCDC analysis had a marked propensity to underestimate sea surface temperature changes in the most recent period. There are other changes in the sea surface temperature dataset documented in <a href="http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/JCLI-D-14-00006.1" target="_blank">Huang et al</a> and <a href="http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/JCLI-D-14-00007.1" target="_blank">Liu et al</a>. These are secondary in terms of recent trends but still important for certain applications. For example, ERSSTv4 likely captures far better ENSO variations prior to 1920 or so. This, however, is a land surface air temperatures blog so I shall wax lyrical no further on the matter of SSTs. I can try to answer questions on ERSSTv4 in the comments (I was a co-author on the ERSST analyses) if you have any burning questions.<br />
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So, onto land temperatures. Karl et al. apply the pre-existing pairwise homogenization algorithm used in GHCNv3 to the databank version 1.0.1 release. Effectively this is going from considering these:<br />
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to considering these:<br />
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The effect of going from the 7,280 stations in GHCNMv3 to applying the same algorithm to the databank (although not all 32,128 stations as many were too short or isolated or incomplete - Karl et al. mentions 'double' so somewhere around 15,000 were likely used) is very much smaller than the effect of the sea surface temperature changes despite the step change in station count and coverage. The most recent period trends in Karl et al. over land exhibit a little more warming (c.10%) than GHCNv3 does, but its not remotely statistically siginificant. It'll be interesting to look, down the line, at what proportion of that change arises from improved coverage and what proportion to changes in areas of common sampling and to consider the effects on common stations and a slew of other analyses. Presumably this will be part of a broader analysis under GHCNv4 which will be built off the databank release, again using PHA. There may be additional innovations, in part arising from the <a href="https://www2.image.ucar.edu/event/summerprog.surfacetemps" target="_blank">SAMSI/IMAGe/ISTI</a> workshop held in Boulder last summer. <br />
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There are two additional questions that arise:<br />
<br />
<b>1. Does this analysis obviate the need for ISTI?</b><br />
<br />
<i>Absolutely not.</i><br />
<br />
Without ISTI the land side of Karl et al would not have been possible for starters. But more generally this is but one estimate and we most definitely need multiple estimates. We are also yet to run the PHA algorithm and others through the benchmarks through which additional insights and improvements are expected to accrue. We also know there remain lots and lots of data out there to rescue and incorporate into the holdings and use to get still better estimates of the global, regional and local changes. So, much work to be done and we have only just started to scratch the surface of what is possible.<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>2. Does it call into question the slew of papers of the recent hiatus / pause / slowdown?</b><br />
<br />
<i>Not really.</i><br />
<br />
The NCDC estimate (and GISS which uses the same marine and land basis estimates) was already at the low-end of the family of available estimates of global mean behaviour and this simply puts them back within or just above these estimates for their trends over 1998 to 2012 / 2014. The slowdown is also less marked in all of the datasets now in part because of the additional two and a bit years since the AR5 reported periods in which we appear to be flipping to a positive IPO (this will become clearer with time) which will cause enhanced short-term surface warming.<br />
<br />
But, in part this is a question of which hypothesis to test. Karl et al are testing whether there has been a detectable change in the observed trend behaviour. The answer is no, and pretty much was anyway according to a number of prior analyses. The modern period adjustments and innovations in Karl et al. simply strengthen that conclusion.<br />
<br />
Arguably the more interesting hypothesis to test is whether the observations are consistent with the family of climate model projections. Here the Karl et al adjustments take the NCDC dataset from inconsistent (3 sigma) to suspicious (2 sigma) (here I am adopting metrology Guide to Uncertainties in Measurements language for clarity - in that context Karl et al. analysis takes us from k=3 to k=2, k=1 (within 1 sigma) would be deemed consistent).<br />
<br />
Furthermore, the questions of mechanistic understanding of decadal variability that all these studies have focussed upon are societally relevant and will improve our understanding of the climate system. Not only that but the insights will be used to improve climate models and therefore future predictions and projections. So, the existing literature on the topic is undoubtedly highly valuable. Doubtless there will be those saying they aren't / weren't.<br />
<br />
<b>Concluding remarks</b><br />
<br />
To conclude, worryingly not for the first time (think tropospheric temperaures in late 1990s / early 2000s) we find that potentially some substantial portion of a model-observation discrepancy that has caused a degree of controversy is down to unresolved observational issues. There is still an undue propensity for scientists and public alike to take the observations as a 'given'. As Karl et al. attests, even in the modern era we have imperfect measurements.<br />
<br />
Which leads me to a final proposition for a more scientifically sane future ...<br />
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This whole train of events does rather speak to the fact that we can and should observe in a more sane, sensible and rational way in the future. There is no need to bequeath onto researchers in 50 years time a similar mess. If we instigate and maintain refernce quality networks that are stable SI traceable measures with comprehensive uncertainty chains such as <a href="https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/crn/" target="_blank">USCRN</a>, <a href="http://www.gruan.org/" target="_blank">GRUAN</a> etc. but for all domains for decades to come we can have the next generation of scientists focus on analyzing what happened and not, depressingly, trying instead to inevitably somewhat ambiguously ascertain what happened.</div>
PeterThornehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02438826461353615177noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8292370141134809076.post-70933965388515633492015-02-28T07:18:00.001-05:002015-02-28T07:18:24.843-05:00Promotional flyers now available in French<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
International volunteers are helping to translate the promotional materials recently distributed at the COP meeting in Lima into additional languages. These will be made available through <a href="http://www.surfacetemperatures.org/promotional_materials">http://www.surfacetemperatures.org/promotional_materials</a> as they become available. Please distribute and use to promote the Initiative's aims and objectives at relevant venues and meetings.<br />
<br />
With thanks to Lucie Vincent of Environment Canada and the graphics team at NOAA's National Climatic Data Center versions in French are now available.</div>
PeterThornehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02438826461353615177noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8292370141134809076.post-8456837044859771072015-01-20T06:37:00.000-05:002015-01-20T06:37:15.175-05:00Because the POSTman always delivers ...<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
We recently had a full teleconference meeting of participants. If you are prone to insomnia the full minutes are available at this <a href="https://sites.google.com/a/surfacetemperatures.org/home/steering-committee/ISTI_all_participants_Jan2015.pdf?attredirects=0&d=1" target="_blank">link</a>.<br />
<br />
The major news is that, after some discussions on the appropriate name for the group ISTI does, indeed, have a new group ... the Parallel Observations Science Team (or POST) led by Victor Venema and Renate Auchmann.<br />
<br />
You may recall a <a href="http://variable-variability.blogspot.no/2014/08/database-with-parallel-climate-measurements.html" target="_blank">number</a> of <a href="http://variable-variability.blogspot.no/2013/02/a-database-with-daily-climate-data-for.html" target="_blank">posts</a> on <a href="http://variable-variability.blogspot.no/2012/02/hume-homogenisation-uncertainty.html" target="_blank">this</a> subject over at <a href="http://variable-variability.blogspot.no/" target="_blank">Victor's place</a>. We shall work with colleagues to help further this effort. By being part of the formal ISTI family we will ensure that benefits regarding data holdings, benchmarking, and lessons learnt from this effort are more broadly shared. We always look for win-wins!<br />
<br />
We are still looking at populating the parallel measurements database so if you know of any coincident measurements using distinct techniques or looking at spatial variability at the local scale (or both) then please do get in contact. Victor and Renate are also still populating this group (terms of reference <a href="https://docs.google.com/a/surfacetemperatures.org/viewer?a=v&pid=sites&srcid=c3VyZmFjZXRlbXBlcmF0dXJlcy5vcmd8aG9tZXxneDoxMGZkZjAyNGE4NDkwNzY0" target="_blank">here</a>) so if parallel measurements are of interest and you feel you could contribute drop them a line.<br />
<br />
More details on this effort can be found at <a href="http://www.surfacetemperatures.org/databank/parallel_measurements" target="_blank">http://www.surfacetemperatures.org/databank/parallel_measurements </a></div>
PeterThornehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02438826461353615177noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8292370141134809076.post-9925536388529124002015-01-01T00:56:00.002-05:002015-01-01T02:57:43.376-05:00Survey on national homogenised temperature data sets<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
I've recently run a survey on national homogenised temperature data sets. Whilst this was not an exhaustive survey (as indicated by the number of responses), it is an indication of what's out there and what resources various countries are putting into this work.<br />
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
Survey reports were received from 18 countries (CHN, CAN, ISR, IRL,
SUI, SLO, NOR, HUN, NED, ROM, GBR, AUT, SRB, ESP, CZE, SWE, UKR, AUS) and 1
region (Catalonia). Summary results were as follows:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoListParagraph" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -18.0pt;">
1. Number of staff involved in homogenisation
(full-time equivalent)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
Less than 1<span style="mso-tab-count: 3;"> </span>2
countries</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
1-2<span style="mso-tab-count: 4;"> </span>9</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
2-4<span style="mso-tab-count: 4;"> </span>5</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
4 or more<span style="mso-tab-count: 3;"> </span>3</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
(global and continental data sets are excluded from this - for example, the UK have several people working on the HadCRUT data sets, and the Netherlands on ECA&D and associated projects)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraph" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -18.0pt;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">2. </span></span>Existence of a national homogenised data set</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
Yes<span style="mso-tab-count: 6;"> </span>16</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
Yes but not yet released<span style="mso-tab-count: 4;"> </span>1</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
No national set but a station/regional set<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>1</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
No<span style="mso-tab-count: 6;"> </span>1</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br />
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">3. </span></span>Time resolution of data set</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
Daily<span style="mso-tab-count: 6;"> </span>8</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
Monthly<span style="mso-tab-count: 5;"> </span>7</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
Mix depending on element<span style="mso-tab-count: 3;"> </span>1</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
Monthly for early data, daily for later<span style="mso-tab-count: 2;"> </span>1</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraph" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -18.0pt;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">4.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span>Time resolution of adjustment</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
Results from this are a little unclear – several responses indicated
use of the Vincent methodology, which interpolates adjustments based on monthly
values to daily timescales.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
Daily<span style="mso-tab-count: 6;"> </span>4</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
Monthly<span style="mso-tab-count: 5;"> </span>11</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
Monthly for detection, daily for adjustment<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>2</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraph" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -18.0pt;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">5. </span></span>Elements included</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
Maximum, minimum and mean temperature<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>8</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
Maximum and minimum temperature<span style="mso-tab-count: 2;"> </span>5
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
Mean temperature only<span style="mso-tab-count: 4;"> </span>4</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
(note that ‘maximum and minimum temperature’ implies mean temperature
is not homogenised independently – in most cases it can still be calculated
based on max/min)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-AU; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><br clear="all" style="mso-special-character: line-break; page-break-before: always;" />
</span>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraph" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -18.0pt;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">6. </span></span>Frequency of updating/reassessing homogeneity</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
Not updated<span style="mso-tab-count: 5;"> </span>6
(in 2 cases, the first data set has only just<br />
been completed)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
Appended with unadjusted data only<span style="mso-tab-count: 2;"> </span>2</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
Irregularly<span style="mso-tab-count: 5;"> </span>1</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
Annually or near-annually<span style="mso-tab-count: 3;"> </span>4</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
Intervals longer than 2 years<span style="mso-tab-count: 3;"> </span>4
(ranging from every 3 to every 10 years)</div>
</div>
Blair Trewinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01149841441852181770noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8292370141134809076.post-42657673064937626162014-12-11T05:30:00.000-05:002014-12-11T06:01:45.216-05:00Why we need max and min temperatures for all stations<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
I'm doing an analysis of Diurnal Temperature Range (DTR; more on that when published) but as part of this I just played with a little toy box model and the result is sufficiently of general interest to highlight here and maybe get some feedback.<br />
<br />
So, for most stations in the databank we have data for maximum (Tx) and minimum (Tn) that we then average to get Tm. Now, that is not the only transform possible - there is also DTR which is Tx-Tn. Although that is not part of the databank archive its a trivial transform. In looking at results running NCDC's pairwise algorithm distinct differences in breakpoint detection efficacy and adjustment distribution arise, which have caused great author team angst.<br />
<br />
This morning I constructed a simple toy box where I just played what if. More precisely what if I allowed seeded breaks in Tx and Tn in the bound -5 to 5 and considered the break size effects in Tx, Tn, Tm and DTR:<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi54EtKGlbi7QUIiXHoz3Rb-sUR8oAwSnwNx48Knx9-wGFzeRXv7SBkjcwj85DVKLMi0pM8vpL6_vFTLXJn8CzAHTI7Gl-YH9SW-_JMyBidXYD7jVY1v65awIG_j_hQNfsGN-DjO0uDSdU/s1600/Untitled.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi54EtKGlbi7QUIiXHoz3Rb-sUR8oAwSnwNx48Knx9-wGFzeRXv7SBkjcwj85DVKLMi0pM8vpL6_vFTLXJn8CzAHTI7Gl-YH9SW-_JMyBidXYD7jVY1v65awIG_j_hQNfsGN-DjO0uDSdU/s1600/Untitled.png" height="640" width="264" /></a></div>
The top two panels are hopefully pretty self explanatory. Tm and DTR effects are orthogonal which makes sense. In the lowest panel (note colours chosen from colorbrewer but please advise if issues for colour-blind folks): <br />
red: Break largest in Tx <br />
blue: Break largest in Tn<br />
purple: break largest in DTR<br />
green: break largest in Tm (yes, there is precisely no green)<br />
Cases with breaks equal in size are no colour (infintesimally small lines along diagonal and vertices at Tx and Tn =0)<br />
<br />
<br />
So … <br />
<br />
if we just randomly seeded Tx and Tn breaks in an entirely uncorrelated manner into the series then we would get 50% of breaks largest in DTR and 25% each in Tx and Tn. DTR should be broader in its overall distribution and Tm narrower with Tx and Tn intermediate.<br />
<br />
if we put in correlated Tx and Tn breaks such that they were always same sign (but not magnitude) then they would always be largest in either Tx or Tn (or equal with Tm when Tx=Tn)<br />
<br />
If we put in anti-correlated breaks then they would always be largest in DTR.<br />
<br />
Perhaps most importantly, as alluded to above, breaks will only be equal largest for Tm in a very special set of cases where Tx break = Tn break. Breaks, on average will be smallest in Tm. If breakpoint detection and adjustment is a signal to noise problem its not sensible to look where the signal is smallest. This has potentially serious implications for our ability to detect and adjust for breakpoints if we limit ourselves to Tm and is why we should try to rescue Tx and Tn data for the large amount of early data for which we only have Tm in the archives.<br />
<br />
Maybe in future we can consider this as an explicitly joint estimation problem of finding breaks in the two primary elements and two derived elements and then constructing physically consistent adjustment estimates from the element-wise CDFs. Okay, I'm losing you now I know so I'll shut up ... for now ...<br />
<br />
<b>Update:</b><br />
<br />
Bonus version showing how much more frequently DTR is larger than Tm:<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKphUmULyaRZ2iCwRuj8r2rNioBUqsa1__XWzI1gbpJni9l32gIeGjFZ8EGWok_PLBO05zbCrEqr600JCepp5_-MipziSLheD79GH_UNmJ_yddQ5quBuf1DHP7LxGOeAmU0UtJD6WOAD0/s1600/Untitled2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKphUmULyaRZ2iCwRuj8r2rNioBUqsa1__XWzI1gbpJni9l32gIeGjFZ8EGWok_PLBO05zbCrEqr600JCepp5_-MipziSLheD79GH_UNmJ_yddQ5quBuf1DHP7LxGOeAmU0UtJD6WOAD0/s1600/Untitled2.png" height="352" width="400" /></a></div>
</div>
PeterThornehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02438826461353615177noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8292370141134809076.post-87903536836286270452014-12-09T10:21:00.000-05:002014-12-09T10:21:15.649-05:00What has changed since the version 1 release of the Databank?<br />
It has been nearly six months since we have released the <a href="ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/globaldatabank/monthly/stage3/" target="_blank">first version of the databank</a>. While this was a big achievement for the International Surface Temperature Initiative, our work is not done. We have taken on many different tasks since the release, and a brief description is below: <br />
<br />
<u><b>Monthly Update System</b></u><br />
As described in <a href="http://surfacetemperatures.blogspot.com/2014/09/the-databank-near-real-time-update.html" target="_blank">this post</a>, we have implemented a monthly update system appending near real time (NRT) data into the databank. On the 5th of each month 4 sources (ghcnd, climat-ncdc, climat-uk, mcdw-unpublished) update their Stage 1 data, and on the 11th, their common formatted data (Stage 2) are then updated. In addition, an algorithm is applied appending new data to the recommended merge, and that is updated on the 11th as well.<br />
<br />
<u><b>Bug Fixes</b></u><br />
Users have submitted some minor issues with version 1. Some stations in Serbia were given a country code of "RB" when they should have been given "RI." These have been addressed, and a new version of the databank (v1.0.1) was released.<br />
<br />
There have been concerns about how the station name is displayed. Non-ASCII characters pose problems with some text interpreters. A module has been created in the Stage 1 to Stage 2 conversion scripts where these characters are either changed or removed to avoid this problem in the future.<br />
<br />
Of course issues could still exist, if you find any please let us know! As an open and transparent initiative, we encourage constructive criticism and will apply any reasonable suggestions to future versions.<br />
<br />
<u><b>New Sources</b></u><br />
We have acquired new sources that will be added as Stage 1 and Stage 2 data soon, including<br />
<ul>
<li>300 UK Stations from the Met Office</li>
<li>German data released by DWD</li>
<li>EPA's Oregon Crest to Coast Dataset</li>
<li>LCA&D: Latin American Climate Assessment and Dataset</li>
<li>Daily Chinese Data</li>
<li>NCAR Surface Libraries</li>
<li>Stations from Meteomet project</li>
<li>Libya Stations sent by their NMS</li>
<li>C3/EURO4M Stations</li>
<li>Additional Digitized Stations from the University of Giessen</li>
<li>Homogenized Iranian Data</li>
</ul>
It is not too late to submit new data. If you have a lead on sources please let us know at data.submission@surfacetemperatures.org. We will freeze the sources again on February 28th, 2015, in order to work on the next version of the merge.Jared Renniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13451784184430415799noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8292370141134809076.post-52032405304440997832014-12-05T03:18:00.000-05:002014-12-11T09:01:49.296-05:00Discovering NCDC's hard copy holdings<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<b>Update Dec 11th</b>: permanent link with some browser issues resolved at <a href="http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/webartis" target="_blank">http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/webartis </a><br />
<br />
NOAA's <a href="http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/" target="_blank">National Climatic Data Center </a>have undertaken an inventory of their substantial basement holdings of hard copy data. These include a rich mix of data types on varied media including paper, fiche and microfilm.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhH3bmKBts_uC2-ZECGLUmLvKdQxNT1-9h8mQrJa5_1VlOiIkZ_fEhI_stqfCBvhLfGYKM_8x75llbWbPDK3HEnxrDbBFZyz0FGRgPfxQUxwL8iOdUTORpRGWE0Ayj8b2C2O3IQFAryNcY/s1600/US_navy_cursory_cataloge.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhH3bmKBts_uC2-ZECGLUmLvKdQxNT1-9h8mQrJa5_1VlOiIkZ_fEhI_stqfCBvhLfGYKM_8x75llbWbPDK3HEnxrDbBFZyz0FGRgPfxQUxwL8iOdUTORpRGWE0Ayj8b2C2O3IQFAryNcY/s1600/US_navy_cursory_cataloge.JPG" height="400" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">One row of several dozen in the NCDC archive of hard copy paper holdings from around the world</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8kI-_ZdsEDrKl_kyppHT7YZa5RGFFrNgC7fky5wES9ggPG4Kf3e5H183RO4o2qmHose2Y_A6XUOKWr19X2GPhZS9BSiYcVNfADLnvnrB8sisEuxcrOvDizinG8oBISnffLRKyhyphenhyphen6TkGI/s1600/German_war_box_detail.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8kI-_ZdsEDrKl_kyppHT7YZa5RGFFrNgC7fky5wES9ggPG4Kf3e5H183RO4o2qmHose2Y_A6XUOKWr19X2GPhZS9BSiYcVNfADLnvnrB8sisEuxcrOvDizinG8oBISnffLRKyhyphenhyphen6TkGI/s1600/German_war_box_detail.JPG" height="300" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Microfilm holdings arising from Europe over the second world war</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
Some, but far from all, of this data has been imaged and / or digitized. NCDC have now released the catalogue online and made it searchable. The catalogue interface can be found at <a href="https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/cdo/f?p=222">https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/cdo/f?p=222</a> (click on search records). The degree to which a given holding has been catalogued varies but this is a good place to at least begin to ascertain what holdings there are there and what their status is. For example searching on American Samoa as country provides a list of holdings most of which are hard copy only.<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9htrHGJSNyYIjakWE67H6fZwiJyct9xzoVNyVp1-wjxJPBRWw8y4FpsJ4udkKbtE7kQam2hMwg5jOJBpu6VFt10VqmXHrNQe3J0STRRkrt7PDyLP8Fve_vRF8dJv9xMFPm_1egpjgh6o/s1600/screencap.tiff" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9htrHGJSNyYIjakWE67H6fZwiJyct9xzoVNyVp1-wjxJPBRWw8y4FpsJ4udkKbtE7kQam2hMwg5jOJBpu6VFt10VqmXHrNQe3J0STRRkrt7PDyLP8Fve_vRF8dJv9xMFPm_1egpjgh6o/s1600/screencap.tiff" height="395" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Example search results for American Samoa</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
For those interested in aspects of data rescue, this is likely to be a useful tool to ascertain whether NCDC hold any relevant records. By reasonable estimates at least as much data exists in hard copy / imaged format as has been digitised for the pre-1950 period. That is a lot of unknown knowns and could provide such rich information to improve understanding ...</div>
PeterThornehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02438826461353615177noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8292370141134809076.post-58594367156884067342014-11-26T03:59:00.002-05:002014-11-26T03:59:58.587-05:00A set of flyers for promoting the initiative's aims and outcomes<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
We have produced a set of one-sider flyers to promote the initiative and its aims and to try to engender additional inputs, collaborations and contributions. These will be taken by Kate Willett to the forthcoming COP meeting in Peru next month.<br />
<br />
We strongly encourage use of these flyers at appropriate venues to support the further advancement of our work.<br />
<br />
The set of flyers can be found at <a href="http://www.surfacetemperatures.org/promotional_materials" target="_blank">http://www.surfacetemperatures.org/promotional_materials</a>. There are flyers on:<br />
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li><a href="http://www.surfacetemperatures.org/promotional_materials/ISTI.pdf?attredirects=0&d=1" target="_blank">The overaching initative</a></li>
<li><a href="http://www.surfacetemperatures.org/promotional_materials/ISTI%20Global%20Land%20Surface%20Databank_V2.pdf?attredirects=0&d=1" target="_blank">The databank first release</a></li>
<li><a href="http://www.surfacetemperatures.org/promotional_materials/ISTI%20Parallel_V2.pdf?attredirects=0&d=1" target="_blank">The parallel measurements collection</a></li>
<li><a href="http://www.surfacetemperatures.org/promotional_materials/ISTI%20Benchmark%20Framework_vs2.pdf?attredirects=0&d=1" target="_blank">The benchmarking framework</a></li>
</ul>
[links are to pdf versions] <br />
<br />
Our more eagle eyed readers would have noted above a new strand to our work. I am delighted to say that we have, following the most recent steering committee call, formally recognized the efforts led by <a href="http://www2.meteo.uni-bonn.de/staff/venema/" target="_blank">Victor Venema</a> and <a href="http://www.geography.unibe.ch/content/forschungsgruppen/klimatologie/gruppenportrait/people_details/auchmann/index_eng.html" target="_blank">Renate Auchmann</a> to populate and exploit a database of parallel measurements by instigating a new expert team under the databank working group. We shall do all we can to support this important effort and in the first instanace we encourage readers to help us in the identification and collection of such holdings.<br />
<br />
A stub page is available at <a href="http://www.surfacetemperatures.org/databank/parallel_measurements" target="_blank">http://www.surfacetemperatures.org/databank/parallel_measurements </a>which we shall populate over the coming months. In the meantime more information on this effort can be found at <a href="http://variable-variability.blogspot.no/2014/08/database-with-parallel-climate-measurements.html">http://variable-variability.blogspot.no/2014/08/database-with-parallel-climate-measurements.html</a>.</div>
PeterThornehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02438826461353615177noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8292370141134809076.post-58913871457518604032014-11-05T12:25:00.000-05:002014-11-05T12:25:23.752-05:00Release of a daily benchmark dataset - version 1 <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The ISTI benchmark working group includes a PhD student looking at benchmarking daily temperature homogenisation algorithms. This largely follows the concepts laid out in the benchmark working group's <a href="http://surfacetemperatures.blogspot.co.uk/2014/10/a-framework-for-benchmarking-of.html" target="_blank">publication</a>. Significant progress has been made in this field. This post announces the release of a small daily benchmark
dataset focusing on four regions in North America. These regions can be
seen in Figure 1. </span><br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMtP7q8DfB-GKrVq6vVLNNw-OZlcOgIYodZqX-jmI2W_L_m38fFWWy-n7auKvdwr5QblNKC_0YsBzcQZhVNxY5cf4otX55jOrWO3Yxcd-OQp2F67a1HbzrJzKrGqALvZVHyp9cpLB3ED0/s1600/pretty_picture.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMtP7q8DfB-GKrVq6vVLNNw-OZlcOgIYodZqX-jmI2W_L_m38fFWWy-n7auKvdwr5QblNKC_0YsBzcQZhVNxY5cf4otX55jOrWO3Yxcd-OQp2F67a1HbzrJzKrGqALvZVHyp9cpLB3ED0/s1600/pretty_picture.png" height="213" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span>Figure
1 Station locations of the four benchmark regions. Blue stations are in
all worlds. Red stations only appear in worlds 2 and 3.</span></span></span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">These benchmarks
have similar aims to the global benchmarks that are currently being
produced by the ISTI working group, namely to:
<br /> </span><br />
</span><br />
<ol style="text-align: left;">
<li><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Assess the performance of current homogenisation algorithms and provide feedback to allow for their improvement </span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Assess how realistic the created benchmarks are, to allow for improvements in future iterations </span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Quantify the
uncertainty that is present in data due to inhomogeneities both before
and after homogenisation algorithms have been run on them</span></li>
</ol>
</div>
<br /><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">A perfect
algorithm would return the inhomogeneous data to their clean form –
correctly identifying the size and location of the inhomogeneities and
adjusting the series accordingly. The inhomogeneities that have been
added will not be made known to the testers until the completion of the
assessment cycle – mid 2015. This is to ensure that the study is as fair
as possible with no testers having prior knowledge of the added
inhomogeneities.
<br /><br />The data are formed into three worlds, each consisting of the
four regions shown in Figure 1. World 1 is the smallest and contains
only those stations shown in blue in Figure 1, Worlds 2 and 3 are the
same size as each other and contain all the stations shown.
<br /><br />Homogenisers are requested to prioritise running their
algorithms on a single region across worlds instead of on all regions in
a single world. This will hopefully maximise the usefulness of this
study in assessing the strengths and weaknesses of the process. The
order of prioritisation for the regions is Wyoming, South East, North
East and finally the South West.
<br /><br />This study will be more effective the more participants it has
and if you are interested in participating please contact Rachel Warren
(rw307 AT exeter.ac.uk). The results will form part of a PhD thesis and
therefore it is requested that they are returned no later than Friday
12th December 2014. However, interested parties who are unable to meet
this deadline are also encouraged to contact Rachel.
<br /><br />There will be a further smaller release in the next week that is
just focussed on Wyoming and will explore climate characteristics of
data instead of just focusing on inhomogeneity characteristics.</span><div>
</div>
</div>
Kate Willetthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11927171226977378923noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8292370141134809076.post-15780217797451137222014-10-06T07:37:00.002-04:002014-10-06T07:37:26.237-04:00A framework for benchmarking of homogenisation algorithm performance on the global scale - Paper now published<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: large;">The ISTI benchmarking working group have just had their first benchmarking paper accepted at <a href="http://www.geoscientific-instrumentation-methods-and-data-systems.net/" target="_blank">Geoscientific Instrumentation, Methods and Data Systems</a>:</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<i><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.geosci-instrum-method-data-syst.net/3/187/2014/gi-3-187-2014.html" target="_blank"><span class="pb_toc_link">Willett, K.,
Williams, C., Jolliffe, I. T., Lund, R., Alexander, L. V.,
Brönnimann, S., Vincent, L. A., Easterbrook, S., Venema, V. K. C.,
Berry, D., Warren, R. E., Lopardo, G., Auchmann, R., Aguilar, E.,
Menne, M. J., Gallagher, C., Hausfather, Z., Thorarinsdottir, T., and
Thorne, P. W.: A framework for benchmarking of homogenisation algorithm
performance on the global scale, Geosci. Instrum. Method. Data Syst., 3,
187-200, doi:10.5194/gi-3-187-2014, 2014.</span></a></span></span></i><br />
<br />
<span class="pb_toc_link"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Benchmarking,
in this context, is the assessment of homogenisation algorithm
performance against a set of realistic synthetic worlds of station data
where the locations and size/shape of inhomogeneities are known <i>a priori.</i>
Crucially, these inhomogeneities are not known to those performing the
homogenisation, only those performing the assessment. Assessment of both
the ability of algorithms to find changepoints and accurately return
the synthetic data to its clean form (prior to addition of
inhomogeneity) has three main purposes:</span></span><br />
<br />
<span class="pb_toc_link"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> 1) quantification of uncertainty remaining in the data due to inhomogeneity</span></span><br />
<span class="pb_toc_link"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> 2) inter-comparison of climate data products in terms of fitness for a specified purpose</span></span><br />
<span class="pb_toc_link"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> 3) providing a tool for further improvement in homogenisation algorithms </span></span><br />
<br />
<span class="pb_toc_link"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Here
we describe what we believe would be a good approach to a comprehensive
homogenisation algorithm benchmarking system. Thfis includes an
overarching cycle of: benchmark development; release of formal
benchmarks; assessment of homogenised benchmarks and an overview of
where we can improve for next time around (Figure 1).</span></span><br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzYYT6q91Hij7uujJz2dTIh5s4gUskBodAdmkZ5zffT70WHTi44B944TEnVeuw58Eul0mkwzDM0vEoLgTUMoOfb3eaDx0bW6qEh7h8hMAr6rP2gBkPfLbiaChFxb8stg6cwLzq4kNIB-UV/s1600/f3_Thorneetal_BAMS_In_Box.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzYYT6q91Hij7uujJz2dTIh5s4gUskBodAdmkZ5zffT70WHTi44B944TEnVeuw58Eul0mkwzDM0vEoLgTUMoOfb3eaDx0bW6qEh7h8hMAr6rP2gBkPfLbiaChFxb8stg6cwLzq4kNIB-UV/s1600/f3_Thorneetal_BAMS_In_Box.png" height="640" width="497" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Figure
1 Overview the ISTI comprehensive benchmarking system for assessing
performance of homogenisation algorithms. (Fig. 3 of Willett et al.,
2014)</span></span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<span class="pb_toc_link"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">There are four components to creating this benchmarking system. </span></span><br />
<br />
<h4 style="text-align: left;">
<span class="pb_toc_link"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i>Creation of realistic clean synthetic station data</i> </span></span></h4>
<span class="pb_toc_link"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Firstly,
we must be able to synthetically recreate the 30000+ ISTI stations such
that they have the correct variability, auto-correlation and
interstation cross-correlations as the real data but are free from
systematic error. In other words, they must contain a realistic seasonal
cycle and features of natural variability (e.g., ENSO, volcanic
eruptions etc.). There must be a realistic persistence month-to-month in
each station and geographically across nearby stations. </span></span><br />
<br />
<h4 style="text-align: left;">
<i><span class="pb_toc_link"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Creation of realistic error models to add to the clean station data</span></span></i></h4>
<span class="pb_toc_link"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The
added inhomogeneities should cover all known types of inhomogeneity in
terms of their frequency, magnitude and seasonal behaviour. For example,
inhomogeneities could be any or a combination of the following:</span></span><br />
<span class="pb_toc_link"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span class="pb_toc_link"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
- geographically or temporally clustered due to events which affect
entire networks or regions (e.g. change in observation time);<br /> - close to end points of time series;<br /> - gradual or sudden;<br /> - variance-altering;<br /> - combined with the presence of a long-term background trend;<br /> - small or large;</span></span><br />
<span class="pb_toc_link"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> - frequent;</span></span><br />
<span class="pb_toc_link"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> - seasonally or diurnally varying.</span></span><br />
<br />
<h4 style="text-align: left;">
<span class="pb_toc_link"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i>Design of an assessment system</i> </span></span></h4>
<span class="pb_toc_link"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Assessment
of the homogenised benchmarks should be designed with the three
purposes of benchmarking in mind. Both the ability to correctly locate
changepoints and to adjust the data back to its homogeneous state are
important. It can be split into four different levels:</span></span><br />
<span class="pb_toc_link"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span class="pb_toc_link"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> -
Level 1: The ability of the algorithm to restore an inhomogeneous world
to its clean world state in terms of climatology, variance and trends.</span></span><br />
<span class="pb_toc_link"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span class="pb_toc_link"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> - Level 2: The ability of the algorithm to accurately locate changepoints and detect their size/shape.</span></span><br />
<span class="pb_toc_link"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span class="pb_toc_link"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> -
Level 3: The strengths and weaknesses of an algorithm against specific
types of inhomogeneity and observing system issues.</span></span><br />
<span class="pb_toc_link"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span class="pb_toc_link"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> -
Level 4: A comparison of the benchmarks with the real world in terms of
detected inhomogeneity both to measure algorithm performance in the
real world and to enable future improvement to the benchmarks.</span></span><br />
<br />
<h4 style="text-align: left;">
<span class="pb_toc_link"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i>The benchmark cycle</i> </span></span></h4>
<span class="pb_toc_link"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">This
should all take place within a well laid out framework to encourage
people to take part and make the results as useful as possible. Timing
is important. Too long a cycle will mean that the benchmarks become
outdated. Too short a cycle will reduce the number of groups able to
participate. </span></span><br />
<br />
<span class="pb_toc_link"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="pb_toc_link"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Producing
the clean synthetic station data on the global scale is a complicated
task that has now taken several years but we are close to completion of a
version 1. </span></span>We have collected together a list of known
regionwide inhomogeneities and a comprehensive understanding of the many
many different types of inhomogeneities that can affect station data.
We have also considered a number of assessment options and decided to
focus on levels 1 and 2 for assessment within the benchmark cycle. Our
benchmarking working group is aiming for release of the first benchmarks
by January 2015. </span></span></div>
Kate Willetthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11927171226977378923noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8292370141134809076.post-31533887889635669322014-09-12T09:38:00.000-04:002014-09-12T09:38:44.384-04:00The Databank Near Real Time Update SystemSince the <a href="http://surfacetemperatures.blogspot.com/2014/06/global-land-surface-databank-version.html" target="_blank">official release</a> back in June, we have worked to keep the databank updated with the most recent data. Each month we will post new data from sources that update in near-real-time (NRT), along with an updated version of the recommended merge with the latest data appended. Stage 1 data (digitized in its original form) will be updated no later than the 5th of each month, and then Stage 2 (common formatted data) and Stage 3 (merged record) data will be updated no later than the 11th of the month.<br />
<br />
So what data gets updated in our NRT system? We have determined four sources that have updated data within the first few days of the month. They are the CLIMAT streams from NCDC as well as the UK, the unpublished form of the monthly climatic data for the world (MCDW) and finally GHCN-D. Similar to the merge program, a hierarchy is placed determining which source its data appends to if there are conflicts. The hierarchy is here:<br />
<br />
1) GHCN-D<br />
2) CLIMAT-UK<br />
3) CLIMAT-NCDC<br />
4) MCDW-Unpublished<br />
<br />
An overview of the system is shown here in this flow diagram (Click on image to enlarge):<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1zBSQKFzxBZAA1zDaEJ-YKEbFpDqxtJFPO_4kTIQSF_mLxgPCe0Gkmc1Tx1zCFE7g5m7txoHsoS6e7Y2zutxeGQr3EhIBxYZ0xJ9-kn8Ch3yf9GtjFDrTDEV3nMgwhDXNHuwUl0-_f_t3/s1600/ISTI_DFD_UPDATE_Level0_V1.0_20140912.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1zBSQKFzxBZAA1zDaEJ-YKEbFpDqxtJFPO_4kTIQSF_mLxgPCe0Gkmc1Tx1zCFE7g5m7txoHsoS6e7Y2zutxeGQr3EhIBxYZ0xJ9-kn8Ch3yf9GtjFDrTDEV3nMgwhDXNHuwUl0-_f_t3/s1600/ISTI_DFD_UPDATE_Level0_V1.0_20140912.jpg" height="162" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
The algorithm to append data looks for station matches through the same metadata tests as described in the merge program. These include geographic distance, height distance, and station name similarity using the Jaccard Index. If the metadata metric is good, then an ID test is used to determine station match. Because the four input sources have either a GHCN-D or WMO ID, the matching is much easier here than in the merge program. Once a station match is found, new data from the past few months are appended. Throughout this process, no new stations are added.</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
We have had two monthly updates so far. As always the latest recommended merge data can be found on our ftp page <a href="ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/globaldatabank/monthly/stage3/recommended/results/" target="_blank">here</a>, along with older data placed in the archive <a href="ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/globaldatabank/archive/monthly/stage3/v1.0.0/recommended/results/" target="_blank">here</a>. Note that we are only updating the recommended merge, and not the variants. In addition, the merge metadata is not updated, because no new merge has been applied yet. We plan to have another merge out sometime in early 2015.</div>
Jared Renniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13451784184430415799noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8292370141134809076.post-88677057911849220622014-08-29T06:48:00.000-04:002014-08-29T07:45:25.970-04:00ccc-gistemp and ISTI<i><div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
This is a guest post by David Jones of the Climate Code Foundation. It is a mirror of their post at <a href="http://climatecode.org/blog/2014/08/ccc-gistemp-and-isti/" target="_blank">http://climatecode.org/blog/2014/08/ccc-gistemp-and-isti/</a><br /></i>
<p>
<a href="https://github.com/ClimateCodeFoundation/ccc-gistemp">ccc-gistemp</a> is <a href="http://climatecode.org/">Climate Code Foundation</a>‘s rewrite of <a href="http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/">the NASA GISS Surface Temperature Analysis GISTEMP</a>. It produces exactly the same result, but is written in clear Python.<p>
I’ve recently modified ccc-gistemp so that it can use the dataset recently released by the <a href="http://www.surfacetemperatures.org/">International Surface Temperature Initiative</a>. Normally ccc-gistemp uses <a href="http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/ghcnm/v3.php">GHCN-M</a>, but the ISTI dataset is much larger. Since ISTI publish the Stage 3 dataset in the same format as GHCN-M v3 the required changes were relatively minor, and Climate Code Foundation appreciates the fact that ISTI is published in several formats, including GHCN-M v3.
<p>
The ISTI dataset is not quality controlled, so, after re-reading section 3.3 of <a href="http://www1.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/ushcn/papers/lawrimore-etal2011.pdf">Lawrimore et al 2011</a>, I implemented an extremely simple quality control scheme, <a href="https://github.com/ClimateCodeFoundation/madqc">MADQC</a>. In MADQC a data value is rejected if its distance from the median (for its station’s named month) exceeds 5 times the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_absolute_deviation">median absolute deviation</a> (MAD, hence MADQC); any series with fewer than 20 values (for each named month) is rejected.
<p>
So far I’ve found MADQC to be reasonable at rejecting the grossest non climatic errors.
<p>
Let’s compare the ccc-gistemp analysis using the ISTI Stage 3 dataset versus using the GHCN-M QCU dataset. The analysis for each hemisphere:
<p>
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For both hemispheres the agreement is generally good and certainly within <a href="http://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/abs/ha00700d.html">the published error bounds</a>.
<p>
Zooming in on the recent period:
<p>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1RaJxFM-hSojApMHpsM4FNnkaJ2hzvFCAyjiWjn5xePWdO-jDYSxHbfuUBINAASSHFTjFCFYpbGf6y5_hP9S4VpRLCcDpQfkKS0DfXyGbO5WN6i4t38Fby7Db-W0r_TIyfb2r5N3JjwI/s1600/1980South.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1RaJxFM-hSojApMHpsM4FNnkaJ2hzvFCAyjiWjn5xePWdO-jDYSxHbfuUBINAASSHFTjFCFYpbGf6y5_hP9S4VpRLCcDpQfkKS0DfXyGbO5WN6i4t38Fby7Db-W0r_TIyfb2r5N3JjwI/s1600/1980South.png" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgH_Em25KkgKF4a0xVI3XWo5LeUL_FHOrSqNF9_LH1mocT0ZQk7uiT0OKXdkFx9z4-H177Yz2GdKVF5rWqRPejQeQ_kf4aCAo1VV0-nXerU8Wll_sTlTdp3tYFhvggPQ4Wm0ecWHAFOj_A/s1600/1980North.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgH_Em25KkgKF4a0xVI3XWo5LeUL_FHOrSqNF9_LH1mocT0ZQk7uiT0OKXdkFx9z4-H177Yz2GdKVF5rWqRPejQeQ_kf4aCAo1VV0-nXerU8Wll_sTlTdp3tYFhvggPQ4Wm0ecWHAFOj_A/s1600/1980North.png" /></a></div>
Now we can see the agreement in the northern hemisphere is excellent. In the southern hemisphere agreement is very good. The trend is slightly higher for the ISTI dataset.
<p>
The additional data that ISTI has gathered is most welcome, and this analysis shows that the warming trend in both hemispheres was not due to choosing a particular set of stations for GHCN-M. The much more comprehensive station network of ISTI shows the same trends.</div>
David Joneshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08093928395422918202noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8292370141134809076.post-9325319483563627742014-07-24T23:32:00.000-04:002014-08-06T03:46:04.113-04:00The WMO Commission for Climatology meeting and developments on the WMO front<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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The World Meteorological Organization’s Commission
for Climatology had its four-yearly meeting in Heidelberg, Germany, from 3-8
July, preceded by a Technical Conference from 30 June – 2 July. The Commission
is the central body for climate-related activities in WMO, and has a major role
in establishing international standards and setting international work programs
in the climate field, particularly through setting up networks of Expert Teams
and Task Teams to work on particular issues. Its<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>President (re-elected at the meeting) is Tom
Peterson of NCDC, who will be well-known to many of you. The International
Surface Temperature Initiative was set up as the result of a resolution of the
last Commission for Climatology meeting, in 2010. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-align: justify;">
I made a presentation to the Technical Conference
on the current status of ISTI. By happy coincidence, this presentation was
scheduled for the morning on 1 July, a few hours after the release of the first
version of the ISTI databank. The presentation appeared to be well-received;
there were few direct questions or follow-ups, but the pile of leaflets we
brought describing ISTI (once they got there, after a couple of bonus days
enjoying Berlin with the rest of my luggage) was a lot smaller at the end of
the week than it was at the start. One particular reason for targeting the
Commission audience is that many of the attendees at Commission meetings are
senior managers in their national meteorological services (often the head of
the climate division, or equivalent), and so potentially have more influence
over decisions to make data available to projects such as ISTI than individual
scientists would. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-align: justify;">
Slow progress is also being made in two other areas
of WMO of interest to ISTI. The inclusion of at least some historic climate data
amongst the set of products which countries agree to freely exchange has been a
long-standing goal of ours. The key decisions on this will be made at the full
WMO Congress, which will be held next year, but progress to date (including
through the recent WMO Executive Council meeting) is encouraging. There are
also moves to include the month’s daily data in monthly CLIMAT messages, which
are the principal means of exchanging current climate data through the WMO
system but currently only contain monthly data. This will be very useful for
the ongoing updating of data sets, as it will make daily data available which
can be assumed to be for a full 24-hour day and is likely to have received at
least some quality control (neither of which is necessarily true for the
real-time synoptic reports which are the primary current source of recent daily
and sub-daily data). Considerable technical work remains to be done, though, to
implement this, even once it is formally endorsed.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-align: justify;">
Data rescue and climate database systems continue
to be a high priority of the Commission, with several initiatives outlined at
the meeting. Among them are proposals for an international data rescue portal,
which (among other things) would potentially facilitate crowd-sourced
digitisation. It is, however, an indication of how much work still remains to
be done in many parts of the world that, according to results of a survey
reported at the meeting, 25% of responding countries still stored their
country’s climate data in spreadsheets or flat files, and 40% had a climate
database system which was not fully functioning or not functioning at all. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-align: justify;">
The Commission also agreed to establish a new Task
Team on Homogenisation. The full membership (and chairing) of this group are
not yet clear but I will almost certainly be part of it. This team will be
working closely with ISTI, but will also have a major focus on supporting the
implementation of homogenised data sets which contribute to operational data
products nationally and internationally. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-align: justify;">
Also of interest to ISTI is a new WMO initiative to
formally recognise “centennial stations”, which, as the name implies, are
stations which have existed with few or no changes for 100 years or more.
Countries are to be asked to identify such stations, whose data will clearly be
of considerable value to ISTI, if not already part of our databank. Free access
to data and relevant metadata are among the recommendations for centennial
stations. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-align: justify;">
And one advantage of holding an international
meeting during the World Cup: it provides an instant conversation-starter with
delegates of almost any country. (Perhaps fortunately for the Brazilian
delegation, the meeting finished just before the semi-finals). </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-align: justify;">
<br />
(Update 5 August: the resolution which came out of the WMO Executive Council meeting is available at <!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<a href="https://docs.google.com/a/noaa.gov/file/d/0B8DhC1GSWSmxbUs1c2UtOGZpeEk/edit">https://docs.google.com/a/noaa.gov/file/d/0B8DhC1GSWSmxbUs1c2UtOGZpeEk/edit).</a></div>
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<br /></div>
Blair Trewinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01149841441852181770noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8292370141134809076.post-90270862251222814862014-07-21T05:13:00.000-04:002014-07-21T05:13:08.887-04:00Later talks from SAMSI / IMAGe workshop<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Following up to the previous post there were two further recorded talks at the event.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_jonathan_woody.mp4">http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_jonathan_woody.mp4</a> - Jonathan Woody gave a talk on analyses of snow depth.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_bo_li.mp4">http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_bo_li.mp4</a> - Bo Li provided a talk on model selection in the use of palaeodata analyses.<br />
<br />
We hope to have a meeting report out within a matter of days to weeks. We will post this here.<br />
<br />
Overall there was a lot of active participation and many new directions to be taken in the analysis of surface temperatures. Our thanks go out to both SAMSI and IMAGe for facilitating this meeting and to all the participants for being active. More details to appear soon ... </div>
PeterThornehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02438826461353615177noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8292370141134809076.post-16874893679510224652014-07-11T18:28:00.000-04:002014-07-11T18:28:41.048-04:00Talks from SAMSI / IMAGe workshop on International Surface Temperature Intiative<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
We are currently in-situ in Boulder at a <a href="https://www2.image.ucar.edu/event/summerprog.surfacetemps" target="_blank">workshop</a> organized with <a href="http://www.samsi.info/" target="_blank">SAMSI </a>and <a href="https://www2.image.ucar.edu/" target="_blank">IMAGe</a>. Work is ongoing and a formal write up will follow after completion. Most, but not all, of the talks have been streamed and are available for viewing.<br />
<a href="https://www.blogger.com/goog_1104637799"><br /></a>
<a href="http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_richard_smith.mp4">http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_richard_smith.mp4</a> - Richard Smith provided an overview of the SAMSI program and their expectations for the workshop.<br />
<a href="https://www.blogger.com/goog_1104637801"><br /></a>
<a href="http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_peter_thorne.mp4">http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_peter_thorne.mp4</a> - I provided an overview of the ISTI program and progress to date<br />
<br />
<a href="http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_peter_thorne_jared.mp4">http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_peter_thorne_jared.mp4</a> - I deputized for Jared to provide an overview of the databank process<br />
<a href="https://www.blogger.com/goog_1104637805"><br /></a>
<a href="http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_kate_willet.mp4">http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_kate_willet.mp4</a> - Kate Willett provided an overview of progress with creation of benchmarks and remaining challenges.<br />
<a href="https://www.blogger.com/goog_1104637807"><br /></a>
<a href="http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_lucie_vincent.mp4">http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_lucie_vincent.mp4</a> - Lucie Vincent provided an overview of typical inhomogeneities found in station timeseries and some of their likely causes.<br />
<a href="https://www.blogger.com/goog_1104637809"><br /></a>
<a href="http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_jaxk_reeves.mp4">http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_jaxk_reeves.mp4</a> - Jaxk Reeves provided an overview of at most one changepoint techniques.<br />
<a href="https://www.blogger.com/goog_1104637811"><br /></a>
<a href="http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_colon_gallagher.mp4">http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_colon_gallagher.mp4</a> - Colin Gallagher provided an overview of fitting regression models.<br />
<a href="https://www.blogger.com/goog_1104637813"><br /></a>
<a href="http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_robert_lund.mp4">http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_robert_lund.mp4</a> - Robert Lund provided an overview of multiple changepoint techniques.<br />
<a href="https://www.blogger.com/goog_1104637815"><br /></a>
<a href="http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_enric_aguilar.mp4">http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_enric_aguilar.mp4</a> - Enric Aguilar and <a href="http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_victor_venema.mp4">http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_victor_venema.mp4</a> Victor Venema provided an overview of several state of the art climate homogenization techniques.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_matt_menne.mp4" target="_blank">http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_matt_menne.mp4</a> - Matt Menne provided and overview of the Pairwise Homogenization Algorithm and Bayes Factor Analyses by NCDC and their benchmarking.<br />
<a href="https://www.blogger.com/goog_1104637823"><br /></a>
<a href="http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_peter_thorne2.mp4">http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_peter_thorne2.mp4</a> - I provided an overview of uncertainty quantification in climate datasets.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_colin_morice.mp4">http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_colin_morice.mp4</a> - Colin Morice provided an overview of the HadCRUT4 uncertainty estimation techniques.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_doug_nychka.mp4">http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_doug_nychka.mp4</a> - Doug Nychka provided an overview of spatial statistical aspects.<br />
<a href="https://www.blogger.com/goog_1104637834"><br /></a>
<a href="http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_jeff_whitaker.mp4">http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_jeff_whitaker.mp4</a> - Jeff Whitaker provided an overview of comparisons between surface temperature products and dynamical reanalyses driven solely by observed SSTs and surface pressure measurements.<br />
<a href="https://www.blogger.com/goog_1104637836"><br /></a>
<a href="http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_enric_aguilar2.mp4">http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_enric_aguilar2.mp4</a> - Enric Aguilar gave a talk on problems in some typical data sparse non-N. American / European series.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_finn_lindgren.mp4">http://video.ucar.edu/mms/image/samsi2014_finn_lindgren.mp4</a> - Finn Lindgren provided a talk on spatial statistical aspects.<br />
<br /></div>
PeterThornehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02438826461353615177noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8292370141134809076.post-86171617113189526252014-06-30T10:04:00.000-04:002014-06-30T10:04:26.499-04:00Global Land Surface Databank: Version 1.0.0 Release<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">The International Surface Temperature Initiative is pleased to <span style="line-height: 150%;">release version 1 of a new monthly dataset that brings together new
and existing sources of surface air temperature. Users are provided a way to more
completely track the origin of surface air temperature data from its earliest
available source through its integration into a merged data holding. The data
are provided in various stages that lead to the integrated product. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit; line-height: 150%;">This release is the culmination of three years effort by an
international group of scientists to produce a truly comprehensive, open and
transparent set of fundamental monthly data holdings. The databank has been previously available in beta form, giving the public a chance to provide feedback. We have received numerous comments and have updated many of our sources. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: inherit; line-height: 150%;"></span><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit; line-height: 150%;">This release consists of:</span><br />
<ul>
<li>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;"></span>Over 50 distinct sources, submitted to the databank to date in Stage 0 (hardcopy / image; where
available), Stage 1 (native digital format), and Stage 2 (converted to common
format and with provenance flags).</span></li>
<li><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;"><span style="font-family: inherit; mso-list: Ignore;">All code to convert the Stage 1 holdings to Stage 2.</span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;"><span style="font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: normal;"></span></span></span>A recommended merged product and several
variants which have all been built off the Stage 2 holdings. 2 ASCII formats are provided (ISTI format, GHCN format), along with a CF Compliant netCDF format.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">All code used to process the data merge, along with statistical </span>auxiliary<span style="font-family: inherit;"> files.</span><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;"></span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">Documentation necessary to understand at a high
level the processing of the data, including the location of the manuscript published in <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/gdj3.8/full" target="_blank">Geoscience Data Journal</a>.</span></li>
</ul>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">The entire databank can be found <a href="ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/globaldatabank" target="_blank">here </a>and the merged product is located <a href="ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/globaldatabank/monthly/stage3/" target="_blank">here</a>. Earlier betas are also found <a href="ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/globaldatabank/archive/monthly/stage3/" target="_blank">here</a>. Because the databank is version controlled, we welcome any feedback. We will be providing updates on the blog regarding any new releases. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">For more information, please visit our website: </span><a href="http://www.surfacetemperatures.org/" style="font-family: inherit;">www.surfacetemperatures.org</a></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">General Comment? Please email </span><i style="font-family: inherit;"><b>general.enquiries@surfacetemperatures.org</b></i></li>
</ul>
</div>
<span id="goog_1482629053"></span><span id="goog_1482629054"></span><br />
<div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBABwq7e-o0VDrGUifWhWRKUUsGJ280xmzRvZMaxIDl1vc5-NnqZHYBnRPXI0DV2-sqP5VFjRvRIzRDQMfbz-PUhvXNhroK8oIcTpe1Q1BTr-m7Wp60ww-BYwV6gNaq3Jcqhl_aCP2SFbm/s1600/merged_locations.gif" height="308" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Location of all stations in the recommended version of the Stage Three component of the
databank. The color corresponds to the number of years of data
available for each station. </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9pBgGTSvLLIdCzBKcRdh5iKCik7lc0BfDAqLq2Dj4PhrIqeQmh3Dd5LzxXBiGY2QJ91hm8-yLP_o0C8GKHCr4Ne3pTsbaPAWbdjBDdwpwJFIAR0vDRpaZCK8otZqvd8CbwmF69RZXI_QF/s1600/merged_stations.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9pBgGTSvLLIdCzBKcRdh5iKCik7lc0BfDAqLq2Dj4PhrIqeQmh3Dd5LzxXBiGY2QJ91hm8-yLP_o0C8GKHCr4Ne3pTsbaPAWbdjBDdwpwJFIAR0vDRpaZCK8otZqvd8CbwmF69RZXI_QF/s1600/merged_stations.gif" height="282" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Station count of the recommended merge by year from 1850-2010. Databank stations in red compared to GHCN-M, version 3 in black. </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<br /></div>
</div>
Jared Renniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13451784184430415799noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8292370141134809076.post-16565174084603348232014-06-28T02:28:00.000-04:002014-06-28T02:28:28.520-04:00Understanding the effects of changes in the temperature scale standards through time<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="tr_bq">
Since records of surface temperature started being made
there have been iterations of the fixed points standards used by
national metrological institutes (that is not a typo). Assuming that all
meteorological measurements through time have been made to such
standards (which may be a considerable stretch) this would have imparted
changes to the records that are not physical in origin. As part of <a href="http://www.meteomet.org/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">meteomet</a>
efforts have been made to understand this. It is a relatively small
effect compared to effects of other long recognized data issues. Nevertheless it is important to properly and systematically consider all
sources of potential biases as exhaustively as possible.<br /><br />The work itself was led by Peter Pavlasek of the <a href="http://www.smu.sk/category/44/" target="_blank">Slovak Institute of Metrology</a>. His introduction is reproduced below:</div>
<div class="sites-codeblock sites-codesnippet-block">
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<code>Temperature
is one of the main quantities measured in meteorology and plays a key
role in weather forecasts and climate determination. The instrumental
temperature recordings now spans well over a century, with some records
extending back to the 17th century, and represents an invaluable tool in
evaluating historic climatic trends. However, ensuring the quality of
the data records is challenging, with issues arising from the wide range
of sensors used, how the sensors were calibrated, and how the data was
recorded and written down. In particular, the very definition of the
temperature scales have evolved. While they have always been based on
calibration of instruments via a series of material phase transitions
(fixed points), the evolution of sensors, measuring techniques and
revisions of the fixed points used has introduced differences that may
lead to difficulties when studying historic temperature records. The
conversion program here presented deals with this issue for 20th century
data by implementing a proposed mathematical model to allow the
conversion from historical scales to the currently adopted International
Temperature Scale of 1990 (ITS-90). This program can convert large
files of historical records to the current international temperature
scale, a feature which is intended to help in the harmonisation
processes of long historic series. This work is part of the project
“MeteoMet” funded by the EURAMET, the European association of National
Institutes of Metrology, and is part of a major general effort in
identifying the several sources of uncertainty in climate and
meteorological records.</code></blockquote>
</div>
<br />Michael de Podesta, who has served on the steering committee since ISTI's inception, reviewed the software for ISTI and had the following summary:<br /><blockquote>
<div class="sites-codeblock sites-codesnippet-block">
<code>Assuming
that calibration procedures immediately spread throughout the world –
homogenisation algorithms might conceivably see adjustments in 1968,
with smaller adjustments in 1990.</code><br /><code> </code><br /><code>If
undetected, the effect would be to create a bias in the temperature
record. This is difficult to calculate since the bias is temperature
dependent, but if the mean land-surface temperature is ~10°C and if
temperature excursions are typically ±10 °C then one might expect that
the effect to be that records prior to 1968 were systematically
overestimated by about 0.005 °C, and records between 1968 and 1990 by
about 0.003 °C.</code></div>
</blockquote>
<br />Michael's full summary which includes some graphical and tabular summaries can be found <a href="https://sites.google.com/a/surfacetemperatures.org/home/software-and-resources/Summary%20of%20T%20to%20T90.pdf?attredirects=0&d=1" target="_blank">here</a>.<br /><br />The code package is a windows operating system based package. It is available <a href="https://sites.google.com/a/surfacetemperatures.org/home/software-and-resources/ToITS_90_v2.3_Install.rar?attredirects=0&d=1" target="_blank">here</a>.</div>
PeterThornehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02438826461353615177noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8292370141134809076.post-77579167827536506332014-06-04T02:32:00.001-04:002014-06-04T02:32:37.419-04:00Paper describing benchmarking concepts in OA review<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Just briefly to note that a discussion paper is now open for comment authored by the members of the benchmarking working group. This paper discusses the concepts and frameworks that will underpin all aspects of the benchmarking and assessment exercise. Its open to review until July 30th. Please do, if you have time and inclination, pop along and have a read and provide a constructive (!) review. The discussion site is at <a href="http://www.geosci-instrum-method-data-syst-discuss.net/4/235/2014/gid-4-235-2014.html">http://www.geosci-instrum-method-data-syst-discuss.net/4/235/2014/gid-4-235-2014.html</a> .<br />
<br />
Also, watch this space at the end of this month for exciting developments on the first pillar of the ISTI framework - the databank.<br />
<br />
Finally, we are rapidly hurtling towards the <a href="https://www2.image.ucar.edu/event/summerprog.surfacetemps" target="_blank">SAMSI/IMAGe/ISTI workshop</a> on surface temperatures and their analyses. Its going to be a busy few weeks so expect this blog to be somewhat less moribund than of late ...</div>
PeterThornehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02438826461353615177noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8292370141134809076.post-50490643620244213582014-04-04T13:15:00.000-04:002014-04-04T13:15:08.982-04:00The 2014 Earthtemp network workshop 23rd-25th June, KIT, Germany<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<i>Posted on behalf <a href="https://twitter.com/Rosie_Graves" target="_blank">Rosie Graves</a> and Karen Veal</i><br />
<br />
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<span lang="EN-GB">The <a href="http://www.earthtemp.net/">EarthTemp
Network</a> aims to stimulate new international collaboration in measuring and
understanding the surface temperatures of Earth. Motivated by the need for
better understanding of how different types of measurements relate, including
both in situ and satellite observations the network is international but funded
by the <a href="http://www.nerc.ac.uk/">UK’s Natural Environment Research
Council.</a></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The 2014 meeting will bring together about
60 researchers from all over the world who specialise in different types of
measurement of surface temperature. The meeting will be specifically designed
to review the latest science of surface temperatures for Africa, identify
future developments, and, importantly facilitate new connections and
collaborations between researchers who may not normally meet. Therefore, the
programme emphasizes activities that actively increase networking and
interaction between the participants and that enable structured discussions
towards the goal of identifying key research opportunities. A preliminary
programme can be found at the <a href="http://www.earthtemp.net/">EarthTemp
Network website</a>, follow the links to the ‘Annual themes and workshop’ link
on the left hand side.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The meeting will be held on the 23-25<sup>th</sup>
June 2014 at The Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Karlsruhe, Germany. Registration
is free and lunch will be provided each day of the meeting, with a dinner on
the Tuesday evening also included. If you are interested in attending this
meeting please go to the to the EarthTemp webpage and follow links to the
Annual themes and workshop<a href="https://www.blogger.com/null" name="_GoBack"></a>. As places are limited we
strongly encourage you to act quickly.</span></div>
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">The workshop will be immediately followed by the GlobTemperature 2nd
user consultation meeting in the same location, on the 25-26<sup>th</sup> June.
GlobTemperature is a European Space Agency funded project to support the land
surface temperature (LST) community to develop products and access mechanisms
better suited to users. Participants at the EarthTemp workshop are very welcome
to attend this meeting. More details can be found on the <a href="http://www.globtemperature.info/">GlobTemperature website</a>. </span>
</div>
PeterThornehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02438826461353615177noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8292370141134809076.post-23199881541578412922014-02-06T07:21:00.000-05:002014-02-06T14:03:30.254-05:00Workshop on novel approaches to homogenization, Boulder, July 2014<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
We have long recognized that the enabling framework aspects of the Initiative (databank, benchmarks, data serving) are but one aspect of the problem. What is needed in addition are new approaches to the data homogenization so that we can better understand the data and their uncertainties. This is not something the Initiative can mandate nor something that the 10 cents coin I found following exhaustive searching down the back of my sofa will get us very far in funding. So, we have been and continue to pursue novel means to increase the number of independent groups and individuals undertaking the analysis of the data.<br />
<br />
As one such activity, the Initiative put forward a proposal for a <a href="http://www.samsi.info/" target="_blank">SAMSI</a> (Statistical and Applied Mathematical Sciences Institute) summer program activity - which got selected. Over the past few months we have been working with colleagues from SAMSI and <a href="https://www2.image.ucar.edu/" target="_blank">NCAR IMAGe</a> (Institute for Mathematics Applied to Geosciences) who joined as substantive co-sponsors to arrange the meeting logistics. We are now in a position to announce the workshop.<br />
<br />
So, without further ado ...<br />
<br />
Applications are invited for participation in a workshop to be held in Boulder, Colorado July 8th-16th. The aim of the workshop is to develop new and novel techniques for the homogenisation of land surface air temperature data holdings. The workshop participants will have access to the almost 32,000 stations held in the first version databank release (which will be publicly available by then) and also to several of the benchmark datasets. The workshop will mainly be practically based - with few talks and lots of coding and discussions either in plenary or in smaller breakout groups. A final agenda will be forthcoming nearer the time.<br />
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Applications are welcome from all. The final meeting is space limited to 44 people. Participants from non-traditional backgrounds, early career scientists and members of under-represented groups are particularly encouraged to apply.<br />
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Further meeting details and application form are availble at <a href="https://www2.image.ucar.edu/event/summerprog.surfacetemps">https://www2.image.ucar.edu/event/summerprog.surfacetemps</a></div>
PeterThornehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02438826461353615177noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8292370141134809076.post-69317527772042039112014-01-29T02:54:00.001-05:002014-01-29T02:54:32.829-05:00Initiative progress report published<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
The overarching initiative progress report has now been published and is available <a href="https://sites.google.com/a/surfacetemperatures.org/home/progress_reports/ISTI_progress_2014_final.pdf?attredirects=0&d=1" target="_blank">here</a>. This will now be sent to initiative sponsors for their feedback but feedback here is also welcome.<br />
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The coming year promises an upward shift in apparent momentum as a result of significant work over the past three years with the release of databank holdings and benchmarks and an exciting workshop to be held in the summer - for more details on the latter watch this space in a few days time.<br />
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We will also continue to work with partner activities to further mutual aims.</div>
PeterThornehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02438826461353615177noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8292370141134809076.post-69372911617272495082014-01-16T08:02:00.002-05:002014-01-16T08:02:36.899-05:00All participants meeting Jan 2014<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Early in January a meeting of all groups involved in the initiative was held to discuss progress to date and future plans. The minutes from this meeting can be found <a href="https://sites.google.com/a/surfacetemperatures.org/home/steering-committee/%C2%A0ISTI_all_hands_call_Jan2014.pdf?attredirects=0&d=1" target="_blank">here</a>. The annual progress reports were discussed (more on this at months end). Also, new terms of reference were adopted for all groups (see the group pages at <a href="http://www.surfacetemperatures.org/" target="_blank">surfacetemperatures.org</a>). The coming year promises many new, exciting, developments. Amongst others we expect to see:<br />
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li>Release of the version 1 databank which will consist of c.32,000 stations</li>
<li>Development and release of benchmarks</li>
<li>A workshop held jointly with SAMSI and NCAR on developing novel approaches to dataset homogenization</li>
</ul>
We will endeavour to announce major advances through this blog.</div>
PeterThornehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02438826461353615177noreply@blogger.com0