Blogger forces Nasa to admit global warming figures error
   From The Times
   August 17, 2007

   Lewis Smith, Environment Reporter

   Nasa  officials  have admitted that for the past seven years they have
   used the wrong temperature statistics to assess global warming trends.

   The  mistake was spotted by a blogger, and forced Nasa to declare that
   last  year  was  only  the fourth-hottest year on record in the United
   States, rather than the third hottest.

   Climate scientists were insistent yesterday that the flawed data had a
   negligible effect on global warming statistics, and none at all on the
   overall warming trend.

   The   figures  related  to  temperature  readings  in  the  US,  which
   scientists  at  the  Nasa  Goddard  Institute  of  Space  Science  had
   neglected  to adjust to be compatible with other readings. The changes
   meant  that,  on average, Nasa's figures on US temperatures since 2000
   had been too high by up to 0.15C (0.27F).

   The  error in the data was seized upon by global warming sceptics, who
   regarded  it as a perfect example of why climate change science should
   be doubted.

   James  Hansen,  the director of the Goddard Institute, maintained that
   while  the  flawed  data  had skewed figures "noticeably" for the past
   seven  years, the corrected figures left evidence of long-term warming
   intact.

   Other  scientists  hit back at global warming sceptics by pointing out
   that  the  error  applied to only 48 states of the US, with Alaska and
   Hawaii excluded, and was negligible in its impact.

   Moreover,  they argued, it had no impact at all on the rankings of the
   hottest  years  when  looked  at globally rather than in the US, which
   accounts for only 2 per cent of the Earth's surface.

   David  Parker,  of the Met Office Hadley Centre, said of the effect on
   global averages: "The effect is so small that you couldn't see it on a
   graph.  They  were of the order of a thousandth of a degree. It really
   has no impact."

   Further  adjustments  were  made to the US data this year to take into
   account  new  information  and new interpretations of how it should be
   adjusted. This meant that 1934 took over from 1998 as the hottest year
   on record in the US, and 1921 moved into third place above 2006.

   Reto  Ruedy,  of  the  Goddard  Institute,  said  that the differences
   between  1934  and  1998  were  so slight that it was likely that they
   would swap positions again as information is analysed anew. 

   Paul Simons, Times Weatherman, writes: 

   There  is  nothing  unique  to  the US about this. We have had to make
   exactly  the  same  adjustment  in  the  UK. For instance, the weather
   station  at  Kew  Gardens  was  once  a rural idyll, but is now firmly
   planted in the heat of West London.

   The  temperature  adjustments  that  have been made to the US data are
   almost  insignificant  for  the  global  temperature  records.  The US
   adjustments  amount  to  0.15  per cent of yearly average temperatures
   over the past six years. But the US land surface is only 2 per cent of
   the world land area, so the effect on global records is negligible.

   But  global  warming  is  real  and  it  is definitely happening - the
   Earth's  temperature this July was the seventh warmest July on record,
   June  was  the  third  warmest  and  January and April were the second
   hottest for the first six months of the year across the globe.