Massive Temperature Adjustments At Luling, Texas
By Paul Homewood
As most will be aware, Steve Goddard has been running a series of posts about the large and unexplained adjustments being made to the US temperature record by NOAA.
For instance, his latest post is here.
So, I thought it might be worth looking in more detail at a few stations, to see what is going on. In Steve’s post, mentioned above, he links to the USHCN Final dataset for monthly temperatures, making the point that approx 40% of these monthly readings are “estimated”, as there is no raw data.
From this dataset, I picked the one at the top of the list, (which appears to be totally random), Station number 415429, which is Luling, Texas.
http://cdiac.ornl.gov/ftp/ushcn_v2.5_monthly/monthly
(The file can be opened by Zip File).
Taking last year as an example, we can see that ten of the twelve months are tagged as “E”, i.e estimated. It is understandable that a station might be a month, or even two, late in reporting, but it is not conceivable that readings from last year are late. (The other two months, Jan/Feb are marked “a”, indicating missing days).
But, the mystery thickens. Each state produces a monthly and annual State Climatological Report, which among other things includes a list of monthly mean temperatures by station. If we look at the 2013 annual report for Texas, we can see these monthly temperatures for Luling.
(The table is split into two, to make it readable).
Where an “M” appears after the temperature, this indicates some days are missing, i.e Jan, Feb, Oct and Nov. (Detailed daily data shows just one missing day’s minimum temperature for each of these months).
Yet, according to the USHCN dataset, all ten months from March to December are “Estimated”. Why, when there is full data available?
But it gets worse. The table below compares the actual station data with what USHCN describe as “the bias-adjusted temperature”. The results are shocking.
| Actual F |
Actual C |
Bias Adjusted C |
Diff | |
| Jan 2013 | 50.3 | 10.17 | 10.79 | 0.62 |
| Feb | 54.2 | 12.33 | 13.48 | 1.15 |
| Mar | 58.1 | 14.50 | 15.33 | 0.83 |
| Apr | 63.4 | 17.44 | 18.30 | 0.86 |
| May | 70.7 | 21.50 | 22.64 | 1.14 |
| Jun | 80.2 | 26.78 | 27.52 | 0.74 |
| Jul | 79.7 | 26.50 | 28.46 | 1.96 |
| Aug | 81.9 | 27.72 | 29.23 | 1.51 |
| Sep | 76.1 | 24.50 | 25.99 | 1.49 |
| Oct | 63.6 | 17.56 | 20.51 | 2.95 |
| Nov | 51.6 | 10.89 | 13.09 | 2.20 |
| Dec | 46.1 | 7.83 | 8.86 | 1.03 |
| Annual 2013 | 64.7 | 18.17 | 19.52 | 1.35 |
| Annual 1934 | 70.9 | 21.61 | 20.72 | -0.91 |
In other words, the adjustments have added an astonishing 1.35C to the annual temperature for 2013. Note also that I have included the same figures for 1934, which show that the adjustment has reduced temperatures that year by 0.91C. So, the net effect of the adjustments between 1934 and 2013 has been to add 2.26C of warming.
Note as well, that the largest adjustments are for the estimated months of March – December. This is something that Steve Goddard has been emphasising.
The figures for 1934 are below.
(Again, note that eleven out of twelve months are estimated for 1934, yet the State Climatological Report indicates there is data for every month. (See page 101 of the report).
How accurate are the State Climatological Reports? Well, they tally exactly with the Monthly Station Reports of daily data, for instance March 2013, (which you will recall has been estimated by USHCN).
So what possible justification can USHCN have for making such large adjustments? Their usual answer is TOBS, or Time of Observation Bias, which arises because temperatures are now monitored in the early morning rather than the late afternoon, which tended to be the practice before. But by their own admittance, TOBS adjustments should only account for about 0.2C.
What about station location? Has this changed? Well, not since 1949 according to the official Station Metadata.
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/homr/#ncdcstnid=20024457&tab=LOCATIONS
Luling is a small town of about 5000 people, and the station is situated at the Foundation Farm, 0.7 miles outside town. In other words, a fairly rural site, that should not need adjusting for urban influences.
It is plain that these adjustments made are not justifiable in any way. It is also clear that the number of “Estimated” measurements made are not justified either, as the real data is there, present and correct.
Luling is only one case. But, coming at the top of the list, as it does, it is inconceivable that this is a rogue sample. If it is, though, it should be easy enough for USHCN to check and correct.
Whenever the question of adjustments comes up, there is usually a lot of arm waving, and talk of TOBS, station mix and so on. This manages to divert attention from what is going on, as these things cannot be easily quantified, or challenged. We are told, in effect, to “trust the computer”.
Well, we now have a specific example here with Luling, which cannot be so easily explained away.
Could it be that this rural station is being homogenised to match nearby urban stations? Or is something else to blame?
I don’t know, but what I do know is that the time for arm waving is past, and we deserve serious answers.
Trackbacks
- Dear Climate Change Deniers by ThunderDawg - Page 118 - TribalWar Forums
- Luling, Texas weather station | Deadal Earth
- Skeptical of skeptics: is Steve Goddard right? | Climate Etc.
- The scientific method is at work on the USHCN temperature data set | Watts Up With That?
- For Crickham- Critique of GISS Urbanization Adjustments - Page 5 - US Message Board - Political Discussion Forum
- NOAA’s temperature control knob for the past, the present, and maybe the future – July 1936 now hottest month again | Watts Up With That?
- What is happening with USHCN temperature data? | The right-wing liberal
- What is happening with USHCN temperature data? | Virginia Virtucon
- Stevengoddardista, oikaisuista, virheistä ja zombeista | Roskasaitti
Comments are closed.
NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT 
Very interesting. Thanks Paul.
We will not get them until ice covers the capitals and the hoax has been played out.
I tend to agree: having spent my career in for-profit industry, where you’d think the “truth” matters more than in government, I’ve learned posturing and position are far, far more important than good practice. Humans or at least the alphas who create and run things, are driven by personality and passion – about themselves – not doing the right thing at the right time for the right result. “My thing, my way, my timing” is the unstated mission statement. Some old-style leaders’ “things” involved the right thing etc., but the content is not so important in general as the appearance. Form, not substance makes people sleep well at night (until, of course, the lack of substance causes the form to fall down, at which point the hero becomes the goat, but it’s all somebody else’s fault anyway, and who cares because I became rich and independent in the process and you didn’t).
Colour me cynical but I agree that egregious errors will not be admitted. It takes the next generation and a bold one to say that Stalin was a monster.
Paul, you’re like sane, articulate,eloquent version of Goddard.
Keep it up. This sort of post in its elegance and simplicity is much much powerful than Goddard. Its simple basic Maths.
Great job Paul, confirms our worst suspicions.
“I don’t know, but what I do know is that the time for arm waving is past, and we deserve serious answers.”
Well, first question is, have you asked the people who produce this data to answer your question if this is worth a serious answer ?
Without that, trying to get information from source, your blog post actually is just the equivalent of arm waving I am afraid.
Keep us posted how you get on.
Andy
“Without that, trying to get information from source, your blog post actually is just the equivalent of arm waving I am afraid.”
BS. HE HAS DATA.
Next job!!
” have you asked the people who produce this data to answer your question if this is worth a serious answer ?”
I can tell you the answer right now, if one is given at all: They are experts and the question doesn’t deserve an answer because we cannot possibly understand what they are doing and this question isn’t worthy of their time.
But why do we have to ask authority if questions are worthy anyway? Who the bleep are they to say? This is something a middle school aged child should be able to handle properly and transparently in a science class assignment. The fact that it had to be ‘discovered’ says this authority is at best incompetent.
They are violating principles of science that are or at least used to be taught in grade school. I expect better from a junior high school science project. There is no acceptable reason for it. None. This should never be done in science. Altering data makes it not science, it turns it into politics.
Second answer.
I have in the past asked similar questions, and received “Yes, we’ll get get back to you” answers, but they never do.
The simple fact is that the responsibility is on them to provide answers, and not on us to prove them wrong. When they keep on failing to answer, I think we can all guess the reason.
Third answer – the information I have provided is DIRECTLY FROM SOURCE. If USHCN cannot explain how they get from “ACTUAL DATA” to “ESTIMATED DATA” , then that is their problem , and not mine.
All I can do is highlight the issues, it needs a lot more publicity and pressure from others if we are to get to the bottom of this.
Fourth answer – If there is an easy answer to my query, it should not take 10 minutes for Gavin, Zeke or one of the others to provide a very simple explanation. Steve Goddard has already reposted this article, and since they have responded in arm waving fashion to his previous posts, I assume they will easily refute what I have said. So I challenge them – explain these massive adjustments at Luling.
If they fail to, I would ask you why not.
Keep it up
Excellent work Paul.
I understand from blog comments, that this may have happened elsewhere (Australia), and that US agency have done adjustments to their records from other countries e.g. Iceland.
Can anyone answer two basic questions –
Can we be sure that such adjustment have not happen in Britain as well?
In any country, what safeguards are there to ensure that if such adjustments are made they are fully documented with records of the raw and adjusted data?
How much money does a Green billionaire and subsidy recipient have to pay to a station operator or data collector drone to get the results he needs to collect more subsidies for fighting Global Warming?
If he’s a billionaire, why would he want or need subsidies? And, I assume he’s a pretty old billionaire. Wink. Wink. Nod. Nod.
To the super rich, there is no such thing as too much money. They collect it like you collect postage stamps. So anytime some idiot says they will give them money for nothing, they take it.
Good snooping there Paul.
Here is a photo of the MMTS at Luling, it is not badly sited:
I do note thought that there have been five station locations in Luling, so it might be that the NOAA algorithm is flagging these as needing adjustments. I admit its strange.
I have a direct line to John Nielsen-Gammon, who is the state climatologist of Texas. I’ll ask him why this discrepancy exists. This “may” have something to do with the recent shift to climate division reporting, but even so, it is nonsensical.
This is very good work and very illuminating. I posted a link to this post in the latest thread at WUWT as this material is very much on topic to the latest post there.
Thanks for the effort.
I should add that this is a different issue than what Goddard has been claiming about missing data. He’s saying 40% of the data is missing, you show that data is there but is flagged as estimated.
This whole thing may boil down to something as simple as a screwed up algorithm that is flagging data wrongly, even though it is there.
And I agree with “JustAnotherPoster” above. Much more powerful than arm waving. That’s why I’m sending it to John N-G. He is known as a straight shooter, so I expect he’ll provide an answer, and if HE can’t he’ll go up the food chain until he finds one.
Anthony…. Time and time again the result is the same… In fact Adjusted Data always cools the past while warming the present…
What more do we need to know?? That’s the trend.
No Anthony, Goddard has shown that 40% of the REPORTED data is estimated and not raw (i.e. observed) data. It would help if you would actually read what he has said and respond to the actual issues raised and not create strawmen of your own making.
Anthony, I have enjoyed your blog WUWT much over the years but with this attack on Goddard, you have taken the gloss off my, and many others, enjoyment … forever now I will question your motives which goes to your credibility. For what it is worth, Goddard has done a bloody good job in exposing the ‘data’ for what it is … garbage. The only ‘data’ is actual recordings, if it is not there and is ‘constructed’ from other recordings then it is fabricated data, “estimated” … if real data is manipulated by way of unexplained algorithms then it is ‘manipulated data’. In-filling missing data with unexplained fabricated records as “estimated” is not data recording and should not form part of the record.
“He’s saying 40% of the data is missing, you show that data is there but is flagged as estimated.
BS, if it is “estimated” then it is not original data, it is fabricated data … the data is missing, full stop!
Skeptics should question each other’s work. That is how science is meant to be.
Lord knows the politically-correct warmists don’t question each other’s work.
The work of Anthony Watts, Steven Goddard(Tony Heller), and a handful of others is the only reason the politically-correct warmists have not been able to completely obliterate the competing ideas.
Giving up or “taking the gloss off” your enjoyment of their work would be a terrible mistake.
Instead, you should celebrate their willingness to engage in such battles, and stick to their guns.
And another thing, NOAA has had plenty of time respond to the accusations by Goddard but has not … why? Do you think that just because you are now asking a question that they will provide answers? If they don’t provide thoroughly credible answers then you owe Godard and the rest of the sceptic community an apology. Unthinkingly, you have damaged the broad skeptic community.
Sorry but Goddard’s association with other crackpot theories (EX – birther)posted on his blog make his credibility appear more questionable.
Goddard is a birther? Since when?
“Unthinkingly, you have damaged the broad skeptic community.”
I don’t think AW does anything without thinking about it. But you are correct about the damage done.
Well, aren’t you just the good little Alinksyite. Attempting to discredit Goddard’s credibility in doing basic math by saying he is “associated” with an irrelevant matter is pure ad hominem. Nice try, though.
And for the record: Goddard has never claimed to be a Birther. He merely pointed out that, at some point in his past, Obama willingly let a publisher claim that he was from Kenya. Goddard’s point in doing so was not to assert that Obama was in fact born in Kenya, but rather to assert that Obama is an opportunist and a liar.
“Sorry but Goddard’s association with other crackpot theories (EX – birther)”
Goddard has shown pretty convincingly that Obama preferred to be introduced as a Kenyan in multiple different occasions right up until he decided to be the president.
I have not seen Goddard claim that Obama was actually a kenyan. He has just revealed the double standard of Obama claiming to be a kenyan for decades and when this became inconvenient it was suddenly “an outlandish conspiracy theory” to think he is one.
I think Obama claimed to be a kenyan just so people would not think he was from “the hood”, with all the negative stereotypes associated with it.
I once read series emails, most certainly one from Climate Gate.
Michael Mann had heard that Jerry North from Texas A&M was working on a non-hockey stick proxy. In the emails Mann told North that he had heard that North was working on a non-hockey stick proxy and North virtually slobbered all over himself in, saying in effect (with a lot of paraphrasing) No, No, I would never do that, you know I would never do that.
What has recently happened between Goddard and Watts has enhanced the broad skeptic community, not damaged it.
And, yes, because Anthony may finally be on board with this issue, the government is definitely under more pressure to provide an answer. And now there is more power behind determining the correctness of their answers. I suspect that the entire skeptic community will want to know the effect of this revelation and will be determined to make sure the government gets it right.
Anthony as already said “Goddard was right”. Anthony has already said he will be having a healthy portion of crow with this.
I am not taking up for Anthony Watts. I have never met the man.
I do, however, know Tony Heller on a personal basis. He is brilliant, and edgy and fearless and has a thick skin. All qualities that he will need if he chooses to stay in the ring.
We are extremely fortunate to have people like Tony Heller and Anthony Watts, and we need them both.
I don’t think we’re supposed to call them broads anymore.
This is a straw man.
What Goddard is saying, using simplified numbers: the reporting includes 1000 data points from 2013. Of those 1000 data points, 654 of them represent actual data from a station, and 346 of them are estimated.
This is fact, and not challenged (unless some raw data from 2013 are lost in the mail, or on Lois Lerner’s hard drive). The other numbers Goddard reports for prior years are equally factual, and not challenged.
The “over 40%” number comes from year-to-date reporting for 2014, which, again using simplified numbers, means that of 1000 data points reported for 2014, 580 of them represent actual data from a station, and 420 of them are estimated.
The current data may or may not include a significant amount of measured-but-not-yet-received, actual data. You can claim that the final reported totals for 2014 will be less than 40, but such a claim has no bearing on the reported data for prior years, up to and including 2013. You can argue that “estimated” is not the same thing as “fabricated”; but that would be a semantic argument that fails to address the issue Goddard is presenting.
Something so simple as keeping temperature data in MODERN TIMES is not astonishing, it is criminal. Stupid, even.
We have sophisticated computer systems that can probe deep space yet we can’t devise a simple system that tracks temperature, much less, weather???
Insane.
Billions and billions and billions has been spent on the global warming business and NOT ONE PENNY has gone into establishing a sane, systematic, well run temperature system in the USA.
Disgusting.
I looked into this. The BEST analysis is here.
It seems that there was a station move in May 2011, and an almost immediate drop in temperature relative to the regional average of over 1°C. It looks like the USHCN algorithm is using the regional average until it can get a handle on the effect of the move. So of course the “adjustment” looks large.
Nick
The Station Metadata suggests a move of about 100 yds in 2011, with no change at all in altitude.
But the notes say
CHANGE ST INFO LAT/LON GOOGLE EARTH USED FOR UPDATE. NO EQUIPMENT MOVED. CHANGED DRIVING DIRECTIONS.
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/homr/#ncdcstnid=20024457&tab=LOCATIONS
Paul, hi …
it most probably has never moved in all those years …
the different LAT/LON positions are, imho, at first slightly different calculations by different surveys/surveyors, and since the advent of Garmin, slightly diffrent positions by different gps’s …
BEST “regional average” is a fiction.
One does not deduce the instance from the average…you get the average from the instances.
Excellent work, Paul.
How do they get average temperatures to two decimal places when the data are no decimal places or tenths?
“How do they get average temperatures to two decimal places when the data are no decimal places or tenths?”
– – –
They’re better than the data.
Paul, did you notice in the USHCN file for Luling that there were other batches of records with E against them?
1943-45 (Wartime)
1950-52
1973-74
1978-81
Paul, seeing the Luling data I thought I would at a few more, take a look at the very next USHCN stations starting with
415618 showing Es for
1899-1909
1932-37
1952-53
1983-84
2007-8
and the next 415707
1901-31 (30 years)
2001-2004
and 415869
1893-1904
1913-1914
1949-51
1978
1988
2003-current
and 415875
1893-1905
1922-24
1944-47
1958-59
1984-86
2005-current
As Steve says they are doing an aweful lot of “Estmation”.
There was an equipment issue with the Luling MMTS. For 2013, and perhaps earlier, it was reading much colder than a well-sited station 5 miles away (in many instances, high temperature differences on sunny, well-mixed days were 8-12 degrees). The system was repaired and sensor replaced in early 2014 and the cold bias disappeared. NCDC was made aware of the problem and these adjustments may have been made in response to that, at least for 2013.
Thanks
Checking the latest figures for May, it seems to be all back to normal.
There is no mention on NOAA’s metadata of this. Would you expect this to be registered?
Thanks
Paul
Repairs are only noted on an inspection report for management use, which isn’t public. Unfortunately, there’s no way for others to see what actions are taken at a COOP station unless equipment is moved or replaced, which causes the B-44 to be updated (the notes visible on NCDC come from the comments section of the B-44).
So repairs that change the readings are not captured on anything that the users of the data could read to help understand the data better? That doesn’t sound good.
Having been involved in my fair share of testing, calibration of the instrumentation is a critical step – and anything that affects the readings (instrumentation calibration/creep, etc) are clearly identified in the data. Not sure how you could ever make sense of the readings when this information isn’t clearly identified.
mesoman permalink
June 27, 2014 3:38 pm
Perhaps you should read Paul’s later post, there is no mention of any “Repairs” for that site.
I’m the one who noticed the problem and made the repairs.
Not buying.
The report of the observations above makes it easy to compare the daily temps with those measured at San Marcos Airport .
http://www.friendlyforecast.com/usa/archive/archive.php?region=TX&id=286791&?-Forecast-Luling-Texas&date=20130320000000&sort=hour
The highs match up just fine. The lows look lower in luling.
So, I am not buying this “bad wire” story, at all.
Perhaps I can rephrase my comment.
I believe mesoman when he says he is the station guy there.
I believe him when he says he found a bad cable and replaced it.
I do not believe that the bad cable has anything to do with this thread, nor do I believe that the bad cable, replaced in early 2014, has any bearing on any of the 2013 observations unless he can show us the bad raw observations. And even so I do not believe that the cable was bad in March, so someone would have to figure out when this cable was damaged and what months, weeks, or mere days ( Mesoman sounding pretty thorough)
were giving bad readings. It doesn’t sound like paul found any evidence of such.
So in general, nice try, not buying.
I should start out by stating that I’m not here to make excuses for NCDC. My job is to make sure the equipment is working like it should; once the data leaves my office it’s out of my hands. I’m not sure where you’re finding your data, but I’m looking directly in WxCoder (where observers enter their data), and there is a clear cold bias between Luling and San Marcos in March. Just during the first week, there are some major differences–one example, on the 2nd, shows San Marcos hi/low as 78/37, while Luling is 62/29. Those sites aren’t far away from each other and shouldn’t be showing that big of a difference, and there are other occurrences in the month.
Another example that indicates a problem is July 2013, which had lows in the 50s at Luling for the first 3 days of the month–lows in the 50s, in South Texas, in July–very very unlikely. On those dates, my station and San Marcos were in the mid-upper 60s. In July alone, there were several days where Luling had highs in the low-mid 90s, while my site and San Marcos were at 100-101.
Another example: In August, during one of our bad drought-related heatwaves, Luling reported 6 highs at or above 100. My station 5 miles away had 16, and San Marcos had 17. There’s no reason, other than bad equipment, for something like that to occur.
Also, check out Nick Stokes’s maps that show Luling sticking out like a sore thumb.
So, just as a matter of personal/professional curiosity: do you mind if I ask about the repair/correction made?
I’ve got a little bit of experience with various temperature-measurement instruments (thermocouples, RTDs, etc.). IMX, when you get a faulty wire, normally the reading goes OPEN; a false-low reading is usually a matter of re-calibration, rather than reattaching a faulty wire. So, I’m not challenging you; I’m just curious what kind of instrument it is, and what the repair was.
Reblogged this on Tallbloke's Talkshop and commented:
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Ohhh. Dear. Paul homewood finds the same sort of Shenanigans going on in Texas as Roger Andrews found in Australia. Several degrees added to temperature records…
Frankly I am thoroughly disappointed with Anthony. His comment here is the second time he has denigrated Goddard’s work while failing completely to understand it.
Anthony, get your head in gear and read more carefully what Goddard is saying. You should have been leading this with all yours and your team’s experience of surface stations.
mesoman permalink June 27, 2014 7:15 pm I’m the one who noticed the problem and made the repairs.
mesoman, it looks like the USHCN network needs your invaluable help in Texas.
You may have noted my post at
June 27, 2014 3:28 pm which modified looks like this
Paul, seeing the Luling data I thought I would at a few more, take a look at the very next USHCN stations starting with
415618 showing Es for
415707
1901-31 (30 years)
2001-2004
and 415869
2003-current
and 415875
2005-current
Now I don’t expect you to do anything about the 30 years between 1901 & 1931 but they certainly need help with 415869 with estimates for 2003-current and 415875 2005-current.
Prove to the world, that, in fact, 415429 is “I picked the one at the top of the list, (which appears to be totally random)”
What “Final” list? Exactly?
http://stevengoddard.wordpress.com/2014/06/26/it-gets-more-bizarre-by-the-hour/#comment-376700
The lists I see are by state than location within each respective state.
http://cdiac.ornl.gov/ftp/ushcn_v2.5_monthly/
ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/ushcn/v2.5/
415429 is not at “the top” either of the above two sites. That’s for sure!
But nice cherry pick and nice lying. 😦
Typical denier BS.
This is the quality of retort to which your side has been reduced? Your side has been hoisted on their own petard colluding the hide the decline, and you can only question the randomness of selection of a given station?
Wow, I didn’t realize how thoroughly we’ve already won.
Let’s see, I need to adjust a single station’s data by between 1 and 2 degrees C. But I claim to know the accuracy of resulting monthly data to a tenth of a degree. Then I mash this up with hundreds/thousands of stations around CONUS and the rest of the world (with data of no better quality) and then claim to know the world’s temperature to a hundredth of a degree. Sure, you bet, sounds like great science to me.
This is only correct for the US annual average, not for an individual station’s monthly average.
For individual stations the TOB between 7 a.m. and 5 p.m. reading can be as large as 2°C in the monthly average. See e.g. Karl, Thomas R., et. al, J. Climate Appl. Meteor., 25, 145–160 (1986), figure 4. The TOB shows large spacial and temporal variation. TOB happens to be quite strong in Texas.
If these conspiracy theories are correct, data diddling for funds, how did the state of Texas, or anyone else, benefit from this collusion.