Climate Reason - The Little Ice Age Thermometers
A study of Climatic Variability from 1660-2009
http://climatereason.com/LittleIceAgeThermometers/
Introduction
The Little Ice Age Thermometers project is an attempt to compile instrumental readings from 1660 that predate the era of modern ‘global temperatures’ as recorded by Hadley (1850) and Giss (1880).
It demonstrates that climate variability prior to the modern era is much greater than officially recognised, and that global records are measured from troughs of the little ice age and should therefore cause no surprise when they subsequently rise. Context to past temperatures that predate instrumental records can be found by examining the various articles within this web site regarding the warmer MWP and Roman warm optimum and the world wide impacts of these- and other- warm and cold events.
Modern warming -where it exists- often appears to be an artefact of the way temperatures are compiled, or represent very real warming caused locally by the Urban Heat Island effect (see article) UHI is poorly calculated in correction factors used in the global temperature datasets although they themselves are a reflection of the dramatic urbanisation of the world during the past fifty years.
This web site therefore exists primarily as the means to examine historic aspects of climate change in the belief this will help to put the modern era into context as merely a continuation of what has occurred in the past.
This page links to articles by Tony Brown and other commentators, as well as highlighting a variety of related web sites. Although never intended as a blog, your enquiries, comments or suggestions for links to additional relevant sites/articles are welcomed by Information on the location of historic temperature data sets is particularly welcomed.
Articles
Article: History and reliability of global temperature records. Author: Tony Brown
This article (part 1 of a series of three) examines the period around 1850/80 when Global temperatures commence, and looks at the long history of reliable observations and records prior to the development of instrumental readings.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/11/14/little-ice-age-thermometers-%e2%80%93-history-and-reliability/
Article: Three long temperature records in USA. Author: Tony Brown
This article links three long temperature records along the Hudson river in the USA. They illustrate that a start date of 1880 (Giss) misses out on the preceding warm climatic cycles and that UHI is a big factor in the increasingly urbanised temperature data sets from both Giss and Hadley/Cru
http://noconsensus.wordpress.com/2009/11/25/triplets-on-the-hudson-river/#comment-13064
Article: Three long temperature records from Europe. Author: Tony Brown
In examining these records from Europe the climatic variabilty prior to the Giss records of 1880 are again shown, demonstrating that no one should be surprised when temperature readings commencing from a trough of the Little Ice Age should subsequently rise again in our own era.
http://noconsensus.wordpress.com/2009/11/05/invisible-elephants/
Article: The Great Arctic warming in the 19th Century. Author: Tony Brown
This long article -with many links- examines the little known period 1815-60 when the Arctic ice melted and the Royal Society mounted an expedition to investigate the causes.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/06/20/historic-variation-in-arctic-ice/#more-8688
Article: 18th Century Climate variability in Sweden. Author: Tony Brown
This short article was the genesis of my interest in long temperature records and the effects of UHI, through the examination of records from Uppsala, Stockholm and CET. It illustrates that even going back just another thirty years (as is possible with Uppsala) can put subsequent temperature rises into better context.
http://chiefio.wordpress.com/2009/10/09/how-long-is-a-long-temperature-history/
Article: Politics of climate change. Author: Tony Brown
Climate change has become highly politicised and the British Govt - long time leaders in funding research into the subject - were very heavily implicated in making it a political issue in order to promote their own agenda. An unsual subject for me, but very well referenced with numerous links and quotes from such bodies as the Environmental Audit Committee of the House of Commons.
Relevant Articles by other commentators.
Article: Arctic warming 1919-1939. Author: Dr Arnd Bernaerts
I have often written short pieces on the frequent episodes of Arctic warming back to the Ipiatuk some 3000 years ago, and one day will work them up into a longer piece. This free online book by Dr Arnd Bernaerts examines the last great warming -prior to the modern one- in great detail.
http://www.arctic-heats-up.com/chapter_1.html
Article: The Medieval Warm Period. Author: Von Rudolf Kipp
This is another topic that I intend to write about some day, but this excellent piece will probably save me the trouble. It takes the numerous studies of this period and graphically displays the resultant temperature information. In addition it provides much interesting textual information. Here in German:
http://www.science-skeptical.de/
Also carried here in a more accessible form for English speakers:
Article: Peer Reviewed papers on causes of climate change. Author: Andrew of Popular Technology
That there are no peer reviewed papers supporting a non anthropogenic view of climate change is a myth perpetuated by those that like to believe they have a monopoly on climate knowledge (although it is true that obtaining funding for sceptical research is very problematic) This item collates some 450 peer reviewed papers that query the current orthodoxy.
http://www.populartechnology.net/2009/10/peer-reviewed-papers-supporting.html
Article: Graphic representation of Giss temperature records for the British Isles. Author: Lucy Skywalker
http://www.greenworldtrust.org.uk/Science/Scientific/UK-records.htm
Article: Circling the Arctic. Author: Lucy Skywalker
This is a very useful graphical representation of historic arctic temperatures
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/09/09/arctic-temperatures-what-hockey-stick/#more-10703
It nicely complements the two arctic articles carried here.
Article: Impacts of land use cover. Author: Fall, S., D. Niyogi, A. Gluhovsky, R. A. Pielke Sr., E. Kalnay, and G. Rochon, 2009:
Humans undeniably have an impact on their local environment and local temperature, of which the Uhi effect is the best known (see links from within this website). Land use is also a major contribtor to localised temperature change, not only from the obvious impact of building, but through deforestation, planting new crops, ploughing up grassland etc. This technical article explains some of the issues involved.
Impacts of land use land cover on temperature trends over the continental United States: Assessment using the North American Regional Reanalysis. Int. J. Climatol., DOI: 10.1002/joc.1996.
Article: Global trends of measured surface air temperature. Author: James Hansen
This is the original article by James Hansen from 1987 where he identified the stations worldwide that he felt could be used in his own dataset that was to start from 1880. Figure 2 sums the numbers up. Essential reading for climate researchers as it puts the GISS datasets into context.
http://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/docs/1987/1987_Hansen_Lebedeff.pdf
Article: Improved Understanding of Past Climatic Variability from Early Daily European Instrumental Sources. Author: Camuffo D and P D Jones
Phil Jones of CRU was apparently fascinated by the temperature data sets preceding the 1850 cut off point that he chose in 1993. He subsequently identified seven as being of particular interest and in 2002- together with Dr D Camuffo- wrote a fascinating book on early (pre 1850) climate as measured by seven data sets.(behind a pay wall)
http://www.isac.cnr.it/~microcl/climatologia/improve.php
The link to the book/dvd is towards the bottom of the article. The caveats expressed about the longer data sets are worth reading. In it he mentions:
"The actual warming rate has been proven to be at such a slow rate that temperature changes, over years (i.e. 0.006°C/yr) and even decades (i.e. 0.06°C/decade), are in most cases smaller than the instrumental resolution and can hardly be directly detected."
Article: Study of historic European weather records. Author: Miscellaneous
There was an additional study of old weather records carried out in Europe. As CRU was the UK partner Phil Jones seems to have been involved in this also:
http://ralph.swan.ac.uk/millennium/Millennium8a2.htm
This is well worth reading, as it is fascinating and provides a better understanding of current interpretation of past recorded climate.