The battle
30.04.2010
Recently, Professor John Sweeney, Director of the Irish Climate Change Analysis and Research Unit at Maynooth University acknowledged that scientists were ‘lousy’ at communicating their ideas to the general public. They have allowed journalists and lobbyists to fill this vacuum and undermine the public’s belief in climate science.1
A number of things have happened during the past few months which have led to questions been raised about climate science. It started on the weekend of November 13, 2009 when someone copied a large number of files from the computer system of the University of East Anglia’s climate research unit. These files were made available on the internet and appeared on a number of blogs. The timing of the leaks, just before the Copenhagen Climate Conference, was crucial, as it was meant to discredit climate science.
Climate sceptics claimed that Phil Jones, the director of the climate research unit and a collaborator, Wei-Chyung Wang of the University of Albany, attempted to suppress data which cast doubts on an important piece of research, conducted in 1990, on the effect which cities have on global warming.
The research was conducted over a period of 30 years. The data was drawn from 84 weather stations, half of which were situated in urban areas. Cities with concrete buildings and paved streets are heat traps. The research set out to measure whether the overall increase in temperature could be due to the warming effects of expanding cities, rather than global warming, as claimed in the 2000 report of the Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Jones’ and Wang’s research data suggested that the impact of expanding urban centres on global warming was negligible. Under pressure from critics, Jones was asked to verify the data and produce the exact location of the weather stations and whether some had been moved during the 30 year period. Jones refused to provide the information, claiming that it would be ‘unduly burdensome.’
This led climate change sceptic, Doug Keenan to accuse both Jones and Wang of fraud.2 Unfortunately, Jones’s and Wang’s claims were incorporated into the 2007 IPCC Assessment Report.
In January 2010, Graham Smith from the Information Commissioner’s Office in Britain ruled that the University of East Anglia had flouted the rules in the way it handled the freedom of information request it received in May 2008. According to the hacked emails within a few days of receiving a request from David Holland who is a climate sceptic, Phil Jones wrote to a number of colleagues in the United States requesting them to delete a number of emails which dealt with the topic. However, the University of East Anglia points outs that no emails were in fact deleted after this exchange.3
It is important to state that even if Jones’ and Wang’s data is incorrect, there is plenty of evidence from a lot of other sources, including the oceans, that global warming is taking place. Jones himself defends his research and points out that his conclusions are supported by data from Australia and what was then the Soviet Union. No one has raised any questions about that data. The controversy does highlight the need for rigorous, peer-reviewed and transparent science. Writing in The Guardian, Jones states that “we need to make more data available.”
Furthermore, “scientists must make their assumptions clear and researchers across all controversial scientific fields, including climate change, had to be more open
and acknowledge uncertainties in predictions.”4
There is a final element to this drama. When the files were first hacked into, the University of East Anglia insisted that they were victims of criminal ‘theft’ of data. A police enquiry was initiated under the direction of Superintendent Julian Gregory. He included people from Scotland Yard in his investigative team. As of February 5th, 2010, the investigation has made little progress. There is now speculation that there may not have been a crime at all. Some believe that the hacker was given a legitimate password, which would point to internal collusion or that the data was accidentally made available to the public.5
Fr Sean McDonagh is a researcher on justice and peace issues and more recently ecological challenge.
1 Ronan McGreevy, “Deniers winning climate change war - expert,” The Irish Times, January 30, 2010, pg 6.
2 Fred Pearce, “Strange case of moving weather posts and scientists under siege,” The Guardian, February 2, 2010, pg 6.
3 Fred Pearce, “UK scientist ‘hid’ climate data flaws.” The Guardian, February 2, 2010, pg 1 & 2.
4 Phil Jones, “Climate Expert defends research,” The Guardian, February 3, 2010, pg 12.
5 David Leigh, Charles Arthus, Rob Evans, Fred Pearce, “Hack, inside job or accident 0 who stole ‘climategate’ files?” February 5, 2010, pg 18.
