Climategate expands - Russians allege data manipulated and excluded to show warming

The scandal that broke open last month when thousands of controversial emails from the world’s top climate scientists were exposed on the Internet, Climategate, may have been just the tip of the proverbial iceberg. Russian news agency RIA Novosti is reporting a story from Kommersant that climate data from that country was “probably tampered with.” The report says that the Institute of Economic Analysis (IEA) in Moscow “believes that Russian meteorological-station data did not substantiate the anthropogenic global-warming theory.”

According to the report, UK’s Hadley Center purposely excluded data from Russian stations for no other reason than the fact they did not show warming. The IEA says that Hadley only used data from 25% of the available Russian stations thus omitting 40% of Russian territory. Those stations that Hadley did choose to use were in urban areas where the Urban Heat Island effect is likely to come into play and skew temperatures warmer.

If it is true that Hadley willfully omitted otherwise acceptable data, it would lend empirical evidence to the charges of collusion and data manipulation that have been leveled at the scientists involved in Climategate. Questions already abound over the accuracy of the data used to formulate the manmade climate change theory and many have said the data was cherry-picked and modified at will by scientists. The omission of hundreds of stations that do not show warming could shatter the very basis of the science.

The full report is below followed by links to other sites with more information.

Russia affected by Climategate
Kommersant via RIA Novosti

A discussion of the November 2009 Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident, referred to by some sources as "Climategate," continues against the backdrop of the abortive UN Climate Conference in Copenhagen (COP15) discussing alternative agreements to replace the 1997 Kyoto Protocol that aimed to combat global warming.

The incident involved an e-mail server used by the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) at the University of East Anglia (UEA) in Norwich, East England. Unknown persons stole and anonymously disseminated thousands of e-mails and other documents dealing with the global-warming issue made over the course of 13 years.

Controversy arose after various allegations were made including that climate scientists colluded to withhold scientific evidence and manipulated data to make the case for global warming appear stronger than it is.

Climategate has already affected Russia. On Tuesday, the Moscow-based Institute of Economic Analysis (IEA) issued a report claiming that the Hadley Center for Climate Change based at the headquarters of the British Meteorological Office in Exeter (Devon, England) had probably tampered with Russian-climate data.

The IEA believes that Russian meteorological-station data did not substantiate the anthropogenic global-warming theory.

Analysts say Russian meteorological stations cover most of the country's territory, and that the Hadley Center had used data submitted by only 25% of such stations in its reports.

Over 40% of Russian territory was not included in global-temperature calculations for some other reasons, rather than the lack of meteorological stations and observations.

The data of stations located in areas not listed in the Hadley Climate Research Unit Temperature UK (HadCRUT) survey often does not show any substantial warming in the late 20th century and the early 21st century.

The HadCRUT database includes specific stations providing incomplete data and highlighting the global-warming process, rather than stations facilitating uninterrupted observations.

On the whole, climatologists use the incomplete findings of meteorological stations far more often than those providing complete observations.

IEA analysts say climatologists use the data of stations located in large populated centers that are influenced by the urban-warming effect more frequently than the correct data of remote stations.

The scale of global warming was exaggerated due to temperature distortions for Russia accounting for 12.5% of the world's land mass. The IEA said it was necessary to recalculate all global-temperature data in order to assess the scale of such exaggeration.

Global-temperature data will have to be modified if similar climate-date procedures have been used from other national data because the calculations used by COP15 analysts, including financial calculations, are based on HadCRUT research.

On the net:

• Kommersant via RIA Novosti (English) - Russia affected by Climategate
• Kommersant - Translated wtih Google
• Icecap - BOMBSHELL - Russian IEA Claims CRU (thus NOAA/NASA) Probably Tampered with their data (PDF)
• Climate Audit - Russia: Hadley Center “probably tampered with Russian climate data”
• Watt's Up With That - Russian IEA claims CRU tampered with climate data – cherrypicked warmest stations
• Big Government - Climategate Just Got Much, Much Bigger
• UK Telegraph - Climategate goes SERIAL: now the Russians confirm that UK climate scientists manipulated data to exaggerate global warming