UK Climate Scientist Steps Down After E-Mail Flap
Dec. 2 (Bloomberg) -- Claims that scientists suppresseddata about global warming prompted the head of a Britishuniversity’s climate research center to step down pendingcompletion of an investigation.
Phil Jones, a professor and director of the ClimaticResearch Unit at the University of East Anglia in Norwich, willtemporarily relinquish his post, the U.K. school said yesterdayin a statement. Private e-mails from Jones were among thousandsof correspondences between scientists debating climate changethat were stolen and posted on the Internet last month.
The e-mails, dating back as far as 1996, have been cited byskeptics of man’s contribution to global warming as evidence ofa conspiracy to manipulate data to support research. TheClimatic Research Unit has said the e-mails were taken out ofcontext and allegations of data manipulation are unfounded.
“They’re conspiring to keep papers out of publishedjournals,” said Marc Morano, a climate skeptic who is editor ofa Web site on the issue, referring to the leaked e-mails in aNov. 24 interview. “You see them as nothing more than a bunchof activists manufacturing science for a political goal.”
Jones said disclosure of the e-mails ahead of the climate-change summit that starts Dec. 7 in Copenhagen is an attempt toundermine measures to fight global warming.
“This may be a concerted attempt to put a question markover the science of climate change in the run-up to theCopenhagen talks,” Jones said in a statement. “We are, andhave always been, scrupulous in ensuring that our sciencepublications are robust and honest.”
Climategate?
Web sites and blogs such as the Climate Audit Mirror Sitehave carried copies of e-mails, correspondence betweenclimatologists and commentary in what environmental columnistEric Pooley today called “the shouting match known asClimategate.”
In one e-mail cited widely on blogs including ClimateAudit, Jones writes about completing “Mike’s nature trick ofadding in the real temps” in order to “hide the decline.”
Reached by telephone on Nov. 26, Jones referred all queriesto the University of East Anglia press office.
The university’s data, combined with information from theU.K. Met Office, form one of the main temperature data seriesused in 2007 by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel onClimate Change when it concluded warming is “unequivocal,” andthat the global average temperature rose by 0.76 degrees Celsius(1.37 degrees Fahrenheit) from 1850 to 2005.
“There are three independent data sets” used by the UNpanel, said Vicky Pope, head of climate change advice at theExeter, England-based Met Office. “The data has been heavilyreviewed and checked and the data sets all agree on thewarming.”
Copenhagen Summit
More than 190 nations will meet in Copenhagen starting nextweek for 11 days in an effort to agree on international limitson emissions that contribute to global warming.
World leaders, including U.S. President Barack Obama, havesaid a treaty won’t be completed in Copenhagen. UN SecretaryGeneral Ban Ki-Moon said he’s hoping for agreement next year.
Organizations including the United Nations and NASA sayburning fossil fuels and cutting down forests is increasingconcentrations of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, creating agreenhouse effect that is warming the planet.
Last week, a group of 26 researchers, including some whosee-mails were stolen from a computer at East Anglia, saidGreenland and Antarctic ice sheets are melting faster thanexpected and the future rise in sea level will be “muchhigher” than previously forecast.
Independent Review
The British university said it will make all of its data onland surface temperatures public. More than 95 percent of thedata has been public for “several years,” the statement said.
The university will also conduct an independent review,which will address data security, an assessment “of how weresponded to a deluge of Freedom of Information requests, andany other relevant issues which the independent reviewer advisesshould be addressed,” Trevor Davies, pro-vice-chancellor ofresearch at East Anglia, said in a statement.
Nothing in the stolen e-mails suggests the university’sclimate research is not “not of the highest-quality ofscientific investigation and interpretation,” Davies said.
Who will lead the investigation and how long it will takewill be announced “within days,” according to the statement.
To contact the reporters on this story:Jim Efstathiou Jr. in New York at jefstathiou@bloomberg.netAlex Morales in London at Amorales2@bloomberg.net
Last Updated: December 2, 2009 05:26 ESTSource: Bloomberg
