James Doogue

You'd think in a big place like Western Australia it wouldn't be too hard to find locations to put weather stations where accurate measurements can be taken without being influenced variables not related to climate.

In talking about the weather to a Northern Hemisphere friend, I was drawn to make the following observations about Perth's temperature records:

We apparently had a record high for Christmas day in Perth, and I think the Christmas/New Year is set to be one of the hottest.

I don't get too excited about such records nowadays because I often find when I drill down into the records, that they have been truncated excluding all records before 1910, or they have been homogenised and 'adjusted' the temperature record, with early 1900's 'cooled-off' to give a false impression of a continuous warming over the 1900's. This removes the historical cooling period between the 1940's and 1970's after which most of the world's climate scientists thought we were heading towards an ice age.

And of course there's the Urban Heat Island effect which even our ABC once recognised. https://joannenova.com.au/2020/02/abc-suddenly-notices-the-heat-island-effect-in-cities/

The official Perth temperature was originally taken from a grassy, wooded hill near our old parliament House. Then it was moved down to near the Australian Broadcasting Network at the East End of our CBD. It was virtually in the car park. Then it was moved to a hot sandy lot next to a main road in East Perth. Now the official site for Perth Temperature records is in another sandy lot next to one of our younger university campuses in Mt Lawley.

As you can see from the satellite picture of the weather station which has collected official Perth temperature since 2003, it's perfectly situated to gather extreme summer high temperatures being in a sand pit.

We have a tradition of going to the beach in the morning in summer. Not too many go in the afternoon because the sand is too hot to walk or lay on. So unless you have good footwear, and sit on the wet sand, the beach on a hot summer afternoon is too unpleasant because of the hot sand.

In the winter, and in the evening, that Bureau of Meteorology position is ideally located to pick up some warmth from the heat sink roadway and of course the university campus nearby.

As with other areas, we are told to 'trust the science'. But how can we trust climate scientists dumb enough to situate a weather station in a location with so many none climate related variables impacting the temperature record?

That's not to say it wasn't hot the last couple of days and won't be for a couple more. We are getting the winds coming straight off the desert.

Meanwhile most of Eastern and Southern Australia enjoyed a cooler than average Christmas and Boxing Day.

Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at 10:47 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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