Steve McIntyre: Yamal FOI Sheds New Light On Flawed Data

Monday, 07 May 2012 09:50
Steve McIntyre, Climate Audit

In today’s post, I’ll also show that important past statements and evidence to Muir Russell by CRU on the topic have been either untruthful or deceptive.

Phil Jones’ first instinct on learning about Climategate was that it was linked to the Yamal controversy that was in the air in the weeks leading up to Climategate. I had speculated that CRU must have done calculations for Yamal along the lines of the regional chronology for Taimyr published in Briffa et al 2008. CRU was offended and issued sweeping denials, but my surmise was confirmed by an email in the Climategate dossier. Unfortunately neither Muir Russell nor Oxburgh investigated the circumstances of the withheld regional chronology, despite my submission drawing attention to this battleground issue.

I subsequently submitted an FOI request for the Yamal-Urals regional chronology and a simple list of sites used in the regional chronology. Both requests were refused by the University of East Anglia. I appealed to the Information Commissioner (ICO).

A week ago, the Information Commissioner notified the University of East Anglia that he would be ruling against them on my longstanding FOI request for the list of sites used in the Yamal-Urals regional chronology referred to in a 2006 Climategate email. East Anglia accordingly sent me a list of the 17 sites used in the Yamal-Urals regional chronology (see here). A decision on the chronology itself is pending. In the absence of the chronology itself, I’ve done an RCS calculation, the results of which do not yield a Hockey Stick.

In today’s post, I’ll also show that important past statements and evidence to Muir Russell by CRU on the topic have been either untruthful or deceptive.

Full essay

Steve McIntyre: Yamal FOI Sheds New Light On Flawed Data