Mystifying Met Office Advocacy. Defending the Indefensible and disparaging the Talkshop? Not on my watch!

The above blogpost drew my attention for no other reason than I was specifically mentioned in it. For reasons I simply cannot fathom out, Roy Spencer included both myself and Tallbloke’s Talkshop in his decision to “validate” the UK Met Office’s methodology with his own, I use the term loosely, research. I really have no problem with being referenced but quite why in such a derogatory manner seemed more akin to the inept “debunk” attempted by the formerly Meta sponsored “Science Feedback” than any other valid reason. The Met Office and their “over-Lord” Vallance seem to not be the only ones trying to silence or put down the Talkshop.

Drawn in, I continued with the article and I have to say found it remarkably wanting of any vestige of scientific detail. It read more like stating “I agree with the Met Office whilst Ray Sanders and the Talkshop are wrong because we both say so”. With some reluctance I feel I have to respond to clarify the position and rather question Mr Spencer’s somewhat strange conclusions and motivations in reaching them.

Firstly regular readers will know that I am in the process of assessing every operational Met office weather station plus many long term closed sites. In over 400 reviews so far I have opened up many other meteorological aspects for debate above and beyond pure simple siting issues and backed this up with extensive links to official data sources to demonstrate my points.

The ultimate Surface Stations Project aim is to recreate a UK national historic temperature record based on accurate and verifiable prime source data with no adjustments. In other words I am trying to prove beyond any reasonable doubt the real world situation and not the output of a computer modelled unreality. An example of the early stages in this process was the initial data provided for the long term (but now closed) premium quality site at Wye Agricultural College. This real world data does not support the “massaged numbers” provided by the Met Office for this area where three of the five reference points are long deceased – Dungeness offered its last readings 1/12/1979 that is now over 46 years ago.

I use this as an example in contrast to Mr Spencer’s approach which is largely to accept the Met Office numbers as Holy Gospel and not question the multiple errors, problems and misrepresentations therein.

So to start:

“There has been criticism of the UK Met Office’s methodology for monitoring long-term changes in UK-average temperatures, starting with Tallbloke’s (Ray Sanders’) blog post on 31 October 2024. A major criticism that Tallbloke has is the fact that most UK stations do not meet the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) criteria for a good climate monitoring station. The UKMO doesn’t actually use the WMO quality classification system, but their own 4-tiered system. Another criticism is that many UK stations have closed in recent years, and so those stations are, in effect, estimated (“fabricated”?) from surrounding stations.“

The UKMO most certainly does use the WMO criteria – I have published their listing twice. Is Mr Spencer saying this international standard to which the Met Office was party to formulating does not apply to them? if so, that rather claims the Met office says “Up yours” to the WMO which I know for certain they do not.

“those stations are, in effect, estimated (“fabricated”?) ” Why the question mark to the term “fabricated”? Fabrication is the construction of something from separate constituent parts. In the case of the Met Office, artificial numbers termed “climate averages” for no longer existing sites are constructed from a medley of other sites’ readings. These are neither readings nor data, they are reified mathematical constructs (a.k.a. fabrications) entirely dependent on which constituents are used to compile them. The Met Office refuses to identify the constituent parts to anyone outside their organisation hence other potential definitions of the term “fabrication” may legitimately come into play.

“On the additional subject of replacing a closed station with estimates from surrounding stations (which NOAA also does because so many of their UNHCN stations in the U.S. have closed, a process that has also been criticized), I believe it is a little disingenuous to claim those data are “fabricated”. . Rather than continuing the closed station record with estimates from surrounding stations, one could just use the surrounding stations, which is the same thing.” {my bold}

The above is rank nonsense. Since when has an “estimate” derived from surrounding areas been the same as a specific site reading i.e. a FACT. The only person here being “a little disingenuous” certainly is not me. Frankly I cannot believe Roy Spencer can make such an absurd statement not worthy of a secondary school statistics paper failure.

Mr Spencer then continues essentially claiming Met office data are excellent and so are his and they both agree….a case of wise men in agreement or is it fools seldom differing? How many of all the following aspects of Met Office data (and by association his) shortcomings has Mr spencer accounted for or is even aware of?

Time of Observation Bias . I have demonstrated many times this effect and the discrepancies when protocols are changed. The stochastic nature of this is producing double digit errors both in the past, ongoing and will be even more distorting in future . This alone accounts for most night time warming in raised minima. It is far too extreme and random an effect to be “adjusted” for.

He seems blissfully unaware of Aitken Effect and all the ongoing changes from reduced wind speeds caused by siting defects and changes over time.  The fact that the WMO recommends artificial aspiration which the Met Office do not use is ignored.

He does not consider the poor maintenance standards of  the Met Office with many sites in almost derelict screens at times such as Glenlee, Banff  and Lough Fea among many, many others. As ex Met Office site manager John Marlow pointed out, the Met Office supplied him with un-calibrated thermometers which did not even meet acceptable standards. If they cannot look after the Screen paintwork outside properly, how is it possible to know how poor the standards are inside.

He appears not to have considered the alarming inability of the Met Office to convert Fahrenheit to Celsius correctly. They have managed to  convert differentials of just  0.1°F into 0.6°C (an almost 11 fold error) depending on where in the scale they appear as I have demonstrated at Wye. And there are the absurdities demonstrated at Swanage and Faskally plus many others, where different rounding protocols applied produced different celsius readings archived from the same recorded Fahrenheit readings.

He does not consider the changing nature of sample points used (i.e. where the Met office actually sites its units) – these changes over time have been quite dramatic as I also point out on many occasions notably Dumfries and Galloway, SW Wales, Kent, Derbyshire, Fife, Devon, Dorset and East Anglia..

Quite amazingly he has not considered instrumentation changes from LIGT to PRT with the latter picking up transient spikes that LIGT would not as Dr Eric Huxter highlighted. They also overcome historic Time of Observation bias that he doesn’t seem to realise corrects earlier excess recording of cold events to create a false impression of warming on correction.

His opinions on UHI effects are frankly risible. Simply saying things were bad in the past so they can be comparative to now (with the caveat of “if” things haven’t changed) is irrelevant as well as plain wrong. Things have massively changed. There were 46.1 million living in the UK in 1961 ………how many now?  Look at any 1940s image of Heathrow  compared to now! I come across lots of people defending atrocious sites such as Walled Gardens on this type of  assumption which are nonsense. Did that 1864 gardener whip out his 50cc Honda leaf blower? Cut the grass, strim the edges and cut the hedges with ICE powered equipment?……I don’t think so.  Even walled gardens have experienced major changes as have numerous other sites some often out in the countryside.

And then to conclude Mr Spencer having dismissed UHI goes on to discuss the long term but very low grade site at Armagh which at one time had its thermometers housed in a metal box bolted to an outside wall in lieu of being just by the first floor window. Here is a map of Armagh in 1962 – the Observatory housing the weather station was well outside the city centre back then, whilst now it is surrounded by urban growth. A significant change on top of the terrible (spurious CIMO Class 4) siting inside the artificial walled area of the observatory.

Mr Spencer then goes onto mention Oxford with its regular sunshade observatory building, in a walled garden with the delightful company of a massive Marquee regularly alongside together with barbecues and a bar as often as not throughout every recent summer. Fantastic quality control eh?

Perhaps Mr Spencer would like to consider running through the surface stations index and checking out the quality of Met office data before castigating the Talkshop and our diligent and unpaid work. Perhaps then he would avoid the sites surrounded by newly erected solar farms, those alongside Electricity Sub Stations and all those other low grade sites by any standards even the Met Office’s arbitrary own that have no independent scrutiny.

Here you go Mr Spencer, check out the “Rogues Gallery” sample that I could probably add a lot more to and then come back with your confidence level that your and the Met Office data agree……wise men or fools?

Codicil:. Seems like we at the Talkshop are taking more and more flak……..must be getting nearer the target.

Source: https://tallbloke.wordpress.com/2025/12/21/mystifying-met-office-advocacy-defending-the-indefensible-and-disparaging-the-talkshop-not-on-my-watch/