Tuesday, January 03, 2012

Official bias continues

The Met Office bias in its predictions for global annual temperature continues alive and well.  In December 2010 I posted an analysis of Met Office predictions since 1999.  All but one of the eleven annual predictions had overshot and the 2010 figure looked likely to be an over prediction as well.  (It was - see the table below).

That is 11 out of 12.  What of the 2011 figures?  The prediction is here in their press release of 2nd Dec 2010:
"Nevertheless an anomaly of 0.44 °C is still likely - with the range very likely to be between 0.28 °C and 0.60 °C."
The Met Office assessment in November for the first ten months of the year gave the actual figures undershooting the estimate as follows:
"The global average temperature from HadCRUT3 for January to October 2011 was 14.36°C, 0.36°C above the 1961-1990 long term average."
The figures so far are well below the 'likely' figure - though within the broad range given for 'very likely'. (Final 2011 figures will not be available till March 2012.)

And what of the prediction for 2012?  Alas, I cannot find any trace of the usual December prediction. 

Here are the figures for the last 13 years.

Year   Forecast  Actual
1999  ...0.38    ...0.26
2000  ...0.41    ...0.24
2001  ...0.47    ...0.40
2002  ...0.47    ...0.46
2003  ...0.55    ...0.46
2004  ...0.50    ...0.43
2005  ...0.51    ...0.47
2006  ...0.45    ...0.43
2007  ...0.54    ...0.40
2008  ...0.37    ...0.31
2009  ...>0.40  . .0.44
2010  ...0.58    ...0.50
2011  ...0.44   ....0.36 (Jan-Oct)