U.K. investigates data on man-made global warming

TEXT OF INTERVIEW

Steve Chiotakis: In a third investigation into the so-called climate-gate saga in the U.K., authorities didn’t find anything that would undermine the case for man-made global warming. They’ve cleared scientists of any wrongdoing, but have criticized them for not being quite so open. The BBC’s Roger Harrabin is with us live from London with an update on this story. Hi Roger.

Roger Harrabin: Yeah, hi.

Chiotakis: Give us a quick reminder of what these scientists were accused of.

Harrabin: OK. Just before Christmas, you may remember, there was a great rumpus in the international media when these scientists were accused of trying to unduly influence the scientific peer review process after their e-mails were hacked. And it’s created really a crisis not just in climate science, but across the hold of science.

Chiotakis: And what’s being done about these hacked e-mails, Roger?

Harrabin: Well the police were still looking into the hacked e-mails. You know there’s some question of it being an inside job, some question of it being an outside job, and we still don’t know.

Chiotakis: Roger, what was the main criticism that these scientists got?

Harrabin: One criticism refers to a graph which appeared on a publication from the World Meteorological Organization, which showed temperatures rising. Now this was a graph which blended together real temperature data with temperature data from tree rings. And the panel here said if you looked deep into the report, you’d find out all the annotations to that and all the explanation, but actually on the cover it wasn’t very clear, and that was rather misleading. So, and the other comment they make, of course, is a regular one, which another inquirist made, which is the scientists involved were simply far too defensive with their data — they weren’t opened, and that science itself has to be revolutionized in this, the age of the blogosphere, to make science more democratically accountable and more transparent on the Internet.

Chiotakis: The BBC’s Roger Harrabin joining us from London. Roger, thank you.

Harrabin: Thank you.