The US Dept. of Energy was happy to help hide the decline.
One message appeared to show a member of Defra staff telling colleagues working on climate science to give the government a ‘strong message’.
The emails paint a clear picture of scientists selectively using data, and colluding with politicians to misuse scientific information.
‘Humphrey’, said to work at Defra, writes: ‘I cannot overstate the HUGE amount of political interest in the project as a message that the government can give on climate change to help them tell their story.
‘They want their story to be a very strong one and don’t want to be made to look foolish.’
Professor Phil Jones, director of the Climatic Research Unit at the centre of the affair, said the group findings did stand up to scrutiny.
Yet one of the newly released emails, written by Prof. Jones – who is working with the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) – said: ‘Any work we have done in the past is done on the back of the research grants we get – and has to be well hidden.
‘I’ve discussed this with the main funder (U.S. Dept of Energy) in the past and they are happy about not releasing the original station data.’
In another of his emails, he wrote: ‘I’ve been told that Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is above national Freedom of Information Acts.
‘One way to cover yourself and all those working in AR5 would be to delete all emails at the end of the process.’
He didn’t take his own advice.
Now, for the fauxtography. You can’t have a good story without compelling visuals. If nature doesn’t provide them, Photoshop will.
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