Temperature variations of southeastern Australia, 1860-2011

L Ashcroft; D Karoly; J Gergis

Journal article

Temperature variations of southeastern Australia, 1860-2011

L Ashcroft, D Karoly, J Gergis

Australian Meteorological and Oceanographic Journal | Published : 2012

DOI: 10.22499/2.6204.004

Abstract

This study presents the first quality-controlled dataset of surface air temperature observations for 1860-1909 across southeastern Australia. Long-term monthly maximum and minimum temperature records from 38 stations in Victoria, South Australia, New South Wales and southern Queensland were identified from the Australian Bureau of Meteorology observational network to provide continuous data coverage from 1860-1950. Detailed homogenisation was undertaken using metadata collected from station history files and a two-step statistical process that involved individual station adjustments and comparison with neighbouring reference series. The homogenisation process removed many non-climatic change..

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University of Melbourne Researchers

David Karoly Author

Joelle Gergis Author

Linden Ashcroft Author

Related Projects (1)

Reconstructing pre-20th century rainfall, temperature and pressure for south-eastern Australia using palaeoclimate, documentary and early weather station data.

South-eastern Australia is in the grip of a severe water crisis due to the worst drought in recorded history and increasing temperatures. Th..

Grants

Awarded by Australian Research Council (ARC)

Awarded by Australian Research Council

Funding Acknowledgements

This research is funded by an Australian Research Council (ARC) Linkage Project (LP0990151). Many thanks to staff at the National Meteorological Library, the National Archives of Australia and the Australian Bureau of Meteorology Climate Data Management and Record Management groups for their patience and assistance in locating station metadata. Particular thanks go to Clive Brett, Meaghan Flannery, Cris Gouletsas, Karen Rowney and Karl Braganza. Thanks also to Blair Trewin and two anonymous reviewers for their helpful advice, which improved this manuscript. Research space was kindly provided by the Australian Bureau of Meteorology National Climate Centre and Climate Data Management groups.