She turned toward the camera and said, "Let me show you some examples of weather station data. Here, for instance, is a record of the average temperature for Pasadena since 1930."++
Pasadena, CA 1930-2000
"As you see," Jennifer said, "a dramatic rise in temperature. And here is Berkeley since 1930."
Berkeley, CA 1930-2000
"A surprisingly incomplete record. But we are using raw data, so you can see missing years. And you see a clear warming trend. Indisputable, wouldn't you agree?"
"I would," Evans said, thinking that it wasn't much of a trend--less than a degree.
"Now, here is Death Valley, one of the hottest, driest places on Earth. No urbanization has occurred here. Again, missing years."
Death Valley, CA 1933-2000
Evans said nothing. It must be an anomaly, he thought. Jennifer put up more graphs:
McGill, NV 1930-2000
Guthrie, OK 1930-2000
"These are stations from the Nevada desert and the Oklahoma plains," she said. "They show temperatures that are flat, or declining. And not only rural areas. Here is Boulder, Colorado. It's only of interest because NCAR is located there--the National Center for Atmospheric Research, where so much global warming research is done."
Boulder, CO 1930-1997
"Here are some more small cities. Truman, Missouri, where the buck stops..."
Truman, MO 1931-2000
Greenville, SC 1930-2000
Ann Arbor, MI 1930-2000
Evans said, "Well, you have to admit, it's not very dramatic."
"I'm not sure what you consider dramatic. Truman has gotten colder by 2.5 degrees, Greenville by 1.5 degrees, Ann Arbor by one degree since1930. If the globe is warming, these places have been left out."
"Let's look at some bigger places," Evans said, "like Charleston."
"I happen to have Charleston." She thumbed through her graphs.
Charleston, SC 1930-2000
Evans said, "So, a bigger city gets warmer. What about New York?" "I have several records from New York, city and state."
New York, NY 1930-2000
Syracuse, NY 1930-2000
Albany, NY 1930-2000
Oswego, NY 1930-2000
"As you see," Jennifer said, "New York City is warmer, but many other parts of the state, from Oswego to Albany, have become colder since 1930."
Evans was acutely aware of the cameras on him. He nodded in what he hoped was a judicious, thoughtful manner and said, "And where does this data come from?"
"From the Historical Climatology Network data set," she said. "It's a government dataset, maintained at Oak Ridge National Laboratories."
"Well," Evans said. "It's quite interesting. However, I'd like to see the data from Europe and Asia. This is, after all, a global phenomenon."
"Certainly," Jennifer said. She, too, was playing to the cameras. "But before we do that, I'd like your reaction to the data so far. As you can see, many places in the United States do not seem to have become warmer since 1930."
"I'm sure you cherry-picked your data," Evans said.
"To some degree. As we can be sure the defense will do."
"But the results do not surprise me," Evans said. "Weather varies locally. It always has and always will." A thought occurred to him. "By the way, why are all these graphs since 1930? Temperature records go much further back than that."
"Your point is well taken," Jennifer said, nodding. "It definitely makes a difference how far back you go. For example..."
West Point, NY 1931-2000
"Here is West Point, New York, from 1931 to 2000. Trending down. And..."
West Point, NY 1900-2000
"Here is West Point from 1900 to 2000. This time the trend is up, not down."
"Ah-ha," Evans said. "So youwere massaging the data. You picked the interval of years that made you look good!"
"Absolutely," Jennifer said, nodding. "But the trick only works because temperatures in many parts of the US were warmer in the 1930s than they are today."
"It's still a trick."
"Yes, it is. The defense will not miss the opportunity to show the jury numerous examples of this trick from environmental fund-raising literature. Selecting specific years that appear to show things are getting worse."
Evans registered her insult to environmental groups. "In that case," he said, "let's not permit any tricks at all. Use the full and complete temperature record. How far back does it go?"
"At West Point, back to 1826."
"Okay. Then suppose you use that?" Evans felt confident proposing this, because it was well known that a worldwide warming trend had begun at about 1850. Every place in the world had gotten warmer since then, and the graph from West Point would reflect that.
Jennifer seemed to know it too, because she suddenly appeared very hesitant, turning away, thumbing through her stack of graphs, frowning as if she couldn't find it.
"You don't have that particular graph, do you?" Evans said.
"No, no. Believe me, I have it. Yes. Here." And then she pulled it out.
West Point, NY 1826-2000
Evans took one look and saw that she had sandbagged him.