An approach to adjusting climatological time series for discontinuous inhomogeneities

Abstract

A method is described whereby climatological time series of temperature and precipitation can be adjusted for station inhomogeneities using station history information. The adjusted data retains its original scale and is not an anomaly series. The technique has been tested in Monte Carlo simulations. It has been applied to over 1200 stations in the United States. In many instances the adjustments in temperature time series are substantial (as large as actual climate fluctuations during the twentieth century) often leading to a more consistent pattern of regional climate change than would otherwise be surmised from inspection of the unadjusted data. -from Authors