Prague - British climatologists did not falsify the data on the Czech Republic. This is the outcome of a comparative analysis conducted by the Czech Hydrometeorological Institute.

This could be seen as a Czech contribution to the latest „Climagate" affair, which revolves around whether or not was one of the world's top scientific centers on climate change deliberately trying to mislead the public, falsify scientific data and marginalize the so-called global warming skeptics.

Some critics say that 160 MB of data stolen from the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) of the University of East Anglia in Norwich in November 2009 prove it did. Others, including the CRU itself, say that the emails and other data published online were taken out of its context and there is no „conspiracy".

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"No manipulation, in any way"

In an attempt to clean its reputation, the CRU asked national meteorologic stations that agreed to be providing their data to the unit, to reveal their statistics so that the public can see whether or not they were falsified by the CRU.

One of the centers is the Czech Hydrometeorological Institute which says its data were not modified in any way.  

„I cannot speak for the other countries, but the Czech data were not in any way manipulated in order to make the global warming appear more significant," Ladislav Metelka from the Climatological Department of the ČHMÚ in Hradec Králové says. Director of Climatological and Meteorological Section Radim Tolsaz confirms this: "The outcome of the analysis is clear to us. They (the CRU) did not modify our data in any way".

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Cool down, dudes

In fact, the Czech institute says that the CRU presented the Czech temperature numbers as lower than they really were. This might have been an effect of the homogenization of the international data, or simply a mistake made during the transcription. 

„We have seen, for example, that instead of the average temperature of plus 1.5 degrees Celsius they wrote minus 1.5 degrees Celsius," Metelka says. „In effect, our data were cooled," he explains. However, this did not have any effect on the overall result of the CRU's report, Metelka added.

The institute also addressed the accusation that the CRU deliberately chose Czech meteorological stations (Prague-Ruzyně, Cheb, Brno-Tuřany, Ostrava-Mošnov) which are located in warmer zones. However, according to the institute's analysis, this is not the case.

„It appears that the selection of these stations did not affect the result. Some people believe that meteorological stations situated at airports (Prague-Ruzyně and Ostrava-Mošnov) are heated by the traffic, in the case of Ruzyně the station is 200 meters from the runway," Metelka explains.