Quality of US Climate Data

In April 1978 there were over 6,000 surface stations, and now we have dropped down to around 1,200. Of these stations, there are two main types. There are stations that are found in urban areas, which are more likely to be contaminated by local heat sources (see the photos above), and then there are stations in rural areas, which are less likely to be contaminated by local heat sources.

So, we know somewhere around 4,800 surface stations dropped out of monitoring temperatures. The vast majority of the stations that dropped out were rural stations. This is unfortunate because the rural stations are the ones that tend to give the most accurate data (because of less urban heat contamination.)'

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