How well do the central England temperature and the England and Wales precipitation series represent the climate of the UK?

Abstract

In this paper we compare the Central England Temperature (CET) and England and Wales Precipitation (EWP) series with temperature and precipitation records from 24 individual meteorological stations throughout the UK over a 41-year period 1964-2004. With a single exception, the correlation of CET monthly means with those of all local stations was highly significant (p < 0.001). Correlations with EWP were not as large, but for the most part were highly significant; exceptions occurring increasingly in the most northerly stations. Because of their general availability, the CET and EWP series will continue to be popular, and their use in a range of broad studies of UK climate appears to be justified.

Exploring the universal ecological responses to climate change in a univoltine butterfly

“…Previous researchers have shown that CET data are representative of the UK as a whole (Croxton et al . ), and paired monthly correlations between the regional and CET data for the years between 1910 and 1981 (encompassing the overlap in CET and regional temperature data for all years of NHM specimen collection) justify this conclusion (all Pearson's correlations > 0·96). In addition, pairwise comparisons of mean monthly air temperatures between the two record types are not significantly different (Wilcoxon signed‐rank test; P > 0·05), except for August temperatures ( P = 0·02) where the regional data are warmer than CET data by 0·42 °C on average.…”

How do UK climate scenarios compare with recent observations?

“…Monthly mean EWP starts in 1766 and is representative of the land area of England and Wales. Both CET and EWP have been shown to be representative of the UK climate with CET having larger spatial correlations than EWP, but even the latter was highly representative for the most part (Jones and Hulme, 1997;Croxton et al, 2006). Given the length of these two records, it is possible to estimate an approximation of 'natural' climate variability.…”

Vertebrate phenology at similar latitudes: temperature responses differ between Poland and the United Kingdom

“…html). Because the Welsh site is close to the western coast of the UK, the Central England record may not be representative here, particularly in winter (Croxton et al 2006). Consequently, we obtained temperature data from Aberporth meteorological station (ca.…”