- Bishop Hill blog

The Science Media Centre has entered the fray on the Bengtsson affair, publishing one of its usual "expert reaction" pieces. Readers will recall that after the Oxburgh affair nearly every expert the SMC quoted was among those accused of wrongdoing regarding Climategate. It's a similar story today, with the SMC choosing to quote Bob Ward (an expert in what way?!), Myles Allen (who sits on the editorial board of the journal involved) and Simon Lewis, who can bring nothing to the party except a penchant for green activism. Only Tim Palmer might pass muster as a neutral.

This disclaimer at the bottom of the piece intrigued me:

Myles Allen is on the Editorial Board of Environmental Research Letters but played no part in the review of or editorial decisions on the Bengtsson paper. He states: “I wasn’t even aware of it until yesterday, and still haven’t seen the paper — nor do I wish to see it, since rejected papers are meant to be kept confidential.”

Environmental Research Letters is the journal that is accused of rejecting Bengtsson's paper on political grounds rather than scientific ones, but it is better known as the organ chosen by John Cook for the publication of his infamous 97% consensus paper.

Take a look at ERL's editorial board:

Myles Allen University of Oxford, UK
End to end climate change, from emissions to impacts, and its implications, global climate simulations of the future, human and natural influences on climate contribute to observed climate change and extreme weather risk, climate change mitigation and remediation policy, including geoengineering
Michelle L Bell Yale University, USA
Air pollution, ozone, climate change, environmental health, epidemiology, climate policy
Peter H Gleick The Pacific Institute, Oakland, USA
Climate and water, freshwater, human right to water, water-use efficiency, conservation, water supply and sanitation, water conflicts, soft path to water
José Goldemberg Universidade de São Paulo, Brazil
Nuclear physics, environment and energy
Giles Harrison University of Reading, UK
Physics of atmospheric aerosol particles, development of instruments for physical atmospheric measurements
Tracey Holloway University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA
Air pollution chemistry, atmospheric models, energy use, public health assessments, climate policy
Jakob Mann Technical University of Denmark, Denmark
Renewable energy, wind energy, turbulence and modelling
Stefan Rahmstorf Potsdam University, Germany
Climate change, past, present and future climate change, role of oceans in climate change

It seems to me that Allen is the member of the board with expertise in climate sensitivity, the subject of Bengtsson's paper. It's therefore surprising to me that he wasn't even aware of the submission. I wonder which editor it was.