7/12/13, "Sun's bizarre behavior: Weakest solar cycle in 100 years," LA Times, Deborah Netburn
.
"Those of us who have been paying attention to the sun this year have been a little ... disappointed. 2013 was supposed to be the year of solar maximum -- the peak of an 11-year cycle when the number of sunspots that mar the sun's surface is at its highest.
These sunspots, which are actually cool areas on the sun's surface caused by intense magnetic activity, are the sites of spectacular solar flares and CMEs, or coronal mass ejections, which can send billions of tons of solar material hurtling into space.
But this year, the serious solar fireworks show never materialized.
Sure, we've seen a handful of major solar flares, and a few extra fast CMEs, but scientists say our current solar maximum, known as solar maximum 24, is the weakest one in 100 years.
And some scientists believe that the 25th solar maximum could be even weaker.
To help us understand what's going on here, the American Astronomical Society asked three leading solar scientists to provide an update on the 24th solar maximum at a news conference Thursday.
It turns out there is some controversy in the scientific community about exactly why this year's solar maximum has been so unspectacular.
One theory is that this year's weak solar maximum is part of a 100-year solar cycle. Graphs going back to the 1700s show that the number of sunspots during solar maximums in the early part of the last three centuries since humanity has been studying the solar cycle is much lower than the number of sunspots during solar maximums in the latter half of those centuries.
When asked what caused the 100-year cycles, the scientists admitted they did not know.
Other scientists are not convinced that this year's weak solar maximum is part of a 100-year cycle, and have not ruled out the possibility that the sun might be on the verge of a Maunder Minimum, a period of time when it exhibits almost no sunspots.
The last Maunder Minimum was observed in 1645. However, the last time there was a Maunder Minimum, it was preceded by a relatively strong solar maximum.
Nobody knows exactly what is going on, because we've only been studying the sun for such a tiny sliver of its life, and so much of its behavior is a mystery." via iceagenow.info
.
===================================
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The Irish Times reports US scientists wouldn't go on record predicting what the unusual solar activity might mean, while a UK scientist suggested Earth's climate could be affected:
. .
7/12/13, "Sun’s bizarre activity may trigger another ice age," IrishTimes.com, Dick Ahlstrom
.
"The sun is acting bizarrely and scientists have no idea why. Solar activity is in gradual decline, a change from the norm which in the past triggered a 300-year-long mini ice age.
Three
leading solar scientists presented the very latest data about the
weakening solar activity at a teleconference yesterday in Boulder,
Colorado, organised by the American Astronomical Society. It featured experts from Nasa,
the High Altitude Observatory and the National Solar Observatory who
described how solar activity, as measured by the formation of sunspots
and by massive explosions on the sun’s surface, has been falling
steadily since the mid-1940s.
The sun goes through
a regular 11-year cycle with a maximum, when sunspot activity is at its
peak, followed by a minimum when sunspot numbers are reduced and are
smaller and less energetic. We are supposed to be at a peak of activity,
at solar maximum.
The current situation, however, is outside the norm
and the number of sunspots seems in steady decline. The sun was
undergoing “bizarre behaviour” said Dr Craig DeForest of the society.
“The
sun’s current maximum activity period is very late and very weak,
leading to speculation that the sunspot cycle itself could be shutting
down or entering a dormant phase,” he said before the teleconference.
Irish
solar science specialist Dr Ian Elliott, formerly of the Dublin
Institute for Advanced Studies, quoted from figures released by Nasa on
July 1st. It had asked an expert group to predict sunspot activity using
models, with an upper limit and a lower limit.
The
predictions suggested the monthly average sunspot total should range
between 90 and 140, but in fact the present monthly average is only 67,
Dr Elliott said. A typical average at maximum during much of the early
20th century was about 200.
“It is the smallest solar maximum we have seen in 100
years,” said Dr David Hathaway of Nasa. We are currently in solar cycle
number 24 which is about half as active as cycle 23, but cycle 25 is
likely to be smaller again due to changes in the magnetic flux on the
sun’s surface,” he said.
Dr Giuliana de Toma of
the High Altitude Observatory acknowledged the clear signs that solar
activity was in decline but this did not mean the earth was heading for
another “Maunder Minimum”. This was a time between 1645 and 1725 when
solar activity was extremely low or nonexistent, a situation which
caused a mini ice age.
The fall-off in sunspot
activity still has the potential to affect our weather for the worse, Dr
Elliott said. Research by Prof Mike Lockwood [see below] at the University of
Reading (UK) showed how low solar activity could alter the position of the
jet stream over the north Atlantic, causing severe cold during winter
months. This was likely the cause of the very cold and snowy winters
during 2009 and 2010, Dr Elliott said.
“It all
points to perhaps another little ice age,” he said. “It seems likely we
are going to enter a period of very low solar activity and could mean we
are in for very cold winters.”
And while the researchers in the US said the data showed a decline in
activity, they had no way to predict what that might mean for the
future."
========================
UK Prof. Lockwood's 2010 ERL peer reviewed study linked low solar activity to colder weather in Europe. This is a change from his earlier (2007) view on the issue:
4/14/2010, "Are cold winters in Europe associated with low solar activity?" Environmental Research Letters, Lockwood et al.
"We stress that this is a regional and seasonal effect relating to
European winters and not a global effect. Average solar activity has declined rapidly
since 1985 and cosmogenic isotopes suggest an 8% chance of a return to Maunder
minimum conditions within the next 50 years (Lockwood 2010 Proc. R. Soc. A 466
303–29): the results presented here indicate that, despite hemispheric warming, the
UK and Europe could experience more cold winters than during recent decades....
Acknowledgments
"The CET data are provided by the UK Meteorological Office and the HadCRUT3v data set
are compiled by the UK Meteorological Office and the Climate Research Unit, University of
East Anglia, UK. The northern hemisphere temperature reconstructions were obtained via
the World Data Centre (WDC) for Paleoclimatology, Boulder, USA and the interplanetary
and geomagnetic data via the WDC for Solar Terrestrial Physics, Chilton, UK. The cosmic
ray data were generated by the Bartol Research Institute, University of Delaware, USA,
and the PMOD TSI data composite by the World Radiation Centre, Davos, Switzerland.
We thank the many scientists who contributed to these data sets and others for valuable
discussions."...
===================================
On sunspots in 2011 by AP:
6/14/11, "Sunspots May Disappear, Sun Going Into Unusual Quiet Mode: Scientists," AP, Seth Borenstein
"The sun is heading into an unusual and extended hibernation, scientists predict. Around 2020, sunspots may disappear for years, maybe decades.
But scientists say it is nothing to worry about....And it might mean a little less increase in global warming.
It's happened before, but not for a couple centuries.
"The solar cycle is maybe going into hiatus, sort of like a summertime TV show," said National Solar Observatory associate director Frank Hill, the lead author of a scientific presentation at a solar physics conference in New Mexico.
Scientists don't know why the sun is going quiet. But all the signs are there.
Hill and colleagues based their prediction on three changes in the sun spotted by scientific teams:
Weakening sunspots, fewer streams spewing from the poles of the sun's corona and a disappearing solar jet stream....
Experts say the sun has already been unusually quiet for about four years with few sunspots – higher magnetic areas that appear as dark spots.
The enormous magnetic field of the sun dictates the solar cycle, which includes sunspots, solar wind and ejection of fast-moving particles that sometimes hit Earth....
Matt Penn of the National Solar Observatory, another study co-author, said sunspot magnetic fields have been steadily decreasing in strength since 1998. If they continue on the current pace, their magnetic fields will be too weak to become spots as of 2022 or so, he said.
Jet streams on the sun's surface and below are also early indicators of solar storm activity, and they haven't formed yet for the 2020 cycle. That indicates that there will be little or delayed activity in that cycle, said Hill, who tracks jet streams....
There are questions about what this means for Earth's climate. Three times in the past the regular 11-year solar cycle has gone on an extended vacation – at the same time as cool periods on Earth.
Skeptics of man-made global warming from the burning of fossil fuels have often pointed to solar radiation as a possible cause of a warming Earth, but they are in the minority among scientists....
(Frank) Hill (the study's lead author) and colleagues wouldn't discuss the effects of a quiet sun on temperature or global warming.
"If our predictions are true, we'll have a wonderful experiment that will determine whether the sun has any effect on global warming," Hill said."
On sunspots in 2011 by AP:
6/14/11, "Sunspots May Disappear, Sun Going Into Unusual Quiet Mode: Scientists," AP, Seth Borenstein
"The sun is heading into an unusual and extended hibernation, scientists predict. Around 2020, sunspots may disappear for years, maybe decades.
But scientists say it is nothing to worry about....And it might mean a little less increase in global warming.
It's happened before, but not for a couple centuries.
"The solar cycle is maybe going into hiatus, sort of like a summertime TV show," said National Solar Observatory associate director Frank Hill, the lead author of a scientific presentation at a solar physics conference in New Mexico.
Scientists don't know why the sun is going quiet. But all the signs are there.
Hill and colleagues based their prediction on three changes in the sun spotted by scientific teams:
Weakening sunspots, fewer streams spewing from the poles of the sun's corona and a disappearing solar jet stream....
Experts say the sun has already been unusually quiet for about four years with few sunspots – higher magnetic areas that appear as dark spots.
The enormous magnetic field of the sun dictates the solar cycle, which includes sunspots, solar wind and ejection of fast-moving particles that sometimes hit Earth....
Matt Penn of the National Solar Observatory, another study co-author, said sunspot magnetic fields have been steadily decreasing in strength since 1998. If they continue on the current pace, their magnetic fields will be too weak to become spots as of 2022 or so, he said.
Jet streams on the sun's surface and below are also early indicators of solar storm activity, and they haven't formed yet for the 2020 cycle. That indicates that there will be little or delayed activity in that cycle, said Hill, who tracks jet streams....
There are questions about what this means for Earth's climate. Three times in the past the regular 11-year solar cycle has gone on an extended vacation – at the same time as cool periods on Earth.
Skeptics of man-made global warming from the burning of fossil fuels have often pointed to solar radiation as a possible cause of a warming Earth, but they are in the minority among scientists....
(Frank) Hill (the study's lead author) and colleagues wouldn't discuss the effects of a quiet sun on temperature or global warming.
"If our predictions are true, we'll have a wonderful experiment that will determine whether the sun has any effect on global warming," Hill said."
---------------------------------------------
In 2012 Grantham said solar activity's connection to Earth's climate was being considered as a possible reason for 15+ years of flat global temperatures:
Feb. 6, 2012, "Anthropogenic global warming 'stopped' in 1997…and in 1996, 1995, 1982, 1981, 1980, 1979, 1978 and 1972," Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), Bob Ward, Dr. James Rydge
"Climate scientists are interested in what the noisy global average temperature data of the last 15 years shows us. They do not conclude that increasing concentrations of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere have suddenly stopped causing the Earth to warm.... But they do suspect that other factors may be 'masking' the anthropogenic global warming trend, such as a cooling effect caused by an increase in the amount in the atmosphere of aerosols from the burning fossil fuels which reflect sunlight,
or changes in solar activity. "...
========================
In 2007, an elite science society, AGU, received a US taxpayer grant via NSF to study whether sunspots effected rainfall. NASA climate science celebrity Gavin Schmidt laughed off any chance of connection between solar activity and Earth's climate, saying, “If they (solar cycle effects) were there, they’d have been found already.” To Schmidt, it's "settled science," 100% of solar science has already been discovered.
8/17/2007, "Do sunspots foretell heavy rains-and disease?" NBCNews.com, Bryn Nelson, MSNBC.
"The take-home message, researchers concluded in the latest issue of the Journal of Geophysical Research, is that careful scrutiny of past climatic conditions may generate better long-term predictions of destructive weather events in the future. That knowledge, in turn, may provide a crucial head start to those working to limit fallout such as erosion, flooding and mosquito-borne diseases like malaria and Rift Valley Fever.
J. Curt Stager, the report’s lead author and a paleoclimatologist at Paul Smith’s College in Paul Smiths, N.Y., said reaction to his research has been decidedly mixed, due in part to the checkered past of sunspot predictions.
“I’m afraid it suffers from the same failings as most of the purported surface climate-solar cycle connections,” said Gavin Schmidt, a climate modeler at NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York City. In an e-mail, Schmidt said that even uncorrelated “noise” in records with decadal variability, such as rainfall measurements, can sometimes yield apparent patterns if someone looks hard enough. But it doesn’t make those correlations significant.
“People have been looking for solar cycle effects in climate for 200 years,” Schmidt said. “If they were there, they’d have been found already.”
David Verardo, director of the National Science Foundation’s Paleoclimate Program, nevertheless praised the new results in a statement as “an important step in applying paleoclimate analyses to predicting future environmental conditions and their impacts on society.” The foundation provided major funding for the study....The next crest, or solar maximum, is expected to arrive between 2011 and 2012....
Solar physicists cannot yet explain the 11-year rhythm of sunspots. Even so, observers have noted their cyclical waxing and waning since the first half of the 19th Century. Far more recently, satellite data have documented slight increases in the sun’s energy every time the sunspot numbers peak.
In Stager’s study, he and his colleagues compiled evidence suggesting that those solar peaks also correlate with significant up-ticks in the levels of East Africa’s Lake Victoria and other regional lakes. The widespread effect, the researchers suggested, was mediated primarily through unusually heavy rainfall that began roughly one year before each solar maximum.
“The weak part,” Stager conceded, “is we don’t know exactly why it works.”...
Only time, and perhaps more research, will tell if the sunspot-rainfall prognostication fares better in the coming years."
==========================
"THE SUN AND SUNSPOTS: Can an increase or decrease in sunspot activity affect the Earth's climate?," crh.NOAA.gov
parag. 3, "Sunspots are quite large as an average size is about the same size as the Earth....
"Sunspots, Solar Flares, Coronal Mass Ejections and their influence on Earth:
parag. 5, "But the jury is still out on how much sunspots can (or do) affect the Earth's climate....
(last parag.): So the question remains, do solar minimums help to create periods of cooler than normal weather, and do solar maximums help to cause drought over sections of Earth? This question is not easily answered due to the immensely complex interaction between our atmosphere, land and oceans. In addition, there is evidence that some of the major ice ages Earth has experienced were caused by Earth being deviated from its "average" 23.5 degrees tilt on its axis. The Earth has tilted anywhere from near 22 degrees to 24.5 degrees on its axis. The number of sunspots alone does not alter the overall solar emissions much at all. However, the increased/decreased magnetic activity which accompanies sunspot maxima/minima directly influences the amount of ultraviolet radiation which moves through the upper atmosphere."
=============================
If a "price" should be paid for "climate science denialism," as Mr. Sargent suggests, an especially high price should be paid by science deniers like himself who have used their bully pulpit to encourage transfer of hundreds of billions of US taxpayer dollars for excess CO2 that only exists in China.
Mr. Sargent says that in 2010 it was being "scornful" of climate science for anyone to suggest sunspots had an effect on global warming. Among other things, in 2010 a UK scientist published a peer reviewed study finding lower sunspot activity did cause cooler temperatures in Europe. In 2012, Grantham Institute said they were considering solar activity to explain 15+ years of flat global temperatures. No one says Mr. Sargent or LCV has to agree, but if anyone's "heaping scorn" on climate science it's Sargent and LCV. As of 2013, some scientists say they just don't know enough to predict what effect if any sunspots will have on Earth's climate. In other words, it's not "settled science," except to profiteers who attack, harass, ridicule, for the purpose of silencing anyone who impedes their goal of diverting more billions of US taxpayer dollars for the non-existent problem of excess US CO2. China controls global CO2.
8/21/13, "Paying no price whatsoever for climate science denialism," Washington Post, Plum Line,
You really should be paying close attention to the ongoing battle between the League of Conservation Voters and Tea Party Senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin. In addition to being highly entertaining, there’s a great deal at stake here — whether it’s possible to hold public officials accountable for climate science denialism.
Just to catch you up, LCV recently announced plans to launch a $2 million campaign attacking Republicans in Congress for climate change denialism, including a TV ad attacking Johnson....
Back in 2010, Johnson heaped scorn on climate science and blamed “sunspots” for global warming, though a spokesperson later backed away from the remark."...
=======================
6/4/12, "Climate change stunner: USA leads world in CO2 cuts since 2006," Vancouver Observer, Saxifrage
"Not only that, but as my top chart shows, US CO2 emissions are falling even faster than what President Obama pledged in the global Copenhagen Accord."...Here is the biggest shocker of all: the average American’s CO2 emissions are down to levels not seen since 1964 --over half a century ago. …Coal is the number two source of CO2 for Americans. Today the average American burns an amount similar to what they did in 1955, and even less than they did in the 1940s. …It is exactly America’s historical role of biggest and dirtiest that makes their sharp decline in CO2 pollution so noteworthy and potentially game changing at the global level.”...
-----------------------------------------------------------
News of US CO2 plunge has been described as:
- “Surprising,“
- “little noticed,“
- “dramatic,“
- “stunner,“
- “most people are surprised to learn,“
- “quiet but tremendous progress,”
- “major long term implications,”
- “game changing,”
- “shocker,”
- “huge contrast to the forecast.”
Change in global CO2 US v China, 2005 to 2011, energy related, US EIA (US Energy Dept.), WSJ, April 2013
4/18/13, "Rise in U.S. Gas Production Fuels Unexpected Plunge in Emissions," WSJ, Russell Gold
"U.S. carbon-dioxide emissions have fallen dramatically in recent years, in large part because the country is making more electricity with natural gas instead of coal."...
=================================
6/10/13, 2012 US CO2 continues to drop. Chart from IEA report, China continues to rise. (Above chart is thru 2011) :
======================
.
1/29/13, "China Uses Nearly as Much Coal as Rest of World Combined, EIA Says," Wall St. Journal, Cassandra Sweet
"China's use of coal has grown quickly over the last decade and now rivals the amount of coal consumed by the rest of the world combined, the U.S. Energy Information Administration said Tuesday."...
===============================
- May 2012, Washington Post on China CO2:
"China was the biggest contributor (in 2011), with carbon dioxide output growing 9.3 percent." (3rd parag.)
.
==============================
Developing countries CO2 emissions from fossil fuel far exceed those of industrialized nations:
"Although emissions from developing countries now dominate, the industrial countries set the world on its global warming path."...(scroll down to 3rd graph, this text 2 parags. below)
7/23/13, "Fossil fuel use pushes carbon dioxide emissions into dangerous territory," Earth Policy Institute, Emily E. Adams
======================
China emitted 4 billion tons more CO2 in 2011 than the US:
2/2/12, "Carbon pollution up to 2 million pounds per second," AP, Seth Borenstein
"The overwhelming majority of the increase was from China, the world’s biggest carbon dioxide polluter. Of the planet’s top 10 polluters, the United States and Germany were the only countries that reduced their carbon dioxide emissions....
The latest pollution numbers, calculated by the Global Carbon Project, a joint venture of the Energy Department and the Norwegian Research Council, show that worldwide carbon dioxide levels are 54 percent higher than the 1990 baseline."...
=====================================
.
15+ year "pause" in global warming:
.
1/18/13, “Climate change: scientists puzzle over halt in global warming,” Der Spiegel, by Axel Bojanowski (translation from German)
"The British Met Office forecast even more recently that the temperature interval could continue at a high level until the end of 2017 - despite the rapidly increasing emissions of greenhouse gases. Then global warming would pause 20 years."..."The exact reasons of the temperature standstill since 1998, are not yet understood, says climate researcher Doug Smith of the Met Office."...
UK Met Office chart via Der Spiegel
.
=================
.
6/11/13, "What to make of a warming plateau," NY Times, Justin Gillis
.
======================================
.
11/29/12, 134 scientists write to UN Sec. Gen. Ban Ki-Moon, asking him to desist from blaming climate disasters on global warming that hasn't happened:
.
"Global warming that has not occurred cannot have caused the extreme weather of the past few years."...“The NOAA “State of the Climate in 2008” report asserted that 15 years or more without any statistically-significant warming would indicate a discrepancy between observation and prediction. Sixteen years without warming have therefore now proven that the models are wrong by their creators’ own criterion.”…(2nd parag. fr. end of letter). …"Policy actions that aim to reduce CO2 emissions are unlikely to influence future climate. Policies need to focus on preparation for, and adaptation to, all dangerous climatic events, however caused."...Special to Financial Post, 12/10/12
.
===================================
.
BBC discussion suggests a pause in confiscation of taxpayer dollars in the face of dual problems, that temperatures have remained flat since 1998 while CO2 has increased. Money was diverted based on predictions that didn't happen which "peer reviewed literature regards as established yet unexplained:"
7/22/13, "Andrew Neil on Ed Davey climate change interview critics," BBC, Andrew Neil
Multi-billion dollar "spending decisions, paid for by consumers and taxpayers...might not have been taken (at least to the same degree or with the same haste) if global warming was not quite the imminent threat it has been depicted....The recent standstill in global temperatures is a puzzle. Experts do not know why it is occurring or how long it will last....There is no consensus. Extensive peer-reviewed literature regards it as established yet unexplained. It is widely accepted that the main climate models which inform government policy did not predict it."...(subhead, "Reputable evidence")
.
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In 2012, $18.5 billion was taken out of the economy by regulation in the name of CO2 terror. Sargent and LCV don't need congress.
.
.
$18.5 billion worth of climate regulations were issued in 2012 alone. Without congress. "The vast majority of “laws” governing the
United States are not passed by Congress but are issued as regulations.".
-----------------------------------------
"In 2011, the US Congress passed a total of 81 new “laws” while government agencies issued 3,807 new regulations."
.
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A few examples of climate cash sought in 2011:
.
1/11/11, "Big Money in Climate Change: Who Gives, Who Gets," Al Fin
.
.
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