UPADATED AT 8:30AM PST Sept 2nd-
More on SIDC’s decision to count a sunspeck (technically a “pore”) days after the fact. NOAA has now followed SIDC in adding a 0.5 sunspot where there was none before. But as commenter Basil points out, SIDC’s own records are in contrast to their last minute decision to count the sunspeck or “pore” on August 21.
There is an archive of the daily SIDC “ursigrams” here:
http://sidc.oma.be/html/SWAPP/dailyreport/dailyreport.html
If you select the ursigrams for August 22 and 23, you get the reported data for the 21st and 22nd:
August 21:
TODAY’S ESTIMATED ISN : 000, BASED ON 07 STATIONS.
SOLAR INDICES FOR 21 Aug 2008
WOLF NUMBER CATANIA : 011
10CM SOLAR FLUX : 067
AK CHAMBON LA FORET : ///
AK WINGST : 004
ESTIMATED AP : 005
ESTIMATED ISN : 000, BASED ON 14 STATIONS.
August 22:
TODAY’S ESTIMATED ISN : 000, BASED ON 11 STATIONS.
SOLAR INDICES FOR 22 Aug 2008
WOLF NUMBER CATANIA : 013
10CM SOLAR FLUX : 068
AK CHAMBON LA FORET : ///
AK WINGST : 003
ESTIMATED AP : 003
ESTIMATED ISN : 000, BASED ON 11 STATIONS.
In both cases, the daily estimated “International Sunspot Number” based on multiple stations, not just the Catania Wolf Number, was 000. So how did SIDC end up with positive values in the monthly report?
UPDATED at 2:42 PM PST Sept 1st –
After going days without counting the August 21/22 “sunspeck” NOAA and SIDC Brussels now says it was NOT a spotless month! Both data sets below have been recently revised.
Here is the SIDC data:
http://www.sidc.be/products/ri_hemispheric/
Here is the NOAA data:
ftp://ftp.ngdc.noaa.gov/STP/SOLAR_DATA/SUNSPOT_NUMBERS/MONTHLY
The NOAA data shows July as 0.5 but they have not yet updated for August as SIDC has. SIDC reports 0.5 for August. It will be interesting to see what NOAA will do.
SIDC officially counted that sunspeck after all. It only took them a week to figure out if they were going to count it or not, since no number was assigned originally.
But there appears to be an error in the data from the one station that reported a spot, Catania, Italy. No other stations monitoring that day reported a spot. Here is the drawing from that Observatory:
ftp://ftp.ct.astro.it/sundraw/OAC_D_20080821_063500.jpg
ftp://ftp.ct.astro.it/sundraw/OAC_D_20080822_055000.jpg
But according to Leif Svalgaard, “SIDC reported a spot in the south, while the spot(s) Catania [reported] was in the north.” This is a puzzle. See his exchange below.
Also, other observatories show no spots at all. For example, at the 150 foot solar solar tower at the Mount Wilson Observatory, the drawings from those dates show no spots at all:
ftp://howard.astro.ucla.edu/pub/obs/drawings/dr080821.jpg
ftp://howard.astro.ucla.edu/pub/obs/drawings/dr080822.jpg
Inquires have been sent, stay tuned.
Here is an exchange in comments from Leif Svalgaard.
——-
REPLY: So What gives Leif….? You yourself said these sunspecks weren’t given a number. I trusted your assessment. Hence this article. Given the Brussels folks decided to change their minds later, what is the rationale ? – Anthony
The active region numbering is done by NOAA, not by Brussels. The Brussels folks occasionally disagree. In this case, they did. Rudolf Wolf would not have counted this spot. Nor would I. What puzzles me is this:
21 7 4 3
22 8 4 4
The 3rd column are ’spots’ in the Northern hemisphere, and the 4th column are ’spots’ in the Southern hemisphere [both weighted with the ‘k’-factor: SSN = k(10g+s)]. But there weren’t any in the south. The Catania spot was at 15 degrees north latitude, IIRC. Maybe the last word is not in on this.
——–
Hmm….apparently there’s some backstory to this. There is a debate raging in comments to this story, be sure to check them. – Anthony
# MONTHLY REPORT ON THE INTERNATIONAL SUNSPOT NUMBER #
# from the SIDC (RWC-Belgium) #
#——————————————————————–#
AUGUST 2008
PROVISIONAL INTERNATIONAL NORMALIZED HEMISPHERIC SUNSPOT NUMBERS
Date Ri Rn Rs
__________________________________________________________________
1 0 0 0
2 0 0 0
3 0 0 0
4 0 0 0
5 0 0 0
6 0 0 0
7 0 0 0
8 0 0 0
9 0 0 0
10 0 0 0
11 0 0 0
12 0 0 0
13 0 0 0
14 0 0 0
15 0 0 0
16 0 0 0
17 0 0 0
18 0 0 0
19 0 0 0
20 0 0 0
21 7 4 3
22 8 4 4
23 0 0 0
24 0 0 0
25 0 0 0
26 0 0 0
27 0 0 0
28 0 0 0
29 0 0 0
30 0 0 0
31 0 0 0
__________________________________________________________________
MONTHLY MEAN : 0.5 0.3 0.2
========================================================
ORIGINAL STORY FOLLOWS:
Many have been keeping a watchful eye on solar activity recently. The most popular thing to watch has been sunspots. While not a direct indication of solar activity, they are a proxy for the sun’s internal magnetic dynamo. There have been a number of indicators recently that it has been slowing down.
August 2008 has made solar history. As of 00 UTC (5PM PST) we just posted the first spotless calendar month since June 1913. Solar time is measured by Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) so it is now September 1st in UTC time. I’ve determined this to be the first spotless calendar month according to sunspot data from NOAA’s National Geophysical Data Center, which goes back to 1749. In the 95 years since 1913, we’ve had quite an active sun. But that has been changing in the last few years. The sun today is a nearly featureless sphere and has been for many days:
Image from SOHO
And there are other indicators. For example, some solar forecasts have been revised recently because the forecast models haven’t matched the observations. Australia’s space weather agency recently revised their solar cycle 24 forecast, pushing the expected date for a ramping up of cycle 24 sunspots into the future by six months.
The net effect of having no sunspots is about 0.1% drop in the TSI (Total Solar Irradiance). My view is that TSI alone isn’t the main factor in modulating Earth’s climate.
I think it’s solar magnetism modulating Galactic Cosmic Rays, and hence more cloud nuclei from GCR’s, per Svensmark’s theory. We’ve had indications since October 2005 that the sun’s dynamo is slowing down. It dropped significantly then, and has remained that way since. Seeing no sunpots now is another indicator of that idling dynamo.
Graph of solar Geomagnetic Index (Ap):
Click for a larger image
Earth of course is a big heat sink, so it takes awhile to catch up to any changes that originate on the sun, but temperature drops indicated by 4 global temperature metrics (UAH, RSS and to a lesser degree HadCrit and GISS) show a significant and sharp cooling in 2007 and 2008 that has not rebounded.In the 20 years since “global warming” started life as a public issue with Dr. James Hansen’s testimony before congress in June 1988, we are actually cooler.
Click for a larger image
Reference: UAH lower troposphere data
Coincidence? Possibly, but nature will be the final arbiter of climate change debate, and I think we would do well to listen to what it’s saying now.
Joe D’Aleo of ICECAP also wrote some interesting things which I’ll reprint here.
…we have had a 0 sunspot calendar month (there have been more 30 day intervals without sunspots as recent as 1954 but they have crossed months). Following is a plot of the number of months with 0 sunspots by year over the period of record – 23 cycles since 1749.
See larger image here.
Note that cluster of zero month years in the early 1800s (a very cold period called the Dalton minimum – at the time of Charles Dickens and snowy London town and including thanks to Tambora, the Year without a Summer 1816) and again to a lesser degree in the early 1900s. These correspond to the 106 and 213 year cycle minimums. This would suggest that the next cycle minimum around 2020 when both cycles are in phase at a minimum could be especially weak. Even David Hathaway of NASA who has been a believer in the cycle 24 peak being strong, thinks the next minimum and cycle 25 maximum could be the weakest in centuries based on slowdown of the plasma conveyor belt on the sun.
In this plot of the cycle lengths and sunspot number at peak of the cycles, assuming this upcoming cycle will begin in 2009 show the similarity of the recent cycles to cycle numbers 2- 4, two centuries ago preceding the Dalton Minimum. This cycle 23 could end up the longest since cycle 4, which had a similar size peak and also similarly, two prior short cycles.
See larger image here.
Will this mean anything for climate in our near future? Possibly. But we’ll have to wait to see how this experiment pans out.
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When the sun dies
Where will they all hide?
I want to move from the country
Live a sin and a lie then
Nobody ever believes me
You tried to call me a cynic
But I’d say I’m realistic
You are the ones who have hurt me
I want to live in the city
See my reflections
They’re all I have now
See my reflections
They’re all and they’re all I…
When the sun dies
Where will they all hide?
When the sun dies
Where will they all hide?
I’ll be watching you
When the sun dies
Where will they all hide?
I’m starting work on my ski lodge and lift here in FL! Make your reservations now!
On a more serious note, it might be a good time to start stocking up on non-perishable foodstuffs. It’s a lot easier to get crops to grow with a half-degree temperature increase than it is to grow them under a blanket of snow and ice. Of course, The Great Goreacle & his hysterical hand puppet, James Hansen, will say that the approaching glaciers are proof that AGW is true, thus ensuring themselves of billions of dollars in
carbon creditssnake oil sales.Keep up the great work, Anthony. (And all you other
deniersskeptics out there in the land of science.)The sun appears to be blushing in the upper left hand quadrant.
It’s not your fault, sun.
Wonder how long into this quiet sun we’ll have to go before there’s so much cooling that funding gets channeled into studying the effects of solar activity (of all sorts) on the climate. But by then the AGW believers will be chanting on about how the cooling is masking the warming – can’t lose all that funding.
So B.C. above can refer to “the Great Goreacle”, but I get my hands slapped for “McOld” in the previous thread. And I know that I’ve seen lots and LOTS of nicks for Al Gore since I’ve been reading this site.
Nice double standard you have here, guys. Perhaps you need to realize that not all Dems are AGW true believers.
::grumble::
REPLY: Julie you have a point. We have a couple of moderators now, and I didn’t see the one above until just now. Perhaps I’m overly sensitive, but lately I’ve been getting a lot of spam posts calling McCain and Palin all sorts of names, and I delete those since they are part of a political push. So lets all just not call people names please. -Anthony
julie,
You got a point. But your other posts were charming. I think the intent is for you not to demean yourself. It is sound advice. Please keep posting.
In case someone is wondering how we can measure the magnetic field strength of the Sun, google Zeeman Effect.
BC, the main problem your ski resort will face in Florida isn’t lack of snow; it’s lack of mountains, hills, or even bumpy bits. You really ought to consult a reality expert. 🙂
Al Gore is just the messenger. Human nature is to shoot the messenger and say the messenger is out to make big bucks.
Robert, apparently you’re not familiar with the HUGE mountains of phosphate mine tailings, aka “gypsum stacks“, that we have scattered all across West-Central FL. 😉
Might as well use ’em for something, since the trace amounts of naturally-occurring radioactivity in ’em makes the ‘Loons go apoplectic anytime someone comes up with a proposed use for the material, such as roadbeds or foundation filler. (Thus saving thousands of acres of land from being mined, solely for dirt, each and every year.)
thus ensuring themselves of billions of dollars in
carbon creditssnake oil sales.That is terribly unjust and I must object: After all, when the carny sold you snake oil, you actually got the snake oil.
David, hanging– using only Gaia-friendly, organically-grown hemp rope, of course— hypocritical snake oil salesmen is the “green” way of dispatching them, these days. Carbon-emitting energetic projectiles are passé . Ya’ gotta keep up with the program, sir. Remind us to “CC” you on the next memo.
😉
Mr. Jones, you are absolutely correct. Would “Ponzi scheme scam artists” be more accurate?
Alright, I’ve taken up enough of Anthony’s bandwidth for tonight. 🙂
I lived long enough to see Alan Greenspend be discredited. Another Al, another milepost to reach.
Al Gore is just the messenger. Human nature is to shoot the messenger and say the messenger is out to make big bucks.
He’s a fraud and a liar, and yes, out to make big bucks off of that fraud. But, you can call him a “messenger” if you want, David.
Julie: I think “McOld” is hilarious. BTW, I voted for Gore in 2000. Now, I can’t stand him.
[REPLY: Nonetheless, we will refrain from renaming the current candidates. FWIW, I am a liberal skeptic, myself, for now a “big tent” Republican (for liberal reasons), but theoretically that could change at any time.–Evan]
::grumble::
Bear with us.
We do have to maintain some double standard around here.
Yet we have refrained from namegaming either of the current candidates (and, as I’m sure you can imagine, that is a sword that cuts both ways).
Heh. This is beginning to sound pretty much like I thought it would when I saw that solar cycle graph from an earlier posting. The actual Year 2020 might give new meaning to the saying that “hindsight is always 20/20.”
Mr. D’Aleo says: “These correspond to the 106 and 213 year cycle minimums. This would suggest that the next cycle minimum around 2020 when both cycles are in phase at a minimum could be especially weak.”
If this proves true, this sounds pretty ominous. Here is what I mean:
The PDO will be in the middle of its Cool Phase, and the AMO is set to switch over to being less active itself at some point. Dr. Gray, in his latest forecast of Atlantic Hurricane seasonal acitivity disabuses his readers of the notion that AGW is to blame for hurricanes (see page 34 here: http://typhoon.atmos.colostate.edu/Forecasts/2008/aug2008/aug2008.pdf). He also, thereby, provides a pretty approximate date for the AMO, although that is certainly not the only factor in hurricane formation. Still, I feel the case is pretty strong. If it follows Dr. Gray’s example of 25 years, and if it began in 1994 as his graphics seem to say, then that puts the switch back to less active (or Cool, if you like) to 2019.
If this is a minimum, even if it is minor in comparison with other historical minima such as Dalton’s or Maunder’s, that still does not bode well for that time frame (circa 2020). It take time to prepare for such things, if first one decides to prepare for such things, and particularly so on a national or global scale. And the way we are going now with AGW worriers dominating our political establishments is not good. Twelve years may seem like a long time; however, particularly if you have kids, you know it isn’t. We are not out of time yet, but we seem to be on the clock.
Uneasily, I shall say…I guess we shall see.
From Led Zepplin’s “Thank You”:
“If the sun refused to shine, I would still be lovin’ you.”
I told my wife today that I will be fulfilling that promise.
(Yes, that was our wedding song.)
statePoet1775, thanks for your reply. I do get the point – but at the same time, I wish you guys would de-link the whole Republican = AGW skeptic; Democrat = AGW true believer. It does not help our skeptical cause to blast all liberals as sheeple when it comes to AGW… because they are the ones we need to reach. I should know – I’m one of them who was convinced (converted??) by what I read here – and I tell whoever will listen about this site.
That being said, I’m glad you like my (infrequent) comments. 🙂
re: the Sun – personally, I’m looking forward to skiing in the Texas Hill Country in the winter of 2014-15 🙂
[snip] (trying for a snip)?
[and succeeding~charles the moderator]
Or how about Biden his time since he’s next in line?
julie,
I would guess the strongest skeptics are my herd, libertarians. I was agnostic on AGW but thought we could handle it without destroying the economy in the process. Now I even doubt AGW. This is great drama.
David G. Mills
What should we do when the messenger distorts the message?
e.g. by inflating the ocean rise by some 2000%?
Sen. Kerry appears to excel in ad hominem attacks claiming: “Palin as a member of the “flat-earth caucus,” and “He’s chosen somebody who doesn’t believe climate change is man-made.”
Perhaps Sen. Kerry should read Watt’s post above on the sun.
<a href=”http://www.climatechange.alaska.gov/docs/govrpt_jul08.pdf”Governor Palin stated:
During her Newsmax interview, when asked: “What is your take on global warming and how is it affecting our country?” Palin replied:
“If the sun refused to shine, I would still be lovin’ you.”
I like the Hendrix take. Less mushy.
Corrections to links:
D.53 (2008). See
IPCC Central Tendency of 2C/century: Still rejected.
Keenlyside et al.
Governor Palin Climate Change Sub-Cabinet
Koutsoyiannis et al 2008: On the credibility of climate predictions