Animation courtesy Michael Ronayne. Click for larger, slower speed animation
NASA’s David Hathaway just recently updated his solar cycle prediction and has pushed cycle 24 into the future a little more once again. Though to read his latest update on 10/03/08 at his prediction page here, you wouldn’t know it, because the page is mostly tech speak and reviews of semi relevant papers.
However, there is one graphic, the familar one above, that has been updated and tells the story best. Michael Ronayne was kind enough to provide an animation (above) that shows the march of time as far as solar cycle 24 predictions go. With the latest update (static image here) the startup of solar cycle 24 has been pushed into 2009.
This isn’t the first time NASA has moved the goalpost. Back in March I did a story on NASA moving the goal post then, and since then they’ve moved the cycle ahead twice, once in April and again now in October.
NASA isn’t the only one having to update predictions, NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center (SWPC) has also had to make several adjustments to their graphic:
Animation courtesy Michael Ronayne. Click for larger animation
And there is more change in the current thinking on sunspots. As Michael Ronayne writes:
After ignoring sunspots for two and a half years the New York Times finally ran a story and BLOG posting on the current state of the Sun.
Sunspots Are Fewest Since 1954, but Significance Is Unclear
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/03/science/space/03sun.html
Climate and the Spotless Sun
http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/10/03/climate-and-the-spotless-sun/
Details of the recent NASA reports on Ulysses and the Spotless Sun were minimal and the Times failed to mention NASA’s report that the Sun was dimming. The Times reporter speculated on possible connections between solar activity and Earth climate but such speculation was of concern to some Times readers who made their views know in the Dot Earth BLOG. Perhaps the Times should avoid controversial phrases such as “Little Ice Age” in the future. I decided to make a post on the Dot Earth BLOG about some of the graphic records I have been collecting of past SWPC and NASA sunspots predictions. Apparently my input was not fit to print because the moderator did not allow it to be posted to Dot Earth. Attached is the text of my submission to the New York Times. I thought the posting was quite balanced and am not sure what warranted it being rejected.
As you review the SWPC and NASA predictions, note that the outer envelope for the onset of Solar Cycle 24 for the SWPC Low Prediction (http://www.swpc.noaa.gov/SolarCycle/SC24/ssn_predict.gif) is January 2009, while the NASA prediction has been moved out to July 2009. Watch the two animations carefully and note where the changes were made in the NASA predictions.
I am writing a segment on Sunspot Predictions which will be posted in Wikipedia, at the following URL, when it is done:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunspot
It will be interesting to see when solar minimum actually occurs. I suspect that we will be in for a long wait. I will keep the above animations current as SWPC and NASA post their monthly updates.
Lots of scrambling going on to get in tune with the sun these days.
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Should they rename these graphs from “prediction” to “projection”, or perhaps even, “best guess”?
And when they finally get it right as for start, they still don’t know how high it will go, and finally they don’t know when it will end.
Like a recipe in the kitchen that doesn’t quite have the key ingredient, the models are missing something.
I have watched as the 2nd graph slowly got undercut by the numbers coming in, and was wondering when they would react as the beachfront prediction house fell into the sea of noise. Sorry, NASA, we love you, but you need to rethink this whole thing.
Michael Ronayne should email the entry to Andy Revkin at DotEarth. Sometimes the links get caught in a spam filter. I’ve found Andy Revkin to be a fair moderator, over there. Mike M. has a recent, telling, comment on the solar thread. Dee Norris has an entry on that thread, too.
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“the page is mostly tech speak and reviews of semi relevant papers.”
Isn’t that what they do when they don’t have a clue about what is happening but want to convince people they are competent?
I honestly think they don’t have the foggiest notion of what the Sun is going to do or why and they are in “I gotta protect my job and my reputation” mode.
It is what it is, not what Dr. Hathaway says it will be. This just goes to show us that they don’t have it all figured out after all. Now the game is all about preservation of funding. Hmmm, maybe they can create a “solar crisis” and get a lot of federal funds to bail us out. I mean, how much does the US invest in the Sun? If we increased that investment in research maybe we could get it to do what we need it to do, right?
[…] post: NASA moves the goalposts on Solar Cycle 24 again Tags: Climate Change, earth, nasa, politics, science, solar cycle 24, solar-cycle, space Category: […]
You will enjoy this, Leif… fact, everybody reading here will (go, Dee!):
“…(there is one exception to the consensus, a Leif Somebody, but we ASCer’s…”
Stop Anthropogenic Solar Cooling Now!
http://deenorris.wordpress.com/2008/10/05/stop-anthropogenic-solar-cooling-now/
Nasa have been consitently wrong about this solar cycle.That graph looks way too steep. Looking foreward to the next ‘correction’ . Note how the peak of the graph is now considerably smaller than predicted. Deep minimum, deepest for 50 years.
[…] UPDATE (10/6/2008): For those who doubt the scientific validity of ASC, here is poof of the delayed start for Solar Cycle 24 – NASA moves the goalposts on Solar Cycle 24 again […]
Has anyone done stats on the correlations between solar-system-barycentre and solar patterns and past climate records?
In layman’s language, I have a hunch that
(1) you need to see the Sun in relation to all the planets – there is a centre of gravity to the whole system that can end up outside the Sun, and when that happens you have a lot of pull on the Sun, which is actually a good thing for generating solar irradiance and solar magnetic flux;
(2) there is a strong correlation, reasonably verifiable, with records we already have of climate patterns in recent history – say back to the Roman Warm Period;
(3) this is the prime missing link which will enable true longterm climate predictions – except that volcanoes, supernovae, and other human activities (not CO2 production) might also play in unpredictably.
@Lucy Skywalker:
See Landscheidt’s New Little Ice Age Instead of Global Warming?
http://bourabai.narod.ru/landscheidt/new-e.htm
Look out Lucy, there’s a Leif on the wing.
==========================
[…] UPDATE (10/6/2008): For those who doubt the scientific validity of ASC, here is poof of the delayed start for Solar Cycle 24 – NASA moves the goalposts on Solar Cycle 24 again […]
[…] Comment on NASA moves the goalposts on Solar Cycle 24 again by The … Tags: Climate Change, global-warming, halloween, hurricanes, local-issues, picture, politics, […]
Lucy Skywalker (02:45:16) :
Has anyone done stats on the correlations between solar-system-barycentre and solar patterns and past climate records?
Image you have a rod with two identical, heavy balls that can slide along the rod [say they have a hole in them through which the rod runs]. Now, slide the balls such that they are at opposite ends of the rod. The barycenter of this system is now halfway between the balls. Now slide one of balls a bit towards the middle. That will move the barycenter. That the barycenter moves will not ‘jerk’ the other ball [the Sun] around.
See also my answer to Carsten at http://wattsupwiththat.com/2008/10/05/new-solar-cycle-not-packing-much-punch/
[…] Read More: wattsupwiththat.com Tags: NASA, nyt, Science, scientists, solar, Sun Related Posts […]
NASA/Hathaway is desperate for cycle 24 to be bigger than 23…still. I can see several examples of the sun having steep increases in activity, but not after long periods of quiet.
Great animations. They are really helpful in understanding the situation.
Cycle 23 is now at least 12 years, 3 months long. It is possible that August was the bottom of the cycle but we will have to continue watching for several more months to see if the cycle 24 spots increase and continue to outnumber cycle 23 spots.
Solar cycle length theory indicates that we should move into a cooling period now given the above-normal length of this cycle (especially if it continues) but there may also be some lag (several years) before the full effects hit Earth’s climate.
of course, when cycle 24 does finally rev up, they will claim that it’s exactly as they predicted all along… much like they do with their precious climate models.
“Oh yes, the last decade of cooling..er…uhm…”non-warming” is well within modeled parameters as we’ve tuned…er…uhm… “improved” our modeling techniques.”
A tad OT but hilarious!
http://www.theonion.com/content/news_briefs/man_with_food_in_beard
Climate related food stuffs?
LOL
It’s interesting how well this graph correlates with the measured cooling trend since 2001-2002.
It’s amusing to see that there are scientists who think they can predict/project when the next upwards cycle will start. Maybe they would gain more credibility by applying their craft to something more reliable, like…hum…the stock market.
The 3 year slip of cycle 24 ought to put a distinct signature on the climate models as to the proper level of solar contribution going foreward, assuming they don’t interpret the hell out of it.
Leif (05:16:49) Surely that iron butterfly wing flapping would jerk the ball, no?
Intuitively, it is tough to see that the barycenter moving doesn’t effect the sun. But then you say it does, the tidal effects, but they are so tiny as to be difficult to imagine effecting the earth. Still, might not they have some effect on the magnetic fields of the sun?
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Some questions for Leif.
In the link Dee posted, a diagram indicates that the barycenter of the solar system can be as much as 2.2 solar radii from the sun’s center. Wouldn’t the changing barycenter of the solar system induce something akin to tides in the sun? If the barycenter is outside the sun, might it not result in something like spring tide, and perhaps more violent solar activity, than when the barycenter lies within the sun, thus neap tide and less violent activity?
12 yrs 3 mos later, tiny bubbles floating here and there, just makes it so hard to see if this is the bottom or not, the flux isn’t co-operating any better than the lack of fizz in the bubbly. Worst case #1 we simply follow the nice curve of F10.7 and that is 2010.somthing as bottom that leads or matches the sunspot bottom. Now just continue that nice arch on over and 50-75 is the next maxima worst case, so after 2015 it’s a 50-50 tossup Minimum or No Minimum.
Worst case #2 we follow that F10.7 curve into a total dead flatline. Instant Minimum, just add ice & stir.
I do know this: That F10.7 is making one heck of a pretty curve. Ain’t she a beauty!!