What a day! First a major storm whacks the west coast, now we have the official start of solar cycle 24.
Solar physicists have been waiting for the appearance of a reversed-polarity sunspot to signal the start of the next solar cycle. The signal for the start of a new cycle is sighting a particular kind of sunspot. That wait is over.
Click for larger image
A magnetically reversed, high-latitude sunspot, dubbed as number 981, emerged on the surface of the sun today. Just a few months ago, an “All Quiet Alert” had been issued for the sun. This reversed polarity sunspot today marks the beginning of Solar Cycle 24 and the sun’s return back to Solar Maximum.
Solar Cycle 24 has been the subject of much speculation due to competing forecasts on whether it will be an highly active or a quiet low cycle. If it is a low cycle, it may very well be a test of validity for some CO2 based AGW theories. Only time will tell.
UPDATE: There have been some questions about solar cycle length, and “when does one cycle end and another begin or is there overlap”? Thanks to Joe D’Aleo of ICECAP, please see the graph below:
This from ESA may help everyone understand the transition:
With the next solar cycle this [sunspot magnetic] orientation is flipped in both hemispheres, as the Sun’s global magnetic field reverses its orientation.
As a new cycle begins, the number of sunspots with the reverse orientation will increase and the ones with the orientation of the old cycle will decrease in number. In the transition period they can both occur on the Sun, as the two cycles have no sharp boundary and overlap.
Russ Steele has some interesting information on the current state of knowledge and predicting the next solar cycle intensity at his Dalton Minimum Returns site.
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Well I think I need to read up on sunspots as I seem to be a touch clueless as to the effect they have on our climate.
Very Interesting though!
[…] appeared at high solar latitude after a long period of no sunspots (”inactivity”). The blog reporting the “official start” of the new cycle apparently finds this to be […]
[…] 0. http://wattsupwiththat.wordpress.com/ 1. http://wattsupwiththat.wordpress.com/2008/01/04/solar-cycle-24-has-officially-started/ 2. http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/data/realtime/mdi_igr/512/ 3. […]
Charlie you left out We’re from the government we are here to help you.
[…] meaningful. This morning when I logged it to WordPress, I found something that may explain why: a post announcing the emergence of a new sun spot on January […]
LOL Wondering Aloud 😉 If you ever hear the govt say that, you’d better run fast!
Interestingly concerning weather, last Wednesday, we were getting snow and the trains were late because of the freezing cold. Today in the Chicago area it is 64 and our snow is gone. 64 degrees today…
So, the big question, how does the solar cycle affect the 2012 stuff he he?
bordymcb :
The bare-bones amateur take is:
–The normal sunspot cycle affects temperatures less than +/- 0.1C.
–If there is a serious Dawson or Maunder-type minimum (up to 5 bum cycles in a row), it can drag down temps over 1C. This is very nasty.
[…] physicists have been waiting for the appearance of a reversed-polarity sunspot to signal the start of the next solar cycle. As of Friday, that wait is over. A magnetically reversed, high-latitude sunspot emerged on the […]
If you’d like to check the amplitude of the solar cycle in terms of global temperature response, I stumbled on what appears to be the 11-year solar cycle in a global temperature anomaly graph this weekend by simply smoothing CRUTEMP3 GL and HADSST2 Gl annual data with a 3-year filter. I assume it would be there if you used HADCRUT3 or something similar. I only ran the data and graphs from 1950 to 2000, but I imagine it’s there earlier and later. The amplitude with the smoothed data appears to vary with cycle from 0.1 to 0.15 deg C. I seached for a couple of hours to see if a similar graph was posted anywhere, but couldn’t find any. I haven’t tried 2-year or 4-year filters, just tried three, looking for something else, and there it was.
I pulled this off of a Dece entry on Steel’s blog:
“Astronomers are watching the Sun, hoping to see the first stirrings of cycle 24. It should have arrived last December. The United States’ National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration predicted it would start in March 2007. Now they estimate March 2008, but they will soon have to make that even later. The first indications that the Sun is emerging from its current sunspot minimum will be the appearance of small spots at high latitude. They usually occur some 12-20 months before the start of a new cycle. These spots haven’t appeared yet so cycle 24 will probably not begin to take place until 2009 at the earliest”
So, even though we have a high latitude sunspot, this may not be the official start of #24, just a sign it’s ~12ish months from officailly starting.
Am I reading that right?
RE: bill-tb (05:24:06) :
You may be referring to the “NHC” NEPAC DIVISION (virtual tongue planted firmly in cheek):
http://nationalhysteriacenter.blogspot.com/
Vigorous entertainment produces pleasant participation. A 10th grade English teacher did to me this wonder of mentorship. And at the time I was sustaining a marginal “D”. He did this with Shakespeare no less.
Several movies (Star Wars-1977 and later ET-1982) have allowed a similar participation with my children.
Such provocative talk of Solar Cycle 24 here today has reopened this pleasant participation in learning. And I understand “it is the Sun, dummy” that needs focus in academia.
“More input”.
We’re up to 4 named NEPAC storms! UNNNNNNNNPRECEDENNNNNNNTED! (sayeth “FORECASTER HAY-MAN”).
FYI:
HURRICANE NOGURI – 1805 Z, 11-JAN-08
EARLIER TODAY, TYPHOON NOGURI CROSSED 180, AFTER A SIGNIFICANT LEFTWARD / NORTHWARD WOBBLE. THIS STORM IS NOW DESIGNATED AS HURRICANE NOGURI, A CATEGORY ONE HURRICANE. LOCATION IS 179W, 40N, TRACK HAS RESUMED ESE. AT THIS TIME, THIS FEATURE IS OF NOTE SOLELY TO MARINE TRAFFIC (ESPECIALLY DUMB SHIPS) AS IT IS EXPECTED TO PULL UP STATIONARY AGAINST A PROGRESSIVE RIDGE PROG’ED TO BE ALONG 14OW AT THE TIME. STORM IS PROG’ED TO THEN LOSE STRENGTH, AND, IF IT EVER REACHES LAND, SHOULD BE A TD, AT MOST. NONETHELESS … THIS IS THE 4TH NAMED STORM (AND 4TH HURRICANE!) IN THIS HIGHLY UNPRECEDENTED 2008 SEASON. RETROSPECTIVELY, CHANGING SEASON TO YEAR ROUND (JAN 01 THROUGH DEC 31) WAS A *WISE* CHOICE. EOT. FORECASTER – HAY-MAN.
Look again at the heliosphere dent and watch for more reverse field solar activity. When the Sun passed this way in the Galaxy the last time there was an extended ICE AGE. Check you data for around 700,000 years ago.
[…] and months on next to nothing, and the start of Solar cycle 24 seems to have materialized (as first reported here) then abruptly disappeared. The reverse polarity sunspot that signaled the start of cycle 24 on […]
[…] and months of next to nothing, and the start of Solar cycle 24 seems to have materialized (as first reported here) then abruptly disappeared. The reverse polarity sunspot that signaled the start of cycle 24 on […]
[…] and months of next to nothing, and the start of Solar cycle 24 seems to have materialized (as first reported here) then abruptly disappeared. The reverse polarity sunspot that signaled the start of cycle 24 on […]
[…] a cycle 23 spot rather than one from the cycle 24 that is gave one spot on January 8th, signaling a start of cycle 24, but has given no cycle 24 type […]
[…] you can see while the latitude is high and almost identical in latitude to the January 4th cycle 24 spot, it still hasn’t formed up to be a true sunspot. It remains simply a disturbed magnetic […]
Solar cycles have a mind of their own. They begin and end when they do and if they over lap that’s ok. What I am interested in is the cycle itself. Most think it is an 11 year cycle but I feel it may actually be 22(+-) years. This is evident due to each 11 year cycle being of the opposite magnetic orientation to the preceeding cycle. 22 years cycles seem a better explanation to account for a full cycle to occur and for the sun to return to its initial magnetic orientation at the beginning of the cycle. What we maybe/should be talking about cycle 24a?? (which if you work the numbers back will actually be Cycle 12.
I am very intrigued by Ghociumn’s comment of 4/21/8, regarding the 22 yr. cycle. Has anyone ever charted this? If so, I would very much like to see this. In my imagination a chart like this would have a midline of zero sunspots. The upper portion of the graph would contain the data: # of sunspots with N/S polarity. And below the midline-lower portion of the chart-would contain the data: # of sunspots with S/N polarity orientation. What do you think, Anthony? Is this form of data even captured? For how many years? Hmmm…
[…] The announcement came on the IPS web page, today, on the day that two small cycle 23 sunspots has started to appear near the solar equator. Many had expected more cycle 24 spots to be visible by now, but the sun remains quiet, and has been producing more cyccle 23 spots than 24 spots so far since the first cycle 24 spot was seen on January 4th, 2008 […]
September 12, 2008.
Just to point out that there are still no sunspots – it has been 6 weeks now since August started, and no solar cycle 23 sunspots have appeared in August and September – which is good, in a certain way. At least cycle 23 is (possibly) over, so solar cycle 24 can begin thinking about beginning to start beginning.
Then again, solar cyle 24 hasn’t begu eitehr ……
Maybe one more spot:
http://www.spaceweather.com/
“take a look before it disappears.”