We are now at 21 days with no sunspots, it will be interesting to see if we reach a spotless 30 day period and then perhaps a spotless month of December.
From the data provided by NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center (SWPC) you can see just how little magnetic field activity there has been. I’ve included it below with the latest available update from December 6th, 2008:
click for a larger image
What I find most interesting about the Geomagnetic Average Planetary Index graph above is what happened around October 2005. Notice the sharp drop in the magnetic index and the continuance at low levels. Read on for more.
This looks much like a “step function” that I see on GISS surface temperature graphs when a station has been relocated to a cooler measurement environment. In the case of the sun, it appears this indicates that something abruptly “switched off” in the inner workings of the solar dynamo. Note that in the prior months, the magnetic index was ramping up a bit with more activity, then it simply dropped and stayed mostly flat.
Currently the Ap magnetic index continues at a low level, and while the “smoothed” data from SWPC is not made available for 2008, I’ve added it with a dashed blue line, and the trend appears to be going down.
As many regular readers know, I’ve always pointed out the sharp drop in 2005 with the following extended period of low activity as an odd occurance. Our resident solar astronomer Leif Svalgaard disagrees with this. But I’d also like to point out that this was the time when global sea level as measured by the JASON satellite and reported by the University of Colorado began to lose its upward trend.
Source: University of Colorado, Boulder
Coincidence? Perhaps. But I think investigation is needed to determine if there is any mechanism that would explain or exclude this correlation.
(h/t Joe D’aleo
Discover more from Watts Up With That?
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Leif Svalgaard (22:14:07) :
The transport of flux to poles is a random process. In general though, there will be a tendency for a big cycle to have more surviving flux than a small cycle, so several big cycles often occur together as well as several small cycles. This is not a sure thing, though, and that is where the random element comes in. Like, cycle 19 was very large, yet somewhat less polar flux was produced, so cycle 20 was small. This is not a ‘flaw’, but is very characteristic of such chaotic variations. The ‘technical term’ is that the process has ‘positive conservation’ or ‘memory’
Not really answering the question of random events which still stands, but cycle 20 is indeed interesting, I suspect you have no reasonable accuracy of what the polar strength was at cycle 19 which keeps your theory alive (the proxy records are considered week) and SC20’s low activity is completely expected from my side, in fact SC20 would have started a Grand Minimum in the same time scale of the Dalton and Maunder and Sporer. But little use using SC20 as an example, its part of the Grand Minima disturbance, before that we rose from the Dalton with a pattern that is quite smooth, not what u would call random?
The 14C record is not perfect, but it is not so bad as to obscure the variations. And the Dalton minimum was not really a Grand Minimum. Usokin is not the only one that has come to this conclusion. In fact, that is the generally accepted wisdom. There is no predictable pattern in the Grand Minima.
Yes its far from perfect….
Granted, the Dalton is a weaker Grand Minimium but as you know there is a floor to solar activity…its a matter of how long we stay at that floor, and 3 or so cycles is not chicken feed. How some can claim the Dalton is not part of the Grand Minima cycle is not credible in my view.
Can you list some papers from the “accepted wisdom” I would be very interested to read.
davidgmills wrote:
This lawyer will not let you slide. I don’t care what political stripe a politician wears, the way law and politics works is that the law and government must rely on scientific consensus for answers. In a court of law, as in politics, often it is impossible to wait for scientific certainty before decisions must be made. In both politics and law, you have to make decisions based on the consensus of scientists at the time.
If the scientific consensus is wrong, and proved to be wrong, the law and the government will then go with the “new” consensus until it is proved to be wrong.
That is the way the law and politics works, and frankly has no choice but to work.
From what I remember of U.S. criminal law, the accused is presumed to be innocent until proven guilty. In the same way, climate change is presumed to be natural variation until the change is proven to be unnatural. AGW (man-made catastrophic climate change) supporters haven’t proven their case. Skeptics don’t have to prove any separate causation. The “scientific consensus” you claim is a political illusion, as seen from that recent Senate minority report.
TomVonk (04:50:15) :
I didn’t read CA but as I read the original paper
And you think that I did not? This is completely unjustified.
http://www.leif.org/research/DavidA10.png
http://www.leif.org/research/DavidA11.png
show that I did. And I’ll jump to an equally unjustified conclusion: I read it much more carefully than you.
The ‘statistical analysis’ in the paper is unsatisfactory [you are correct that it is like so many others – but they are just as bad. Being in bad company does not make you good]. If you want to argue otherwise, look first at their Figure 2 and tell us what is so convincing about that one].
nobwainer (Geoff Sharp) (05:08:09) :
Not really answering the question of random events which still stands
What question?
I suspect you have no reasonable accuracy of what the polar strength was at cycle 19 which keeps your theory alive (the proxy records are considered week)
We have magnetic measurements at the minimum in 1954 and in 1965, see http://www.leif.org/research/Polar%20Fields%20and%20Cycle%2024.pdf
and SC20’s low activity is completely expected from my side, in fact SC20 would have started a Grand Minimum
Except that it didn’t
Can you list some papers from the “accepted wisdom” I would be very interested to read.
I doubt very much that you would be really interested [or that your interest would quickly wane], but here is a typical one:
http://arxiv.org/PS_cache/nlin/pdf/0107/0107007v1.pdf
One of their conclusions is: “In this Letter, we show concrete evidence that the switching back and forth from grand minima to the “regular” 22–year cycle is a manifestation of a known dynamical process called attractor–widening, resulting in crisis–induced intermittency”
I think we have a high latitude spot!!
Leif,
I refered to this link but now it works.
http://www.astro.ucla.edu/~obs/torsional.html
everybody tells me with simple words its getting hotter . now I dont use as big of words as you guys and gals but I shovel my own snow and I`ve been doing alot more of it over the last couple of years . so which is it parka or fans . I just cant decide between a wood burning furnace or solar assist cooling system .
Katherine:
I guarantee you that if you go into any court in the US today and try to argue that Global Warming has not been proven, you will be the one asked to prove it.
It would not be the other way around.
N Sweden (04:28:12) :
how do we know that current variations is not due to some unknown factor? Have your findings been discussed by climate scientists?
We do not KNOW that. We also do not KNOW if the climate is manipulated by little green men from outer space, but from what we do know about how Nature works, we can hold both propositions for highly unlikely. And this has been discussed for almost 400 years. You can find thousands of posting [both pro and con] on the internet. Here is one of them:
http://www.ucar.edu/news/releases/2004/wigley.shtml
For every article you find, you can find a contrary one.
Another spotless day!
PRESTO FROM SIDC – RWC BELGIUM Sat Dec 13 2008, 1140 UT
NOAA AR 1009 rotated over the west limb, the solar disc is spotless again.
http://sidc.oma.be/index.php
A couple days ago I downloaded data file dssn2008[1].dat
from the SIDC. http://sidc.oma.be/sunspot-data/dailyssn.php
Then manipulated the data by blocking the columbs into
spotless days, and then added a columb at the right for a
running total of spotless days. The data only extended to
Nov.30, but as of then, the total was 230.
NOAA AR1009 broke the spotless run started on 2008/11/18-
spotless day #218. I haven’t been able to find any day-by-day
data for Dec. 2008 to finish my count.
The SIDC won’t update the data again untill Jan.01,2009.
Is there anywhere else I can get daly data for the current
month?
Egad, what happened to my formatting?
Sunspotter (08:36:54) :
Is there anywhere else I can get daly data for the current
month?
http://www.swpc.noaa.gov/alerts/solar_indices.html
and on that page:
http://www.swpc.noaa.gov/ftpdir/indices/quar_DSD.txt
The NOAA numbers are bigger than SIDC numbers. You have to multiply the NOAA numbers by 0.62 [approx.] to convert to SIDC Brussels numbers.
UPDATE
Upon reviewing my data, an accounting error was discovered.
The value should be 238 as of Nov.30, not 230 as stated
above. I guess that’s what happens when one proof-reads
one’s own work.Sorry.
P.S. Thanks for the links, Leif.
Thanks for your answer Leif. If I have understood you correctly, your findings mean that the planet either must be supersensitive to the changes in the sun, or that the planet is not sensitive at all to changes in the sun (almost).
What are the implications for climate science? If climate science has assumed that the sun has been a “player” in the past I guess that your findings should require climate scientists to find new explanations? Has this happened?
Does someone else perhaps know? I realize Dr Svaalgard may have better things to do than answering questions here…;)
brian notsobright (18:39:28) :
I just cant decide between a wood burning furnace or solar assist cooling system .
If you need a heater and don’t have it you die. If you need a cooler and don’t have it, you drink another beer (or soda…). Get the heater.
I have done a comparison graph of Solar Cycle 4 to 23:
http://www.robertb.darkhorizons.org/DeepSolarMin.htm
I have the beginning of SC23 set at mid 1996.
Sources disagree as to when it actually started, but the gist is the same.
One more year of this wimpy SC24 and we get a Dalton 50 max for Christmas.
Otherwise Leif wins with a SC24 65-75 max.
Robert Bateman (06:41:55) :
I have done a comparison graph of Solar Cycle 4 to 23:
One thing to be aware of: The lower panel plots use the ‘observed’ values for the solar flux instead of the ‘adjusted’ values. For radio communication, the observed values are appropriate, but for solar comparisons, the adjusted values must be used, otherwise the July values will be 7% too low [as we are further away from the Sun] and you get a spurious minimum in July [as is even visible on the graph].
N Sweden (03:25:01) :
should require climate scientists to find new explanations? Has this happened?
Yes, indeed, they call it AGW.
Things are VERY quiet. SIDC Belgium issues
All Quiet Alert.
“START OF ALL QUIET ALERT
The SIDC – RWC Belgium expects quiet Space Weather conditions for the next 48 hours or until further
notice. This implies that: * the solar X-ray output
is expected to remain below C-class level, * the
K_p index is expected to remain below 5, * the
high-energy proton fluxes are expected to remain
below the event threshold.”
Leif – Well, yes. But I thought that your findings makes it harder to explain climate change in the past – when there was no AGW. And isnt part of AGW-theory that the “usual” factors (such as solar) cannot explain todays warming, and therefore human factors are likely to play great part of current warming?
If we then learn that the way we explain climate change in the past perhaps does not work, what does that mean for AGW-theory?
In your opinion, how should climate science react to your findings about solar influence on climate?
Lief: Yes, the flux dips in July and reaches a peak in January, and all because of our orbital eccentricity. The flux is basically flatlined, as you point out.
When I look at the sunspot vs flux, I don’t see much movement in the flux from the sunspot activity (sic) directly below. This tells me that there is precious little activity in the Sun.
The whole idea of the page was to illustrate the pattern of progression SC 3-4-5 to SC 22-23-24.
The daily sunspot data (I surmise) from 1817 and below may be lost and all we have left is the monthly averages that were gleaned from them. Finding it’s way into somebody’s papers or reports the monthly survived but the daily counts disappeared.
Robert Bateman (12:44:57) :
The flux is basically flatlined, as you point out.
The year 1954 was as quiet [ http://www.dxlc.com/solar/history/hist1954.html ] and yet cycle 19 was one of the biggest one ever observed.
The daily sunspot data (I surmise) from 1817 and before may be lost
Hoyt and Schatten list the original observations for every day since 1610. The list may be found here: http://www.leif.org/research/rawgssn.txt
It’s now December 15, and still no sunspot activity.
Should we update the title? 8<)
Start a “countdown-until-2008-beats-1913-days-without-a-spot” thread?
I just went back and did a little googling around. It seem the sun went spectacularly active in September 2005 … and then went very quiet the following month in October. There was one sunspot group that generated several x-ray flares in September.
On this page if you scroll down and see the number of flare events in September, then go to this page for the following month, difference is night and day.
Another article quote’s NASA’s Dr. Hathaway as saying:
So not only did the sun get very quiet in 2005, but it got REALLY active immediately before in September.