While the sun still struggles to form cycle 24 spots like seen in this weak plage area (upper right) in today’s SOHO MDI and Magnetograms (shown below) Paul Stanko of NOAA writes to tell me of an interesting development in his tracking of the International Sunspot Number (ISN).
Paul writes:
My running mean of the International Sunspot Number for 2009 just dipped below 1.00. For anything comparable you now need to go back before 1913 (which scored a 1.43) which could mean we’re now competing directly with the Dalton Minimum.
Just in case you’d like another tidbit, here is something that puts our 20 to 30 day spotless runs in perspective… the mother of all spotless runs (in the heart of the Maunder Minimum, of course!) was from October 15, 1661 to August 2, 1671. It totaled 3579 consecutive spotless days, all of which had obs.
Errant counting of sunspecks from Catainia aside, it appears that we haven’t seen anything like this in modern history.
We live in interesting times.
Either way it’s sliced, Paul has a valid point: The sum total SSN for 2009 / days so far in 2009
goes below 1.00 is news.
In 1913, the run started in April and was over in 90 days. 1913 was a vee shaped minimum.
It ramped fast when it was done being silent. The spots were larger on both sides of the vee.
They had penumbras. There was a Tiny Tim in a large plage that went off the west limb too.
But 1913 got in, got the job done, and was out on the track in time to not lose its position (get lapped)
2009 is not so lucky. Bad pit stops.
Thank you, Paul.
While we do not know what tomorrow brings, we certainly know what has happened prior to today, for we are monitoring with the best equipment possible 24/7.
There are no cloudy day rainticket excuses.
We missed nothing.
Thank you again, Paul.
JimB (07:42:12) :
Hello.
My name is Jim, and I’m fat. I cause global warming.
Thanks Jim, it took me at least five minutes to stop laughing and another twenty to wipe the grin of my face.
This should be quote of the week, or joke of the week.
David
What type of equipment? They looked at the sun very carefully. Usually this was done by servants whose eyes were not very important.
So the sun is driving temperature, and the CO2 causing warming model is accurate, it’s just that for now the sun is overpowering it.
” TERRY46 (07:58:26) : What kind of equipment did they use back in the 1600’s to measure sun spots?I feel sure that some of the sun specks we have had over the past few years would not have shown up back then.”
After the 1600’s — telescope, before — camera obscura — or a simple pinhole lens, most likely. John of Worcester (12th cen.) had the first sunspot drawing, by an unknown method, (pinhole optics were roughly known from Aristotle) and Roger Bacon observed a solar eclipse with camera obscura a century or so later.
So…
What is the best estimate of the ‘true coverage’ during the Maunder Minimum? Are the actual logbooks around? Because writing ‘no obs’ or ‘bad weather’ or something would seem like a standard procedure in any sort of long term effort like this. And there was more that just one observer in London, yes?
Ann (8:19:01)
Kirkby’s Figure 2, page 3, shows proxies during the Little Ice Age, supporting the low sunspot count.
http://aps.arxiv.org/PS_cache/arxiv/pdf/0804/0804.1938v1.pdf
The BBC mentioned the quiet sun today and linked it to pictures of the frozen Thames in the Little Ice Age. But of course the BBC added that ‘scientists’ said the quiet sun wouldn’t stop climate change (global warming)!!
I see that someone else has posted about the Watts effect. I think that it is safe to say that between the Watts effect and the Gore effect we could say that the Human race can control the climate. (If you believe that more sunspots leads directly to a warming earth that is.)
If things are getting cold, just have Anthony write a bunch of articles about the quiet sun and the sunspots will ramp up. (Calm yourselves Warmies, it’s just a joke) If things are getting a little warm, just have Al Gore hold a speech to discuss the warmth and it will go away.
Please Note, use of the powerful Gore effect should be monitored closely as overuse could result in a new ice age.
Its worth looking at the Armagh Observatory, (Northern Ireland) temperature data. They have an almost unbroken record from about 1790.
From 1865, the minimum and maximum temperatures are as flat as a billiard table. Strange. Have they been fiddled?
I asked this question once before, no one who knows answered, does anyone know if UV or lack therof has a thermal effect on oceans?
Anthony is very conservative, using his voice on proper occasion to coax out a sunspot.
The batteries are quite low, and Anthony knows it.
Gore, on the other hand, burns his energy like a type “O” star, hot & fast.
We should be preparing for something really bad. It would be practical and a moral imperative to specifically plan for a Maunder scenario while at least having a solid contingency plan for the end of the interglacial.
As expected, the guy at spaceweather.com did not loose any time to reset the spotless days counter to zero, eventhough there is not an official sunspot number out yet. Pathetic!
Peter (09:31:20) :
I asked this question once before, no one who knows answered, does anyone know if UV or lack therof has a thermal effect on oceans?
NASA Studies
It’s almost hard to believe, but new NASA-funded research confirms an old theory that plankton can indirectly create clouds that block some of the Sun’s harmful rays. The study was conducted by Dierdre Toole of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) and David Siegel of the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB).
The study finds that in summer when the Sun beats down on the top layer of ocean where plankton live, harmful rays in the form of ultraviolet (UV) radiation bother the little plants. UV light also gives sunburn to humans.
The plankton try to protect themselves by producing a chemical compound called DMSP, which some scientists believe helps strengthen the plankton’s cell walls. This chemical gets broken down in the water by bacteria, and changes into another substance called DMS.
DMS then filters from the ocean into the air, where it breaks down again to form tiny dust-like particles. These tiny particles are just the right size for water to condense on, which is the beginning of how clouds are formed. So, indirectly, plankton help create more clouds, and more clouds mean that less direct light reaches the ocean surface. This relieves the stress put on plankton by the Sun’s harmful UV rays.
Source: http://www.nasa.gov/vision/earth/environment/0702_planktoncloud.html
Chris,
I lived in Germany off and on for 10 years. Temperatures from about November through early April were usually about two degrees between high and low, and pretty consistent over time. The Rhine controlled the temperature in Wiesbaden, where I lived. I’m pretty sure Armagh’s temperatures were controlled by the Atlantic Current.
Is there really a proxy for sunspots or am I missing the esoteric humor?
Alex: You wrote, “The ENSO index is hovering around 6, (so not quite the El Nino forming that Hansen expects).”
Can I ask where you found that number?
According to the Australian Bureau of Meteorology, the SOI for March 2009 was 0.2, a considerable drop from February:
http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/current/soihtm1.shtml
For the week centered on Wednesday April 15, 2009, NINO3.4 SST anomalies are -0.13 deg C. I posted my mid-month SST update yesterday:
http://bobtisdale.blogspot.com/2009/04/mid-april-2009-nino34-sst-anomaly-and.html
JimB (07:42:12) :
Hello.
My name is Jim, and I’m fat. I cause global warming.
Don’t be silly, Jim. Fat people have big shadows. You loveable, fat tubs of lard keep the planet cooler one quarter-pounder at a time.
Now go on with your fat self.
Peter (09:31:20) :
I asked this question once before, no one who knows answered, does anyone know if UV or lack therof has a thermal effect on oceans?
Liquid water absorbs UV, which raises its temperature.
Do you know why there are no sunspots these days? It’s because of me. I did it. And I won’t turn the sunspots back on until Al Gore apologizes to the world for scaring them with a non-problem.
(Hey, if Gore can claim junk science as undebate-able, then I can stop sunspots with my mind. Deal with it.)
‘Hello.
My name is Jim, and I’m fat. I cause global warming.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,517264,00.html
JimB’
Hilarious, but be sure to read the original article from The Sun where polar bears in peril are juxtaposed with lardy londoners. Seems farcical but this is the true level these papers operate on.
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/article2387203.ece
If Svensmark is right, the real measure of what may be impacting the earth’s climate is the level of cosmic rays and the story there is very interesting.
http://cosmicrays.oulu.fi/webform/query.cgi?startdate=1964/04/21&starttime=00:00&enddate=2009/04/21&endtime=19:54&resolution=Automatic choice&picture=on
Meanwhile, it certainly appears that, led by the great southern oceans, the planet is cooling:
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadsst2sh/from:1998/plot/hadsst2sh/from:2001/trend/plot/hadcrut3gl/from:1998/plot/hadcrut3gl/from:2001/trend
Given that this should be a lagging affect, what happens to temperatures over the next few years will be very telling. Hopefully our politicians won’t be signing any trillion dollar global warming cheques in the interim.
Has anyone seen any data/charts on lower atmosphere cloudiness levels that cover the last 6 months to a year?
The Sun is somnolent: Heavy with sleep.
The questions that no one can answer are how long will the Sun be in this somnolence and why is the Sun in this prolonged period of somnolence.
Perhaps answering the “why” will put Science in a position of answering “how long”.
How do you tell the difference between a late 23 spot and an early 25 spot?
I think 24 is just lazy. By the time it gets here it’ll be time to leave.