No we aren’t talking pianos, but Grand Solar Minimums. Today a new milestone was reached. As you can see below, we’ve been leading up to it for a few years.
(Update: based on comments, I’ve updated the graph above to show the 2004 solar max by sliding the view window to the left a bit compared to the previous graph. – Anthony)
A typical solar minimum lasts 485 days, based on an average of the last 10 solar minima. As of today we are at 638 spotless days in the current minimum. Also as of today, May 27th, 2009, there were no sunspots on 120 of this year’s (2009) 147 days to date (82%).
Paul Stanko writes:
Our spotless day count just reached 638.
What is so special about 638? We just overtook the original solar cycle, #1, so now the only cycles above this are: cycles of the Maunder minimum, cycles 5 to 7 (Dalton minimum), and cycles 10 + 12 to 15 (unnamed minimum).
Since the last one is unnamed, I’ve nicknamed it the “Baby Grand Minimum”, in much the same way that you can have a baby grand piano. We would now seem to have reached the same stature for this minimum. It will be interesting to see just how much longer deep minimum goes on.
Of course it depends on what data you look at. Solar Influences Data Center and NOAA differ by a few days. As WUWT readers may recall, last year in August, the SIDC reversed an initial count that would have led to the first spotless month since 1913:
NOAA did not count the sunspot, so at the end of the month, one agency said “spotless month” and the other did not.
From Spaceweather.com in an April 1st 2009 article:
The mother of all spotless runs was of course the Maunder Minimum. This was a period from October 15, 1661 to August 2, 1671.
It totaled 3579 consecutive spotless days. That puts our current run at 17.5% of that of the Maunder Minimum.
By the standard of spotless days, the ongoing solar minimum is the deepest in a century: NASA report. In 2008, no sunspots were observed on 266 of the year’s 366 days (73%). To find a year with more blank suns, you have to go all the way back to 1913, which had 311 spotless days (85%):
The lack of sunspots in 2008, made it a century-level year in terms of solar quiet. Remarkably, sunspot counts for 2009 have dropped even lower.
We do indeed live in interesting times.
The Damon Minimum is just a period of relatively low solar activity and is very typical and should not be compared with Grand minima…”Baby Grand” is probably an appropriate term as long as the difference is understood. The Sun follows a very regular pattern and our Sunspot records and proxy records show this trend, but many tend not to see it. The typical cycle is a slow rise from a “baby grand” situation of lowish activity which peaks about 60 years later, followed by a Grand minimum of varying strength which can recover quickly to decent levels of activity before gradually over the next 60 odd years decreasing back to the base of the “Baby Grand” situation. The only thing that varies is the strength of the grand minima which is not hard to predict.
I think this one will be more than a “Baby Grand” and we should start heading to the next bottom of the wave situation after SC26. The next decent period of high solar activity wont be here till about 2120.
pkatt (00:00:31) : re temp on other planets #3
And here’s another on warming on other planets and moons:
“Global warming on Neptune’s moon Triton as well as Jupiter and Pluto, and now Mars has some [scientists] scratching their heads over what could possibly be in common with the warming of all these planets … Could there be something in common with all the planets in our solar system that might cause them all to warm at the same time?”
Strange that we have all kinds of alternative excuses for substantial changes on other bodies in the solar system but ours is supposed to be stable and unchanging – these global warmers have been covering all the bases.
http://www.livescience.com/environment/070312_solarsys_warming.html
Alex (01:31:44) :
I am guessing that commenters pointing out the 66.7 s.flux value will have Leif Svalgaard objecting, as this is the *un-adjusted* value, so the *adjusted* value is around 68! Were flux values adjusted in the 50s/60s??
alright, adjusted all the way up to 68. Still pretty anemic.
Were the spots from last week cycle 23 or cycle 24? TIA
Now I’m recalling the casual comment by a leading scientist that this minimum was “nothing much to be concerned about – unless it extends well into 2009 or 2010”.
Wonder if he’s getting concerned yet.
I know that this has been mentioned before, but to repeat: has anyone attempted to normalize sunspot detection as done now to the pre-space-age detection limit? It seems that we should be able to come up with a reasonably robust criteria. For example, angular size, contrast, and duration. This should lead to a better, and scarier, comparison. I throw down the gauntlet.
We had a Parlor Grand in our house. It was enamel black and sang like a bird. Just in case you want to choose from a range of sizes as a title for minimum, here they are:
* Petite Grand – This is the smallest of the horizontal pianos. It ranges in size from 4 feet 5 inches to 4 feet 10 inches, it is indeed small but still powerful.
* Baby Grand – A very popular type of piano which ranges in size from 4 feet 11 inches to 5 feet 6 inches. Baby grands is a popular choice because of its sound quality, aesthetic appeal and affordability.
* Medium Grand – Larger than the baby grand at 5 feet and 7 inches.
* Parlor Grand – These ranges in size from 5 feet 9 inches to 6 feet 1 inch. The parlor grand piano is also called living room grand piano.
* Semiconcert or Ballroom – Next size up from the Parlor Grand piano, it is approximately 7 feet long.
* Concert Grand – At 9 feet, this is the largest of all the grand pianos.
Grand pianos are said to produce finer tones and has the most responsive key action.
Solar min? I just read this, this morning
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20090527/sc_nm/us_climate_usa_sealevel_1
Greenland ice could fuel severe U.S. sea level rise
LOL
To continue those earlier comments and questions about “Global Warming On Other Planets Also Orbiting Our Sun”
The “solar global warming symptoms” – comparing 1950’s through 2005- that I remember seeing graphs about include:
Mars: Icecap reducing.
Jupiter: A second “Red Spot” appearing, and becoming stable
Saturn: Its first “red Spot” appearing
Neptune greater reflectivity
Triton: Increased albedo (Greater atmosphere reflections?)
Pluto and Charon: Both increasing “diameter” and albedo due to ice vaporizing
Someone asked:
“How low can it go?”
Why, the answer is obvious – To 42, of course!!!!!
“I think this one will be more than a “Baby Grand” and we should start heading to the next bottom of the wave situation after SC26. The next decent period of high solar activity wont be here till about 2120.”
So, how does this affect the climate? Cooling? Or nothing at all? If cooling, when and how much?
thanks,
Steve
Steven Hill, this media link talks out of both sides of its mouth:
“Greenland’s ice-melt rate has increased by 7 percent a year since 1996 but Hu said it is unlikely to continue. Still, he and his co-authors ran computer simulations that included this fast-paced melting, along with more moderate scenarios with ice-melt increasing by 3 percent or 1 percent annually.
Hu said it was hard to say whether the 7 percent annual increase could go on for the next 50 years but said it was possible since the current rate of increase in climate-warming carbon dioxide is higher than the high end of projections by the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
(Editing by Bill Trott)”
Now that is MSM understated truth mixed with scare mongering at its best. Hu said it won’t likely bleed, the MSM says it could hemorrhage us to death.
Global emissions to leap 39 percent by 2030: US
WASHINGTON (AFP) – Global carbon dioxide emissions are set to rise 39 percent by 2030 as energy consumption surges in the developing world, notably in Asian giants China and India, the United States warned on Wednesday.
The US Energy Information Administration (EIA) said global energy demand would leap 44 percent between 2006 and 2030, fueled by a 73-percent rise in demand from non-developed countries.
The giants of the developing world, China and India, will fuel much of the growth as their economies continue to expand, EIA said in a report.
It projects carbon dioxide emissions — a major cause of global warming — to reach 40.4 billion metric tonnes by 2030, up from 29 billion in 2006.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20090527/sc_afp/environmentusenergyclimateoutlook_20090527202457
Oh no Mr. Bill, we are all doomed! Here he comes to save the day! Obama, Obama, Obama! WooHoo Cap and Tax! When China owns the USA, I wonder if Obama can tell them what to do?
meant to add, looking at the chart of spotless years, if 2009 stays low it looks as though 2007 – 2008 – 2009 will challenge 1911-1912-1913 as the winning trifecta for lowest cumulative readings of the last 100 years. Will it top that run? 7 more months of data to go before we’ll know.
Steven Hill (06:56:22) :
“I think this one will be more than a “Baby Grand” and we should start heading to the next bottom of the wave situation after SC26. The next decent period of high solar activity wont be here till about 2120.”
So, how does this affect the climate? Cooling? Or nothing at all? If cooling, when and how much?
thanks,
Steve
The climate implications are not really my expertise Steve, but if we look at history I would suspect only some minor cooling for the next 20-30 years followed by milder temperatures assuming we dont have a hand in altering the natural cycle.
And yet, how many of the so-called micro-sunspots we have seen over the past couple years that have been counted, would have been detected with pre-satellite technology?
So the real relative current sunspotless days comparision with the Maunder and Dalton Minimums may actually be higher than what is reflected in these comparasions.
The really good news is that Global Warming may be over.
The really bad news is that Global Warming may be over, and we’re heading straight into the next ice age.
This is a comparison between the solarcycle minimum at 1911 and the current one that I found in the forum on solarcycle24.com. I have (for sure a bit clumpsy) added bars for the months December 2008 to April 2009.
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3305/3573328098_e10e913770_o.jpg
I think the comparison somehow was meant to show what we might expect of this minimum, but in the history of solar cycles I guess the SC 23 are sligtly longer than the SC 14…
Ron de Haan (04:38:06) :
David Archibald, an expert in solar cycles identified …….
Is David Archibald an “expert” in solar cycles?
….the actual climate problem we face: “You haven’t seen any sign of the end of Solar Cycle 23 yet and the cooling over Solar Cycle 24 as a consequence may be as much as 2.8 degrees centigrade…. And severe cooling over the next twenty years is now a certainty.”
Why is the cooling over solar cycle 24? When DA did his Solar Cycle Length/Temperature correlation he used the Butler & Johnson Armagh results. This implies that the 11-year mean centred on the year of solar minimum (i.e. 2008 or 2009) will according to David be 2.8 deg lower than the 11-year mean centred on 1996. There is simply no chance of this happening (we already have at least 5 years data). It’s a busted flush. David Archibald is simply making it up as he goes along.
I once created such a cool graph:
http://blog.sme.sk/blog/560/195013/armaghcetssn.jpg
Armagh = Irish observatory record, CET = central England temperature record
it is clearly visible, that when Maunder/Dalton minimum struck, it took one more decade until the temperatures went abruptly down. Maybe oceans were in warm phase then, slowing the fall down. Now PDO deep cold +AMO going cold + Sun minimum = pretty steep downfall expected.
Tar and feather, anyone? Instead those white roofs :o)
Mr. Derode,
You should study how greenhouses work a little bit more.
The issue with Chu’s idea is not that it is a bad idea. The issue is that falsifies the claims of the AGW promotion industry. The AGW position is that controlling CO2 and reshaping our industrial economy to minimize carbon is the *only* effective policy. The AGW promotion industry calims that UHI is not significant.
If Chu is correct, then both of those fundamental tenets of AGW are wrong.
And that means that the huge disruptions and expenses the AGW community demands are not required.
Apologies for the truncated post (if it got through). My computer fritzed and posted my post half done.
Regarding the many posts on warming on various planets and moons throughout the solar system, can anyone explain why Uranus has been cooling?
http://www.boulder.swri.edu/~layoung/eprint/ur149/Young2001Uranus.pdf
Thanks for the graph, Magnus. It seems that the drawn curve for 2007-2009 depends in part on future data, so that curve may be revised as we go.
Anthony: ‘It totaled 3579 consecutive spotless days.’
That count is not reliable because we did not have continuous coverage back then. Hoyt and Schatten are mistaken [as Ken readily admits] in equating ‘I have not a spot all last year’ with 365 days of continuous observations of no spots.
Alex (01:31:44) :
Were flux values adjusted in the 50s/60s??
As several commenters have pointed out the ‘observed’ value is not the correct measure of solar activity, that value is now falling because the solar distance is increasing. But, of course, with the recent spots rotating out of view F10.7 will be decreasing.
Roger Carr (03:15:29) :
Where is Leif when you need him…
Sleeping [CAlif time]
John Finn (07:20:59) :
David Archibald is simply making it up as he goes along.
This is no news.
Other ‘Davids’ have been accused of the same 🙂
Jurinko (07:24:30) :
I once created such a cool graph:
http://blog.sme.sk/blog/560/195013/armaghcetssn.jpg
Armagh = Irish observatory record, CET = central England temperature record
How do you justify grafting the Armagh record onto the CET record in ~1800. Central England temperatures were ~1 deg higher than Armagh
around that time.
it is clearly visible, that when Maunder/Dalton minimum struck, it took one more decade until the temperatures went abruptly down.
Except that temperatures didn’t actually go down in the Dalton Minimum. You made it look that way by using the temperature record froma relatively warm part of the UK (Central England) then using the temperature record from a cooler part of the UK (Armagh).
Maybe oceans were in warm phase then, slowing the fall down.
Then again may be nothing much happened at all.
Now PDO deep cold +AMO going cold + Sun minimum = pretty steep downfall expected.
How much would you be willing to bet on this outcome?
I have a devout Christian friend who says that he has been praying for the Almighty to deliver us from our wickedness as He did with the people of Sodom & Gomorrah (the origin of “fire and brimstone”), specifically, with an Ice Age and another 9/11-like attack.
Trying not to be too judgemental, I commented that that prayer sounded like the theologicial equivalent of an infantry officer calling for an artillery barrage on his own position.
He said “that’s all you can do when you’ve been over-run by the enemy.”
Interesting times indeed.