NASA Study Acknowledges Solar Cycle, Not Man, Responsible for Past Warming
Report indicates solar cycle has been impacting Earth since the Industrial Revolution
From the Daily Tech, Michael Andrews. (h/t to Joe D’Aleo)
Some researchers believe that the solar cycle influences global climate changes. They attribute recent warming trends to cyclic variation. Skeptics, though, argue that there’s little hard evidence of a solar hand in recent climate changes.
[NOTE: there is evidence of solar impact on the surface temperature record, as Basil Copeland and I discovered in this report published here on WUWT titled Evidence of a Lunisolar Influence on Decadal and Bidecadal Oscillations In Globally Averaged Temperature Trends – Anthony]
Solar activity has shown a major spike in the twentieth century, corresponding to global warming. This cyclic variation was acknowledged by a recent NASA
study, which reviewed a great deal of past climate data. (Source: Wikimedia Commons)
Now, a new research report from a surprising source may help to lay this skepticism to rest. A study from NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland looking at climate data over the past century has concluded that solar variation has made a significant impact on the Earth’s climate. The report concludes that evidence for climate changes based on solar radiation can be traced back as far as the Industrial Revolution.
Past research has shown that the sun goes through eleven year cycles. At the cycle’s peak, solar activity occurring near sunspots is particularly intense, basking the Earth in solar heat. According to Robert Cahalan, a climatologist at the Goddard Space Flight Center,
“Right now, we are in between major ice ages, in a period that has been called the Holocene.”
Thomas Woods, solar scientist at the University of Colorado in Boulder concludes,
“The fluctuations in the solar cycle impacts Earth’s global temperature by about 0.1 degree Celsius, slightly hotter during solar maximum and cooler during solar minimum. The sun is currently at its minimum, and the next solar maximum is expected in 2012.”
According to the study, during periods of solar quiet, 1,361 watts per square meter of solar energy reaches Earth’s outermost atmosphere. Periods of more intense activity brought 1.3 watts per square meter (0.1 percent) more energy.
While the NASA study acknowledged the sun’s influence on warming and cooling patterns, it then went badly off the tracks. Ignoring its own evidence, it returned to an argument that man had replaced the sun as the cause current warming patterns. Like many studies, this conclusion was based less on hard data and more on questionable correlations and inaccurate modeling techniques.
The inconvertible fact, here is that even NASA’s own study acknowledges that solar variation has caused climate change in the past. And even the study’s members, mostly ardent supports of AGW theory, acknowledge that the sun may play a significant role in future climate changes.
NOTE: for those that wish to see the original NASA Goddard article which sparked both the Daily Tech and Science Daily news stories referenced above, you can read it here:
http://erc.ivv.nasa.gov/topics/solarsystem/features/solar_variability.html
– Anthony
“” Bob Wood (18:12:55) :
I’ve noticed that every evening when the sun goes down, so does the temperature. Maybe I should write a paper on that!””
Settle down Bob—there may not be a strong enough correlation there!
LOL
““ Right now, we are in between major ice ages, . . ”
How do they know? Take some time to think about this. “”
We do have the geologic record. The past happened in the past. So there’s evidence of it laying all over the place.
100 years from now, saying what it will be like then— if we should believe those predictions or not—there’s something we need to think about.
The end of the 14th Century saw widespread & global climate disasters.
China (pricing swings leading up to famine & identical to events in Europe).
Toltecs collapse by invading barbaric Aztecs.
Expansion of Polynesia came to a sudden end (unusually cold period).
In Africa, the great Mali Empire collapsed and trading with Europe ceased.
And in Europe all the way into the Slavic lands the 14th century was an unqualified disaster.
see A.T. Wilson – Isotope Evidence for Past Climactic and Environmental Change. Journal of Interdisciplinary History 10 (1980) 241-50.
GISS’s director needs to be told about this.
Mike Abbott,
FYI,
The solar effect on climate is 100%.
No solar = no climate
I know anecdotal accounts don’t mean much, but I gotta tell you that this time last year, I was swimming at our pool every weekend.
It’s too cold so far this year…
Yes, our regular contributor Leif Svalgaard has generally said that he is sceptical that the sun is a driver of climate on earth. To echo another commentor here, perhaps Leif could discuss this viewpoint in an article here. While of course correlation is not causation, it does give one pause to see that the greatest solar minimums in the Age of the Telescope correlated with decreased temperatures over at least some part of the globe.
Craig
evanmjones (20:00:06) :
““ Right now, we are in between major ice ages, . . ”
How do they know? Take some time to think about this.
They know because of the Milankovitch cycles, one thing they can actually predict. ””
Here’s the rub: A person wins a very large lottery jackpot, then says, “I’m going to continue playing until I win again.” The law of probability will assure us that if the person lives and plays long enough then after the first jackpot he or she is “between major” jackpots. But until that second big win the statement is not true.
It’s worth pointing out that the Milankovitch cycles alludes to a theory with a few problems:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milankovitch_cycles
. . . lists six.
Man o man, lots of NASA bashing going on here! There is more to NASA than just their climate stuff…how about those little Mars rovers?
@ur momisugly E.M.Smith (17:55:44) :
“It was 68F on my patio this afternoon. Again. In “summer”…”
We almost set a record high today and yesterday, almost 15 degrees above “normal” where I live.
@ur momisuglyMike Lorrey (18:49:41) :
“Excuse me, but 1.3 watts per square meter is 1% of 1361 watts per square meter, not 0.1%
Thats a order of magnitude difference in warming.”
Try your math again.
But, John, Milankovitch cycles are not the lotto. They are predictable, and I would dare to say unalterable.
Yes, the theory is tied up with positive feedback issues, and there is the 41k vs. 100k. issue and we can’t be sure of inclination’s role, but it’s clear we are in an interglacial.
Man o man, lots of NASA bashing going on here!
Well, we’ve been down on GISS ever since the start. With good reason.
Katlab (17:15:26) :
Okay, so after the 900 page climate bill is passed loaded down with goodies, NASA says that global warming is correlated to solar radiance. They couldn’t have presented this study when Congress was “considering” the bill?
This bill has not passed. It has gotten out of one committee but has not been voted on by the main house or senate. Word is they do not have enough to pass it.. I suggest a letter to your congressmen letting them know you dont support it. House.gov and senate.gov both have resources to look up your congressmen and contact them. Its important that they know what we do and dont want.
To get a feel for the economic cost of our “collective” insanity with regard to AGW, read the Daily Reckoning’s assessment.
“The Daily Reckoning PRESENTS: The Waxman-Markey bill that has been making its rounds on the Hill appears to be the most expensive proposal to hit Congress since the financial crisis. Chris Mayer points out who he thinks will be the winners and losers in this legislation. Read on…
Waxman-Markey Whacks Industry
by Chris Mayer
Gaithersburg, MD
The so-called Waxman-Markey bill snaking its way through the greasy halls of Congress looks likes the most expensive thing to hit the economy since the financial crisis began. Even the normally mild- mannered Wall Street Journal called it “one of the most ambitious efforts to re-engineer American social and economic behavior in decades, presenting risks and opportunities for a wide array of businesses from Silicon Valley to the coal fields of the Appalachians.”
First off, the stated objective of cutting carbon emissions by 83% by 2050 will go down in history as outrageous – akin to when Who drummer Keith Moon drove his Lincoln Continental into the pool at the Holiday Inn. I think members of Congress must be smoking the same thing Moon was.
To show you how patently ridiculous such a goal is, I turn to Questar’s CEO – a man with the unfortunate name of Keith Rattie. Questar is an oil and gas company. Rattie is an engineer. He has been in the business since the 1970s. He walks us through the basic math in a speech he made at Utah Valley University on April 2 called “Energy Myths and Realities.” Rattie uses Utah as an example:
“Utah’s carbon footprint today is about 66 million tons per year. Our population is 2.6 million. You divide those two numbers and the average Utahan today has a carbon footprint of about 25 tons per year. An 80% reduction in Utah’s carbon footprint by 2050 implies 66 million tons today to about 13 million tons per year by 2050. If Utah’s population continues to grow at 2% per year, by 2050, there will be about 6 million people living in our state. So 13 million tons divided by 6 million people equals 2.2 tons per person per year.
“Question: When was the last time Utah’s carbon footprint was as low as 2.2 tons per person? Answer: Not since Brigham Young and the Mormon pioneers first entered the Wasatch Valley and declared, ‘This is the place.'”
“The worst-case scenario here is that the U.S. simply won’t be making steel at some point in the future. The plants will all go to Brazil. China is already the biggest steel producer in the world.”
You can extend this math over the whole country – a growing mass of 300 million people. To meet the Waxman-Markey bill’s goals would mean we have to go back to a carbon footprint about as big as the Pilgrims’ at Plymouth Rock circa 1620.
So I think the bill is absurd. I think it is also a great blow to what is left of American industry. But who cares what I think? As the great Jeffers wrote, “Be angry at the sun for setting/ If these things anger you.” This is the way the world works. Politicians do dumb things. We have to play the ball where it is. And that means we have to figure out who wins and who loses.
Here are some thoughts along those lines…
Agriculture. Agriculture, for whatever reasons, is exempt from the new rules. So farmers don’t have to worry about those manure pools out back or the flatulent cows emitting methane all over God’s green meadows. Those big tractors? Burn up that diesel!
Agriculture is a winner by virtue of not losing, like a hockey team that skates to a tie.
Steel. Big loser. U.S Steel, AK Steel and even foreign steel companies with US operations all get a big kick in the family jewels on this one. Steelmaking emits all kinds of carbon dioxide. The worst-case scenario here is that the US simply won’t be making steel at some point in the future. The plants will all go to Brazil. China is already the biggest steel producer in the world. Now we just handed the country a bunch of new business.
Avoid big steel in the US.
Utilities. Mostly losers. Under the bill, utilities will have to get 12% of their electricity from renewable sources. That means they are going to spend money buying windmills and solar panels. For some of the coal utilities, this is bad news – even though they caught a break when the government made a change to let coal have carbon permits for free to start off with. Gas utilities are better off, as they emit less carbon, but since coal gets some free carbon allowances upfront, their advantage will not be as big as I made out in my letter to you a month ago. (See, the problem with writing about potential legislation is the rules change every week.)
Still, I’d avoid coal producers or coal utilities. They wear big targets on their backs and can’t do much about it, except spend a lot of money. Bad for shareholders. There may be some very good ideas on the picks-and-shovel angle for coal, though. For example, a number of companies will sell equipment to clean up coal. And of course, the solar and wind guys are big winners.
Oil refiners. Losers. This is an industry in which it is hard to make money most of the time as it is. Now, under the new bill, refineries are really screwed. Basically, they are on the hook for about 44% of US carbon emissions. They would be among the biggest buyers of carbon emission allowances. I think with one stroke of the pen, the US government just made the US refining industry that much smaller. Lots of these older refineries will just have to close. US imports for gasoline will rise.
I think the refinery industry already sees the writing on the wall. This is one reason why Valero, the biggest US refinery, has been quick to get into the politically favored ethanol business. It’s also expanding overseas.
Avoid the refineries.
Trading desks. Winners. It figures. As if the government doesn’t help financial firms enough, it is going to hand them a nice tomato in trading carbon credits. The head of Morgan Stanley’s US emission trading desk said: “Carbon, while relatively small, is a critical piece of our commodities offering.” So some financial firms with trading desks in carbon get a nice little payday.
To sum up, this is only the beginning. At the end of the day, this obsession with carbon footprints means that Americans are going to have to pay a lot more for products that use fossil fuels. It means we are going to pay a lot more for energy. Obama and his crew can draw up whatever fantasies they want, but they can’t repeal the laws of economics, which, like forces of nature, win out every time.
Regards,
Chris Mayer
for The Daily Reckoning”
Benestad, R. E., and G. A. Schmidt (2009),
Solar Trends and Global Warming,
J. Geophys. Res., doi:10.1029/2008JD011639, in press.
The planet has been warming since man-made greenhouse gases have been added to the atmosphere. This does not prove it is the cause. On the other hand it is a for more reliable theory to account for current global temperatures than the link to solar activity, which has been moving in exactly the opposite direction for 30 years or so.
We have been in a period of low sunspot activity for a while yet global temperatures have not plummeted. In fact they are higher than the 1990-1999 average.
/// The ten warmest years on record have occurred since 1997. Global temperatures for 2000-2008 now stand almost 0.2 °C warmer than the average for the decade 1990–1999. ///
For the last 4 billion years the sun has been warming up. Yet temperatures today are much lower than they were in the age of the dinosaur. Explain that, if anybody really believes the sun is the biggest factor?
Also it is far hotter at the centre of the earth than at the surface of the sun. And which is closer to us?
… and may be on the verge of inciting the ultimate survival challenge yet experienced by civilized Man.
Dennis Ward 22 56 43
You have raised some intersting points, one of which has always been at the back of my mind. That concerns the warmth at the centre of the Earth, does it have any impact on temperatures?
It periodically finds its way to the surface as a by product in the form of volcanic eruptions-statistically insignificant, below oceans-probably more significant especially if it is under ice covered seas.
Is what lies a few miles beneath our feet of any impact whatsoever on either surface or on sea temperatures? I have no opinion either way and know discussion on possible impact of volcanoes on ice levels is not encouraged over at CA. Consequently I am merely asking the question in the hope that someone can point me to information that gives a conclusive answer either way.
Tonyb
dennis ward (22:56:43) :
The Sunspot counts might be declining but the last 3 cycles are still way above average for the last 400 years. Give it time, there are lag factors involved.
I will leave the other Gems in your comment for others to have fun with.
Stop calling attention to the huge flaming ball of gas in the sky! It has NOTHING to do with how warm we are! The consensus of scientists all agree. We’d be just as warm with out it.
From Dennis Ward: “it is far hotter at the centre of the earth than at the surface of the sun. And which is closer to us?”
Great point. Sun… HA! Who needs a sun to stay warm! Quite right Dennis, Earth is all we ever needed. Don’t know why we keep orbiting that silly, innefectual thing anyway!
/sarcasm off
http://landscheidt.auditblogs.com/2009/06/04/200-year-solar-cycle-prediction/
Anthony, I think this post by Geoff deserves a bit more circulation. It is topical since he dabbles in the prediction game.
We have been in a period of low sunspot activity for a while yet global temperatures have not plummeted. In fact they are higher than the 1990-1999 average.
Starts at the poles/locales and works it’s way over time.
Warms up the same way.
Check out the Laurentide Ice Sheet.
For the last 4 billion years the sun has been warming up
An enigma.
Geologic record shows the Earth cooling down.
That would be an inverse correlation.
How do you work that one?
Smallz79;-)
You won’t get much in the British msm. Our once noble, respected, & admired institutions have been infiltrated by eco-activists, like the sleepers of old communism days, the coup is all but complete. Every major organisation is the same. Decent is quoshed, silenced, shut down. Its almost like one of those fantasy sci-fi movies where everyone knows, but mustn’t say, its against the faith, the dogma. Any decent is offically put down as cranky, fools, lunies, trouble makers, etc, & of course the classic put down, said with utter exasperation, “I can’t bevlieve there are still people like you out there!”. All we get is yet another yawning weekly guilt-trip saga diet of the whales are dying, the dolphins are dying, the fish stocks have run out, the polar bears are drowning, the rain forests are dying/disappearing/gone, ban red meat, ban all meat, eat nothing but vegetables, don’t smoke, stop drinking alcohol, ban salt, ban anything, ban everything, its all dangerous, etc, etc. Anything that can be linked to AGW is promoted with great zeal. We had a small Earth tremor a little while ago, it was nationl news, & even somebody – hopefully tongue firmly in cheek – related to AGW, which promted an formal denial. That’s what the UK is like now. Truly.
I said a while ago, that an article by David C Archibald regarding quiet solar cycles 24 & 25 leading to a cooling Earth was posted on the UK Treasury website, + another similar one added a year or so later. The site was revamped recently & guess what? Yep, the articel has gone, nowhere to be found, it didn’t exist. I dare say the Treasury will have no record of such an article ever having been posted on its site. Good job I printed it off then. Your F.o.I Act is far more powerful than ours, use it to the full I implore you!
Of course we’re are bashed about population growth by the likes of “Sir Jonathan only have two children because they are a drain on the planet Porrit”, why he & his cronies are having ago at western Europe & North America is any bodies guess, probably because they haven’t the guts to go to “guilty” countries & lecture them about it all, because they jolly well know what the result would be. It has been known for many, many years, that population growth in wealthy western democratic nations will be relatively low, with very unlikely doubling of population. Unlike nations such as China, India, & Brazil, just to name 3. I learned about this when I was at college, nothing new here.
As to attitudes here, I suspect most are doubtful, especially when the old arguements about “control” bubble to the surface. What we hardly ever get, is open decent about the causes of Global Warming & Climate Change because such powerful institutions (eg The Met Office) are complicit for reasons given before. The Debate Is Over! The Coup Is All But Complete! Having said that, I like others have noticed a slight change in attitude again from such quarters as TMO. Dr Vicky Pope saying people shouldn’t stir up catastrophe arguments & the like, & that Arctic sea-ice melt could be from natural causes when she was curiously silent about this when the rhetoric was being flung in all directions. Cracks are there but they are small.
Anyway they’ve got Deep Thought now so they’re happy!
Moderator, pl snip as req’d as it is OT!
From the article
Which means that, in 2012, we can expect global temperatures to be 0.1 deg higher than they are currently – all other things being equal.
Also from the article
But as has been mentioned on this blog on a number of occasions, the earth receives ~7% more solar energy in January than it does in July. Yet global temperatures at the surface and in the troposphere are higher during July than January. This suggests that factors such as Land/Ocean ratio are more dominant.
Anyone looking for an alternative to GHGs as a reason for the post-1975 warming – I’d try the oceans.
Apologies for the bad spelling!
AtB
Also it is far hotter at the centre of the earth than at the surface of the sun. And which is closer to us?
And you’ll get nowhere near either one.
You will perish somewhere below 13,000 ft into the Earth from the stifling heat, provided the rock bursts don’t get you first.
And you’ll be burned to a crisp millions of miles from the Sun, providing you can go fast enough to spiral in by defeating the orbital velocity of 66,705 mph.
Dennis lets get some perspective here. If the sun was the size of a standard table-tennis ball IE. 40mm, then the earth would be approx. .36mm ( a pin prick ) in diameter at a distance of 4.2 meters ( width of a room ). Try it out on your lounge floor and then tell me if the sun is irrelevant.
The heat outflow of the earth is estimated at 44 terawatts. the surface area = 510 million sq km or 510 million million sq meters. therefore total heat outflow is in the region of 0.08 watts per sq meter. Sorry but that’s not going to do anything to surface temperatures.