Basil Copeland and I also found linkages between surface temperature and solar cycles in two articles we published in the last year. We were roundly criticized and ridiculed by warmists mainly due to a statistical error in the first essay, but the base premise remained and the second essay was improved due to that error. I’m pleased to see that NCAR has found other solar to earth linkages, such as this one in ENSO. This is exciting news, but by no means a complete solution to the climate puzzle. There is much more to be learned about this. This is but one connector of the hydra-like patch cable that Dr. Jack Eddy imagined – Anthony
Scientists find link between solar cycle and global climate similar to El Nino/La Nina. Credit: NCAR
Establishing a key link between the solar cycle and global climate, research led by scientists at the National Science Foundation (NSF)-funded National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) in Boulder, Colo., shows that maximum solar activity and its aftermath have impacts on Earth that resemble La Niña and El Niño events in the tropical Pacific Ocean.
The research may pave the way toward predictions of temperature and precipitation patterns at certain times during the approximately 11-year solar cycle.
“These results are striking in that they point to a scientifically feasible series of events that link the 11-year solar cycle with ENSO, the tropical Pacific phenomenon that so strongly influences climate variability around the world,” says Jay Fein, program director in NSF’s Division of Atmospheric Sciences. “The next step is to confirm or dispute these intriguing model results with observational data analyses and targeted new observations.”
The total energy reaching Earth from the sun varies by only 0.1 percent across the solar cycle. Scientists have sought for decades to link these ups and downs to natural weather and climate variations and distinguish their subtle effects from the larger pattern of human-caused global warming.
Building on previous work, the NCAR researchers used computer models of global climate and more than a century of ocean temperature to answer longstanding questions about the connection between solar activity and global climate.
The research, published this month in a paper in the Journal of Climate, was funded by NSF, NCAR’s sponsor, and by the U.S. Department of Energy.
“We have fleshed out the effects of a new mechanism to understand what happens in the tropical Pacific when there is a maximum of solar activity,” says NCAR scientist Gerald Meehl, the paper’s lead author. “When the sun’s output peaks, it has far-ranging and often subtle impacts on tropical precipitation and on weather systems around much of the world.”
The new paper, along with an earlier one by Meehl and colleagues, shows that as the Sun reaches maximum activity, it heats cloud-free parts of the Pacific Ocean enough to increase evaporation, intensify tropical rainfall and the trade winds, and cool the eastern tropical Pacific.
The result of this chain of events is similar to a La Niña event, although the cooling of about 1-2 degrees Fahrenheit is focused further east and is only about half as strong as for a typical La Niña.
Over the following year or two, the La Niña-like pattern triggered by the solar maximum tends to evolve into an El Niño-like pattern, as slow-moving currents replace the cool water over the eastern tropical Pacific with warmer-than-usual water.
Again, the ocean response is only about half as strong as with El Niño.
True La Niña and El Niño events are associated with changes in the temperatures of surface waters of the eastern Pacific Ocean. They can affect weather patterns worldwide.
The paper does not analyze the weather impacts of the solar-driven events. But Meehl and his co-author, Julie Arblaster of both NCAR and the Australian Bureau of Meteorology, found that the solar-driven La Niña tends to cause relatively warm and dry conditions across parts of western North America.
More research will be needed to determine the additional impacts of these events on weather across the world.
“Building on our understanding of the solar cycle, we may be able to connect its influences with weather probabilities in a way that can feed into longer-term predictions, a decade at a time,” Meehl says.
Scientists have known for years that long-term solar variations affect certain weather patterns, including droughts and regional temperatures.
But establishing a physical connection between the decadal solar cycle and global climate patterns has proven elusive.
One reason is that only in recent years have computer models been able to realistically simulate the processes associated with tropical Pacific warming and cooling associated with El Niño and La Niña.
With those models now in hand, scientists can reproduce the last century’s solar behavior and see how it affects the Pacific.
To tease out these sometimes subtle connections between the sun and Earth, Meehl and his colleagues analyzed sea surface temperatures from 1890 to 2006. They then used two computer models based at NCAR to simulate the response of the oceans to changes in solar output.
They found that, as the sun’s output reaches a peak, the small amount of extra sunshine over several years causes a slight increase in local atmospheric heating, especially across parts of the tropical and subtropical Pacific where Sun-blocking clouds are normally scarce.
That small amount of extra heat leads to more evaporation, producing extra water vapor. In turn, the moisture is carried by trade winds to the normally rainy areas of the western tropical Pacific, fueling heavier rains.
As this climatic loop intensifies, the trade winds strengthen. That keeps the eastern Pacific even cooler and drier than usual, producing La Niña-like conditions.
Although this Pacific pattern is produced by the solar maximum, the authors found that its switch to an El Niño-like state is likely triggered by the same kind of processes that normally lead from La Niña to El Niño.
The transition starts when the changes of the strength of the trade winds produce slow-moving off-equatorial pulses known as Rossby waves in the upper ocean, which take about a year to travel back west across the Pacific.
The energy then reflects from the western boundary of the tropical Pacific and ricochets eastward along the equator, deepening the upper layer of water and warming the ocean surface.
As a result, the Pacific experiences an El Niño-like event about two years after solar maximum. The event settles down after about a year, and the system returns to a neutral state.
“El Niño and La Niña seem to have their own separate mechanisms,” says Meehl, “but the solar maximum can come along and tilt the probabilities toward a weak La Niña. If the system was heading toward a La Niña anyway,” he adds, “it would presumably be a larger one.”
Source: National Science Foundation (news : web)
h/t to Leif Svalgaard
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Regarding the response to UK Skeptic made by Richard Steckis (18:09:59) :
Excellent response !!! Too many, including some members of science and politicians think that the ‘models’ say or mean more than what they do. UK Skeptic seems to have missed this portion ……
“The next step is to confirm or dispute these intriguing model results with observational data analyses and targeted new observations.”
Confirm or dispute with observational data. Too bad Gore, Hansen, etc. don’t think of such things. Models test hypothesis but do not prove anything.
Then there is no claim of the models to predict. The main jist is……
“The research may pave the way toward predictions”
To the no-more-money-for-them dungeons with them.
What everyone is ignoring is ALBEDO!! guys, ALBEDO!!!!
Curious that when models support AGW they are all wrong, but when they support natural variability they are all the sudden good enough…
The various people that have advocated ENSO as tied to the solar cycle find that El Nino happens at or shortly after solar minimum, not as ‘the Sun reaches maximum activity’ as this study claims…
And what happens to the cosmic ray link? The article does not refer to that [at least not in the blurb]. Now, the true enthusiasts will, of course, point out that the ‘cloud-free’ parts of the ocean at maximum are there because there are fewer cosmic rays to create clouds.
O/T
I don’t know about the rest of you all, but I was a young man all of 8 years old when I witnessed Apollo 11. I remember being dragged by my teen-aged aunt down to the school to watch the launch. I had no previous understanding about what was about to happen. I went back every day for as long as the mission lasted. This would have been the approximate time I became scientifically aware. I feel honoured to have been alive and at such a formative age when those brave Americans reached out and touched another planet for the first time. I still feel the wonder I did then.
I will never forget.
A little late to the party, but then most of the NCAR staff live in Boulder Colorado (otherwise know as the Peoples Republic of Boulder) where the citizens have a tenuous grasp on reality!
Leif,
What’s up with the sun? I thought it was going to ramp up in activity? Any thoughts?
INGSOC,
I remember the Apollo 11 launch very well [I watched it along with everyone else on the single 19″ B&W TV set we had at our firebase in Tuy Hoa, Viet Nam].
A thousand years from now, WWII will be a footnote in history — but the first men on the moon will be remembered as a major milestone for the human race, eclipsing any other event. It was the human race’s first baby step to the stars.
America’s zenith was the period from WWII through the Apollo lunar exploration program. Like you, I am proud to have witnessed it.
Climate politics changing?
Climate science changing?
Leif Svalgaard (18:55:08) :
Curious that when models support AGW they are all wrong, but when they support natural variability they are all the sudden good enough…
The various people that have advocated ENSO as tied to the solar cycle find that El Nino happens at or shortly after solar minimum, not as ‘the Sun reaches maximum activity’ as this study claims…
—
Problem appears to be these analysts’ “assumed” linkage of temperature directly to the 11 year solar sunspot cycle.
Wrong approach, in my ever-so-humble opinion. The real result (of whatever is controlling earth’s climate) is a thirty year oscilating cycle imposed on a 800-1000 year larger cycle. Thus, if the AMO is dominating the year cycle – then the question becomes: What drives (controls and causes, starts and stops) the AMO?
If a second short term temperature cycle is the PDO – which may or may not go up and down with the AMO at any given time – then, What drives the PDO?
It does NOT appear to be sunspots – certainly not directly. Several previous plots show the high’s and lows of eartherm temperature match to the relative length of the sunspot cycle, the relative peaks of ech long or short sunspot cycle – but those are a symptom, not a cause, of the (unknown) cause of the AMO and PDO changes.
There is a second long term climate cycle independent of the short-term PDO’s and AMO thirty year period: The Roman Warm Period descended down to the Dark Ages, back up to the Medival Warming Period, back down to the Little Ice Age, then back up from the mid-1600’s towards today’s – early 2000’s – warmer temperatures.
I can (and have!) thought of all sorts of things influencing those two cycles: but – whatever it turns out to actually be – finding out the SOURCE of those two patterns will be the winner.
We cannot discount the very long term 10,000 year Ice Ages and the even longer 100,000 cycles. These do get controlled by solar and earth’s orbit pertubations. But orbit and polar pertubations cannot account for the very real changes that are clearly measureable. Over 8, 80, even 800 years they only distract from, and not justify, the measured short term cyclic change.
Throw a 1/10 (or even 1/2) of one degree per century in from recent CO2 changes? Yes, it could have happened. But if we are globally rising from the mid-1600’s by 1.0? 1.5? 2.0? degrees without CO2 induced effects in the previous 2000 years, then why assume/require (other than taxes and power) that any theory needs a CO2 factor?
In fact, if you add the proven 30 cycle of 1/2 of one degree to 3/4 of one degree into the graph of temperatures and temperature proxies and their error bars as they fall then rise ever since the year 1050, you probably can account for almost all of the “false evidence” cases of temperature in most any analysis.
So, today’s homework assignment is: What drives the two short term temperature cycles?
Steven Hill (19:19:26) :
What’s up with the sun? I thought it was going to ramp up in activity? Any thoughts?
It is, it is, but slowly. If you look at http://www.leif.org/research/TSI-SORCE-2008-now.png
You’ll see that TSI [the dark blue curve on top] has started to show life. The F10.7 radio flux [the pink curve in the middle] is up, and the sunspot number [green, bottom] shows new activity. But, if the new cycle is going to be weak [as I think it is] the ‘ramp-up’ will be slow.
I’m not lobbying Congress to pass an agenda to double your gasoline, electricity, water, food, internet, etc bills.
AGW is.
They want to make life extremely expensive.
Therefore I cheer anything on that tosses cold water in the face of faked concern for the Planet.
Besides that, their dire predictions turned out no better than the Ice Age warnings late 19th and early 20th centuries. Or the warming scare of the 30’s. Or the Global Warming theory of 1952. Or the Ice Age coming in the 70’s.
I have no problem with Sci-Fi books and scary movies.
When you walk out of the movie or put the book down, nobody is in your face with the latest dire warnings they cooked up.
Excellent question UK Sceptic! The answer for me comes from a quote in the article “The next step is to confirm or dispute these intriguing model results with observational data analyses and targeted new observations.”
It’s just a theory and they plan on using the scientific method to test it. AGW sounded like a good theory when it started. As long as they don’t start passing laws based on this theory, I’ll be happy to read more about it.
@ur momisugly Leif Svalgaard (18:55:08) :
Dr. Svalgaard wrote: “Curious that when models support AGW they are all wrong, but when they support natural variability they are all the sudden good enough…”
Frankly, of course, it’s human nature to respond positively to a report or in this case, analysis & interpretation that falls your way.
More important is that this analysis & interpretation explains what Man knows intuitively: When the Sun is “raging & beastly” (solar maximum) more energy is received by the Earth than when the Sun is “meek & mild” (solar minimum).
Now, this analysis makes do with the 0.1% irradiance variation you agree to and articulates why that variation does make a difference in temperature over the solar cycle.
So it disagrees with your position (although, I acknowledge you provided the heads up to Anthony).
But the fact remains those that claim Man or Science knows all there is to know about the energy transfer process between the Sun and the Earth are arrogant and liable to intellectual blindness.
And you know what they say: “Pride cometh before the fall…”
I was going to point out the double-standard of computer modeling, but then I thought I read that it fit the historical record (backtested). That doesn’t make a perfect predictor either (investment modelling, anyone?), but AGW models don’t even backtest very well at all!
Yet we continue to make policy…well, wecontinue to ALLOW our electerd officials off the hook.
Mark (18:15:35) :
Wonder how these same people reacted when they found out about Mann’s statistical shenanigans (Mannanigans?) with the 1st hockey stick?
Who knows, but note that these guys admitted, and then corrected their error. The same cannot be said for The Team.
Mark
Re: Leif,
“Curious that when models support AGW they are all wrong, but when they support natural variability they are all the sudden good enough…
The various people that have advocated ENSO as tied to the solar cycle find that El Nino happens at or shortly after solar minimum, not as ‘the Sun reaches maximum activity’ as this study claims…”
Leif,
Part of the reason I am a bit dis-trustful (and hence skeptical) of the science of AGW is due to things like the issues with Mann’s hockey stick, and some people (like McIntyre) not being able to get code and data from some science and climate organizations.
And then there are the redistributive politics tied into AGW policies that is a whole other issue…
Nah…its not like a “wow all of the sudden the dynamical models support natural variability”…when we in another breath discounted them for AGW.
More like….there are more complexities….more variables….more layers…..than any simplistic or all-or-nothing approach or analysis can ever handle.
Its the OCEANS immediately, stupid.
Its the SUNS…intermediately, stupid.
And Svensmark and his rays fit in somewhere too.
IT IS ALL THREE….and more.
Thanks Anthony for inducting these studies into the record. 🙂
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
To me the most interesting quote in the article was the following:
“Scientists have known for years that long-term solar variations affect certain weather patterns, including droughts and regional temperatures”.
Just curious what happened 121 years ago. Wouldn’t it be interesting if every eleventh cycle had importance too?
GISS and other temp series producers are not using models. They use adjustment codes to both scrub, correct, and smooth the data. IPCC borrowed dynamical models of CO2 driven climate from a few researchers who may not have had complete control of what they did to the models in promoting their agenda. These dynamical models take super computer strength to run them. In fact short cuts are made because there is not enough computer strength to run the kind of model they would like to run. Statistical models can be run on a PC. Dynamical models should always be compared to observations and then adjusted to reflect the addition or change to the parameters that are causing the divergence. Statistical models almost learn on their own. The longer the data history of conditions present just prior to a weather or climate event, the better it becomes at predicting climate events. But there are no long strings of calculations involved. Just whether or not the same set of pre-conditions existed before.
The paper seems to be describing the outcome of a dynamical model of a proposed mechanism for a small solar signal that may not be able to rise above the noise, not an actual observation. I question the assumptions made about the proposed mechanism and wonder if it isn’t a bit of fishing. Would like to read the entire paper.
Everyone is looking for the slam dunk on climate. When will we get a model that includes the vast variety of factors?:
1. A Heliomagnetosphere/teramagnetosphere interaction (tearing holes in teramagnetosphere?) (exposure to (protection from?) solar wind/cosmic rays, and quantified roughly by sunspot qty/SC periods under a multi decadal curve?
(this so as to explain the heat content(or lack thereof) in #2)
2. A definitive measure of the radiative balance at the limb of our atmosphere?
3. (Now I’ll really show my ignorance) An ENSO/LNSO /+/- AMO oscillation
(I’ll guess – induced by Lunar cycle and its precession COMBINED WITH solar retrograde due to Barycenter fluctuation, including precession of all planetary bodies about the sun, AND about the plane of the ecliptic) (It may be small mass, leif, but it’s there)
And I want to raise a question on this: Since Sun is a ball of ionized plasma, why can’t this (magnetic disturbance) be affected by jovian mass displacement? It isn’t as though the sun was a solid body. It isn’t necessary to move the entire mass…. Just pull on the taffy…
4. Let’s not forget Milankovitch or the solar system’s position within galaxy arms ( and exposure to cosmic rays).
5. The position of tectonic plates/continental mass/ability of oceans to circulate heat.
6. Vulcanism – possibly induced by barycenter gravitational effects on earth’s molten core. (My personal opinion is that these will coincide with other effects because they are all caused by the same thing – barycenter movement.
(BTW – YELLOWSTONE IS OVERDUE! HOLY GUACAMOLE!)
7. The consumption/expulsion of C02 by the biosphere ( how the H*@ur momisugly can anyone calculate the consumption of C02 by the biomass ? We don’t really know what it is!
8. Lastly, the anthropogenic effect. UHI (including how many times Britney Spears, and all the cows of earth passed gas today.
I’m sure I forgot many things, but if you’ll just check with Britney, I think you’ll find that no-one has been keeping track.
Oh, and one more thing: even if the variance is 0.1%, who says that’s not enough to cause drastic changes in Mother Earth? (Besides Leif, that is…)
sorry…
(this so as to explain the heat content(or lack thereof) in #2)
make it #3,
a jones (17:19:48) : “…I am afraid the answer as to why the trade winds vary in both strength and slightly in position is a bit of a circular one…”
Yes, so it seems to me. Increased evaporation lowers the density of the air mass above equatorial waters, presenting less resistance to trade winds, resulting in increased velocity without much momentum change. Other mass flow factors can increase this effect by lowering pressures in this region. If the wind altitude is sufficiently low, reduced seawater viscosity may also play a part.