Guest Post by David Archibald
NASA’s David Hathaway has adjusted his expectations of Solar Cycle 24 downwards. He is quoted in the New York Times here Specifically, he said:
” Still, something like the Dalton Minimum — two solar cycles in the early 1800s that peaked at about an average of 50 sunspots — lies in the realm of the possible.”
NASA has caught up with my prediction in early 2006 of a Dalton Minimum repeat, so for a brief, shining moment of three years, I have had a better track record in predicting solar activity than NASA.
The graphic above is modified from a paper I published in March, 2006. Even based on our understanding of solar – climate relationship at the time, it was evident the range of Solar Cycle 24 amplitude predictions would result in a 2°C range in temperature. The climate science community was oblivious to this, despite billions being spent. To borrow a term from the leftist lexicon, the predictions above Badalyan are now discredited elements.
Let’s now examine another successful prediction of mine. In March, 2008 at the first Heartland climate conference in New York, I predicted that Solar Cycle 24 would mean that it would not be a good time to be a Canadian wheat farmer. Lo and behold, the Canadian wheat crop is down 20% this year due to a cold spring and dry fields. Story here.
The oceans are losing heat, so the Canadian wheat belt will just get colder and drier as Solar Cycle 24 progresses. As Mark Steyn recently said, anyone under the age of 29 has not experienced global warming. A Dalton Minimum repeat will mean that they will have to wait to the age of 54 odd to experience a warming trend.
Where to now? The F 10.7 flux continues to flatline. All the volatility has gone out of it. In terms of picking the month of minimum for the Solar Cycle 23/24 transition, I think the solar community will put it in the middle of the F 10.7 quiet period due to the lack of sunspots. We won’t know how long that quiet period is until solar activity ramps up again. So picking the month of minimum at the moment may just be guessing.
Dr Hathaway says that we are not in for a Maunder Minimum, and I agree with him. I have been contacted by a gentleman from the lower 48 who has a very good solar activity model. It hindcasts the 20th century almost perfectly, so I have a lot of faith in what it is predicting for the 21st century, which is a couple of very weak cycles and then back to normal as we have known it. I consider his model to be a major advance in solar science.
What I am now examining is the possibility that there will not be a solar magnetic reversal at the Solar Cycle 24 maximum.
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@crosspatch
“which way was the wind blowing?”
Yesterday there was no wind (it hit 106) Today there was a 15mph east wind which was why it ‘only’ reached 106 (new record for the day but not all time). However dozens of stations in western Oregon & Washington including Seattle did break all time record temperatures today and none of them are influenced by winds from the Columbia river gorge.
The cause is the same reason that the Eastern US has been so cool-extremely high meridional flow. The jet stream is clear over northern Yukon, and then plunges as far south as Arkansas which is a bit south for this time of the year (its average position for July is near the Canadian border.)
edcom(12:55:20)
“Dr Hathway says that we are not in for a Maunder Minimum and I agree with him” – Why drop the comment without explanation? The comment is directly from Dave Archibold’s post. Dave also states that picking the month of minimun at the moment may just be guessing. If you go to the website http://solarscience.msfc.nasa.gov/predict.shtml that explains the methodology behind Hathway’s predictions, you will find that they are dependent on determining the solar minimum. There needs to be something based on the physics of the Sun before it can be stated that we are not sliding into something like a Maunder Minimum.
SteveSadlov (17:30:13) :
A bit of junk science in the mix on this thread.
Starting with the very article heading the thread. Archibald [and others] are a bit too self-congratulating for my taste, especially when one takes into account that this is not based on sound analysis, but it is in line with the progressive science-illiteracy that characterizes our time.
I had been thrashing around a couple of month ago trying to get updated forecasts of Solar Cycle 24 amplitude, given that we have been running on forecasts that are now three years old and that the subsequent data should have allowed models to be fine tuned. I was having no success when I got contacted by the gentleman from the lower 48. Now I can look forwards and backwards with great clarity. The fog has lifted. It’s a great feeling.
By the way, the heliospheric current sheet has flattened. That allows us to have the month of minimum. It doesn’t necessarily mean that the month of minimum is here or has passed.
Nogw (08:47:16) :
And…neutron cosmic rays Oulu count it is above 10%
There are scores of measuring stations. NOAA keeps track of the cosmic ray intensity, and reports here: http://www.swpc.noaa.gov/alerts/solar_indices.html that the ‘Neutron Monitor % of background’ currently is 99.9%.
@Jeez:
Thank you for making my point so beautifully. Both of your assumptions are based on a false choice — and neither one of them is true.
@jim:
You miss my point. But I agree with yours completely.
Philip B:
Regarding time it takes solar irradiance to input 12×10^22 Joules, assume cross sectional area of earth, times effective solar constant of 1kW/square meter, times 0.70 for ocean fractional area, times one-half for effective daylight fraction, and the order of magnitude to accomplish the task is about 2.7 million seconds, which is about 3 weeks or so. There is an additional fractional amount for solar zenith, but this is about the order of magnitude.
Leif Svalgaard (17:24:41) :
Geoff Sharp (05:14:50) :
This grand minimum will be less severe than the Dalton.
———————————————————–
Which, of course, means that this minimum is no Grand Minimum, by that speculation.
Of course the Babcock bunch would prefer the Dalton Minimum to disappear because it and all the other Dalton like events back through time go against the random nature of the theory. Dalton events are the most common type of Grand Minima and cannot be ignored.
I consider a Grand Minimum to be 2 cycles of less then 50 SSN (old counting method) in succession. The Dalton had a 3rd weak cycle of around 70 which would have contributed to the cooling if that link exists ala SC20.
The Landscheidt Minimum will recover quickly after 2 weak cycles, the timing is completely different.
Geoff Sharp (19:21:56) :
I consider a Grand Minimum to be 2 cycles of less then 50 SSN (old counting method) in succession.
It is not important what you think. The concept of Grand Minimum is a ‘community issue’ and the general feeling [e.g. Usokin] is that Grand Minima are considerable ‘deeper’ and that we should not call any little deviation from the mean a ‘Grand Minimum’.
waow…:d
There is just no telling what might happen if the core loses its flippin’ momentum. LOL
That’s on beyond zebra, and definitely passed astrology on the way out.
Leif Svalgaard (19:46:56) :
Geoff Sharp (19:21:56) :
I consider a Grand Minimum to be 2 cycles of less then 50 SSN (old counting method) in succession.
————————————————
It is not important what you think. The concept of Grand Minimum is a ‘community issue’ and the general feeling [e.g. Usokin] is that Grand Minima are considerable ‘deeper’ and that we should not call any little deviation from the mean a ‘Grand Minimum’.
Just as, I dont consider that you think Usoskin has the “general feeling” as important, after all he is in the same camp as you. There are many other scientists who consider Dalton type events as Grand Minima, as they should, as they make up the majority of grand minima over the last 11000 yrs. The fact they occur every 172 years is something your crowd would rather forget.
Geoff –
Is this a terminology argument? Do you consider the Maunder and Dalton minimums to be very same phenomena? Are they different in any meaningful way?
“Were we to fall back into Dalton, Maunder or worse conditions, we would likely experience phenomena and global crises unlike any previously seen before.”
We are probably one major volcanic eruption away from global calamity. One failed harvest due to a single widespread killing frost in the US Midwest would throw the world into chaos.
(changing subject to Oregon Temps)
“The cause is the same reason that the Eastern US has been so cool-extremely high meridional flow. The jet stream is clear over northern Yukon”
I don’t believe that is the case, actually, because using that line of thinking it would be unseasonably hot all the way down the West Coast. It isn’t. The flow from the East is important because as air moves from a higher altitude to a lower altitude, it warms. So when you have air from the desert of Eastern Oregon which might be at 4000 feet or so move over the mountains and down toward the coast, it will warm considerably. We experience the same thing down here but generally in the fall (remember the Oakland Hills fire in the 1990’s?). San Francisco can get well over 90 degrees on those days with a strong offshore flow.
And that appears to be what is going on in the Pacific Northwest. As one blogger in the region writes:
It is the “easterlies aloft” and the offshore flow that is causing your warming. Air is generally going to increase 4 degrees for every thousand feet of altitude drop. So if you have 100 degree air at 4000 feet in the desert, it can easily end up at well over 100 degrees at sea level if blown West. And there might not have been much of a breeze where you stood but the “easterlies aloft” meaning a few hundred feet above you is what is causing the temperatures to rise.
Here in California, it is still cool and pleasant. So there is a high pressure system North of you and you are getting the offshore breeze from the clockwise circulation. Such a thing normally sets up farther South later in the season … at around Eureka, California bringing an onshore flow to Oregon and and an offshore flow around the SF Bay area in September/October.
Looks like that high pressure might be weakening now, though, so you should be in for more seasonable temperatures soon.
Geoff Sharp (20:28:39) :
Just as, I dont consider that you think Usoskin has the “general feeling” as important, after all he is in the same camp as you.
It is called ‘Camp Science’.
The fact they occur every 172 years is something your crowd would rather forget.
Many people has analyzed this correctly and find no such period.
RW (11:29:36) : Unless your reason for saying Steyn is wrong is that people to not “experience” the global temperature, you better have a good explanation for accusing him of being wrong-given that there has been no atmospheric warming in twelve years…
Highlander (13:39:19) : I suggest some basic reading:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arithmetic_mean
John Finn (15:48:31) : DeBilt has some interesting monthly variations (Hans Erren says something about a solar effect in January but I haven’t checked this):
http://members.casema.nl/errenwijlens/co2/fingerprintdb.html
But something that gets forgotten is that on a scale this small climate is wildly variable and often out of sync with global variations because it is intrinsically variant. Not many people seem to get this…
David Archibald (19:09:22) :
By the way, the heliospheric current sheet has flattened. That allows us to have the month of minimum. It doesn’t necessarily mean that the month of minimum is here or has passed.
Then what does it mean? aside from the fact that there is no such thing as THE minimum. There is an interval of some length [year or so] with low activity. The very month has little significance, and is not given by the ‘flatness’ anyway.
The Lonely Trader,
You use words but don’t say much.
How do you define erring on the side of caution?
Lee (20:34:03) :
Geoff –
Is this a terminology argument? Do you consider the Maunder and Dalton minimums to be very same phenomena? Are they different in any meaningful way?
Only difference is the strength involved…otherwise the same. My point is that they are both Grand Minima.
I am of the mind that Grand Minimums are all created differently. There being no 2 alike.
At what point do we say that the odds have changed from against to for in terms of attaining a “Dalton” type?
How much more time do we need? One year? Two Years?
How many spotless days are required?
We know firsthand how L&P can take out the spots, leaving the flux to do what the flux does. Does that mean that there are still active regions devoid of spots but still visible (facula), or do those go down as well?
Is it the lack of sunspots alone that causes cooling, or does this require the visible facula as well.
There must be plenty of old material gathering dust that can answer part of these questions. It needs to be dug up, especially where the Dalton is concerned.
I don’t expect to be able to find all the answers, but I will try.
I reckon the chlorine sales correlation is as good as any that the IPCC give us!!!
Anyway according to the IPCC and warming hysterics – correlation equals causation! After all, CO2 rise from 1979 to 1998 + temperature rise from 1979 to 1998 means that CO2 rise = higher temperatures. If an isolated 20 year correlation period is good enough for the ‘Church of Carbonology’, then the 12 year correlation period between chlorine and temperature is good enough for me!
It wouldn’t be fair if you started coming up with other reasons as to other reasons for the drop in chlorine consumption – because the warming hysterics don’t have to listen to contrary evidence, so why should I?!? 🙂
Leif Svalgaard (20:50:11) :
Geoff Sharp (20:28:39) :
Just as, I dont consider that you think Usoskin has the “general feeling” as important, after all he is in the same camp as you.
It is called ‘Camp Science’.
The fact they occur every 172 years is something your crowd would rather forget.
Many people has analyzed this correctly and find no such period.
But more have found something….many have found a 200 year period which is the 172 year period but missing one option (3 come along every 172 years) This is common because Dalton type events typically dont use all 3 options, only events like the Maunder, Sporer etc.
This is why the more common Dalton type minima are important.
Archibald [and others] are a bit too self-congratulating for my taste, especially when one takes into account that this is not based on sound analysis, but it is in line with the progressive science-illiteracy that characterizes our time.
Hear, Hear!
But that doesn’t make him wrong. It merely makes his predictions unscientific.
Put me down for “not in a grand minimum” for $20.
We have had relatively active cycles recently. This one looks more like some we have had in the past. I am not buying the “grand minimum” hype from the peanut gallery BUT … I am still interested in forecasts for cycle 25. Last I heard that one was still forecast to be extremely low count.
The graph you are shows nicely the small dip in 2007 and 2008 from the strong la Nina. Your graph doesn’t show it but this dip also continued into 2009 but notice the rise in levels from 2008 (I have included the ‘seasonal signal’ to help you compare it to the graph).
The recent drop in sea level was entirely due to the La Nina and subsequent conditions and had nothing to do with low sunspots! If it is connected with sunspot numbers explain how the sea levels are rising again, global temperatures are rising again and lower atmposperic temnperatures are rising higher than previously recorded!!