Many commenters have mentioned “The Watts Effect”, whereby within a short period of time after I do a post about the sun on WUWT mentioning the lack of sunspots, one appears.
I figured it was time to settle the issue with a test, a big one. The sun is blank, here is my post. We are about to break the monthly calendar record (again) for a calendar month without sunspots. Ironically this last occurred in August 2008. Depending on whether you believe NOAA or SIDC in Belgium about whether a sunspeck noted by one observatory (Catainia in Italy) was a valid sunspot or not determines if August 2008 was a sunspotless calender month or not. Let’s hope neither Catainia, SIDC, or my nefarious and dubious spot producing solar powers spoil this run.
But wait, there’s more.
This was in Spaceweather.com today:
Inspect the image below. It is a photo of the sun taken by the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO). Can you guess what day it was taken? Scroll down for the answer.
August 28th, today. But it could have been taken on any day of the past seven weeks. For all that time, the face of the sun has looked exactly the same–utterly blank.
According to NOAA sunspot counts, the longest string of blank suns during the current solar minimum was 52 days back in July, Aug. and Sept. of 2008. If the current trend continues for only four more days, the record will shift to 2009. It’s likely to happen; the sun remains eerily quiet and there are no sunspots in the offing. Solar minimum is shaping up to be a big event indeed.
=========
Here’s the count as of August 30th:
Spotless Days
Current Stretch: 51 days
2009 total: 193 days (80%)
Since 2004: 704 days
Typical Solar Min: 485 days
Janice (18:40:51) :
You are wise to pay attention to what the plants and animals are doing. Last week I saw birds flocking in the N. Sacramento Valley, as they do in preparation for the flight south. In August, that is quite something different from the October usual..
This spring, a number of Canadian Geese did not migrate north, but stayed on the Trinity River.
Doh. I should have said exponential, not logarithm. Try exp(-1/S) or something like that.
Frederick Michael (19:38:36) :
I would say there is a further factor in a hysteresis level.
A middle ground where there isn’t enough change to force the system into a higher or lower state, but one in which whatever has been going on (warming/cooling) is predominant.
Once a very sharp change occurs beyond the middle ground, the system is then excited into change.
The problem I see is that there is too little data on the lower end of action, whereas there is plenty of data on the higer end.
Complicatiions arise over solar wind levels vs the concentration of GCR’s currently abounding. It would be a bad assumption to think that GCR levels vary strictly with the level of solar wind. Obscuration by levels of dust & gas present in the interstellar medium of which we travel likewise is subject to change.
i.e. – two Grand Minimum of equal stature may be a poor guarantee of equal effect.
Far as I can tell there is a good association between Solar Activity and Climate direction.
I applaud your efforts to quantify. We need that.
P Walker (10:02:35) :
“…playing it in my head I hear Sting , not Bono .”
Poor you. Were either of these two playing in my head I would consider it pure hell.
I like to keep Ella singing in my head.
Frederick Michael (19:38:36) :
So, the average sunspot count over the whole cycle wouldn’t be what matters, it’d be the amount of time it’s low. This could explain why some say it’s the LENGTH of the cycle, not the overall average that matters.
Frederick,
Intensity is the name of the game…
I tend to think fluidly… When skipping rocks across a pond, still water allows the rock to skip and moving water deflects and absorbs the rock.. The sun is fluid and therefore if the pond is still (spotless, low wind generation, and magnetism in a low phase) this calm allows stray ions to be skipped into earths atmosphere. This of course allows low level cloud formation to increase and temperature fall.
On the Other hand if the Solar output is creating wind and magnetic flux then those same ions are absorbed and directed in the flow away from the earth. The ripples created bring heat into the atmosphere and keep ionization from happening on a large scale. (temp rise and decreased cloud cover.)
and then you have to factor in the Oceanic heat reserve…(lag time to show cooling or heating)
However, there will always be some that get through. as your post indicates it is the factoring that is the problem. Again using the water analogy, skipping rocks becomes harder the faster the flow.
Just trying to evaluate the shear number of influencing factors and how they affect each other is more fun than should be allowed.
The more I think through Leif’s position the more I can agree with… that pesky length and intensity…. how to quantify them……hmmmmm…
rephelan (19:10:05) :
“poor Dr. Hathaway had to keep moving his trough to the right until he gave up entirely about six months ago.”
I wish you where right, but David Hathaway just trotted out another of his perma-sliding solar cycle prediction charts:
http://solarscience.msfc.nasa.gov/images/ssn_predict_l.gif
This site holds the secrets behind Hathaway’s perpetually wrong solar predictive methodology:
http://solarscience.msfc.nasa.gov/predict.shtml
Hopefully Hathaway will have the self-respect to stop continually adjusting his predictions and admit that he, like every other solar scientist, has no idea what the sun is going to do next. However, given his track record, in about 4 months we can expect Hathaway to trot out the same stupid chart, shift the start of Cycle 24 forward by 6 months and hope that no one notices.
Hopefully we won’t have a Maunder Minimum. I don’t believe in a higher power but maybe I’m wrong and that maybe, just maybe, something somewhere is turning down the sun a bit just in time to save us from the insanity that is AGW. Copenhagen can be very very cold in December…
I love Copenhagen. I spent many a long summer evening strolling down by Newhavn and sampling the odd beer.
Yes, sorry, my mistake… it is The Police!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K4_7fe0VZdQ
I’ve started a new feature on my blog called “Failed Predictions of SC24” and I’ve started with this: http://solarscience.auditblogs.com/2009/08/29/failed-predictions-of-solar-cycle-24-1-dikpati-and-hathaway-2006/
Any more gratefully received johna.sci AT googlemail.com
I gotta chime in…
Someone mentioned that the solar output changes by .1% with regards to sunspot activity. Working under some simplistic assumptions:
World’s temp in K: ~288K
World’s temp change assuming linear relationship: .288C
Aren’t we all up in arms over a few tenths of a degree warming over a couple of decades? It seems to me, that solar variance could have as large an impact as other factors in temperature.
Feel free to punch holes, as I said, just a simple SWAG. When you’re talking about the single largest driver in our climate, any change in solar input can have a huge affect on our climate.
Thanks for the links and book referrals to the impact of sunspots. It’ll take me a little while to read them.
rbateman (19:51:00) :
Yeah we have an annoying gaggle of Canada Geese who have made your east coast latitude equivalent their home [Norfolk, VA].
Not sure if it just because some bleeding heart is feeding the environmental hazard critters or if there are larger issues at play.
Goose guano is bad….BAD for the Chesapeake Bay.
Honk honk honk. They flew over my house this AM.
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
Ron de Haan
08:50:49 29/08
“We now have the opportunity to observe the current phase of our sun with modern observation technology and the current knowledge, not available to humanity during the previous comparable solar minimum 200 to 400 years ago. … That’s what history teaches us.”
History will not repeat itself – do not underestimate the soporific effect of modern mass media, “OMG nobody told me that the climate varies, thank goodness that somebody had the foresight to invent the IPCC to worry about it for me.”
F Ross
10:10:46 29/08
Definitely OT and probably more detail than you wanted, but …
The song is called “Dance Magic Dance” from the movie “Labyrinth”
It is sung by David Bowie in the role of Jareth – King of the Goblins
The actual lyrics are:
“You remind me of a babe.
What babe?
The babe with the power.
What power?
The power of voodoo.
Who do?
You do.
Do what?
Remind me of the babe.
…”
For those looking for light relief, a clip can be found at:
and yes, Jim Henson was involved …
Richard (15:32:55) :
Where can I get the magnetic flux data from?
How do they get that graph?
One graph plots a value every 6 hours, the other once a day only. On their website you can find data for both .
hareynolds (15:51:54) :
(c) Leif is INCORRECT that a Mimimum is not such a big deal.
If L&P are correct the Maunder minimum was no big deal because solar activity then wasn’t really low. If L&P are wrong, the the Maunder minimum was indeed a real low in solar activity.
Lee (16:07:20) :
Hi Leif,
My question is how low would you expect the peak F10.7 to be in a grand minimum or a Dalton minimum, or do you expect it continue to cycle as it always does?
If L&P are correct, F10.7 would not go really low. Perhaps 100 at maxima.
rbateman (18:01:48) :
The flux is pretty much in the same place, as it was last August, as well.
It is up 1 flux unit.
Bill H (18:23:22) :
it appears they do not want to go lower in there assessments, yet we are going to be lucky to top 55 this year.
55 what?
pyromancer76 (18:51:47) :
I noticed in your 2007 reconstruction of TSI (where you compare yours with that of Wang2005 and Lean2000) that the TSI, W/m^2, remains low for almost 50 years during the Maunder Minimum
In 2007 it was assumed that the sunspot number was a relatively good proxy for the solar magnetic field. With the advent of L&P their is the possibility that that may not accurate; in that case, there would have to be bumps upwards at solar maxima on the 2007 TSI-reconstruction although the minima would stay where they are.
I have two questions: 1) was the magnetic field strength also low for almost 50 years in the 17th c and do we have proxies that can corroborate that fact? and 2) since there seems to be many volcanoes spouting off then, could they have much influence on readings of sunspots/magnetic field strength? Regarding the second, could volcanic activity have screened out some of the sunspot count, TSI measurement? (Salzer and Hughes (2005) note 1641-47, 1672-81, 1702-05 as significant periods of decreased tree growth and increased volcanic evidence. Few other centuries have so many dates.)
My thoughts on that are here: http://www.leif.org/research/TSI%20From%20McCracken%20HMF.pdf
and more on the calibration here: http://www.leif.org/research/Comment%20on%20McCracken.pdf
Volcanoes do upset the 10Be deposition and makes for spurious ‘spikes’ in the record, that shouldn’t be confused with solar activity.
rephelan (19:10:05) :
will the bottom of that wave be in late 2008 or late 2009? I think you’ve been on record here as stating that Cycle 24 is now well underway (correct me if I’m wrong!) and I was wondering if that is still your position.
This is what the plot looks like up to now:
http://www.leif.org/research/Active-Region-Count.png
Just The Facts (20:43:29) :
Hopefully Hathaway will have the self-respect to stop continually adjusting his predictions
I would like to have the weather forecast updated continually so it is always based on the most recent data. Wouldn’t you? From your comment, perhaps not…
John Richert (21:41:34) :
Someone mentioned that the solar output changes by .1% with regards to sunspot activity. Working under some simplistic assumptions:
World’s temp in K: ~288K
World’s temp change assuming linear relationship: .288C
Einstein said: “make it as simple as possible, but no simpler”.
The relation is such that the temperature response to a change of solar radiation is 1/4. So a 0.1% solar change is 0.025% temperature change or 0.072C.
Leif,
that would be sunspots 55 for the year
The sun’s effect on the earth has been reducing since around 1945.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/06/27/new-paper-global-dimming-and-brightening-a-review/#more-8950
Is that a long enough ‘trend’?. Exactly how many years does low solar activity ‘lag’ behind? Or can that figure only be determined when the cherries ripen?
As is often argued here correlation is not causation. But when solar activity has fallen as global temperatures have risen for the last 65 years, then surely there is far more correlation between temperatures and the price of oil?
Bill H (22:49:34) :
that would be sunspots 55 for the year
Yeah, that will take another 3 to 4 years into the cycle.
The lack of correlation between the solar activity and the atmosphere is due to particles that cannot radiate energy because they are not electrically charged and are traveling so slow that they don’t interact with the Earth’s surface; also, photons don’t interact with particles so the Earth is almost isolated against solar radiation. On the other hand, there are rumors on the existence of a black hole in the solar corona which would prevent the flux of electromagnetic energy to the outer space and cannot reach the Earth. So, do not expect a climatic response to solar radiation changes above 0.025% … Heh! 😉
Nasif Nahle (23:24:39) :
The lack of correlation between the solar activity and the atmosphere is due to particles that cannot radiate energy because they are not electrically charged and are traveling so slow that they don’t interact with the Earth’s surface
I don’t think you’ll find many takers for that idea.
REPLY: Ditto that. – A
Leif Svalgaard (22:28:08) :
rbateman (18:01:48) :
The flux is pretty much in the same place, as it was last August, as well.
It is up 1 flux unit.
Precisely.
And tiny spot or two measuring 0.7 millionths of the Solar Hemishere would be in much the same statistically very low Solar Activity boat as a zero.
We need ~78 points of flux monthly avearage / 25 SSN count or more to be relevant, since that is the when ramp becomes visibly recognizable for cycles 1-23.
Statistical non-base level flux is noted. (+1 net change)
Statistical near-zero level SSN Activity is noted (.00x)
We should do the same for the neutron monitor count and every other indicator we have.
Quantify and let the numbers land where they will.
1 year span.
Leif Svalgaard (22:28:08) :
“..will the bottom of that wave be in late 2008 or late 2009? I think you’ve been on record here as stating that Cycle 24 is now well underway (correct me if I’m wrong!) and I was wondering if that is still your position.
This is what the plot looks like up to now:
http://www.leif.org/research/Active-Region-Count.png”
===
Thank you for the graph.
Have you ever plotted the integral of that activity over time? That is, if the sun spot activity is an indication of the changes in solar activity over time, then higher, more rapid sunspot cycles (above the baseline of 0.0 sunspots per solar “day” (rotation) as we have now) might indicate more intense activity over the decades that is more important, more revealing than just the sunspot count itself. After all, solar activity doesn’t go to nothing when the spots go out.
Robert A Cook PE (23:45:49) :
Have you ever plotted the integral of that activity over time?
Yes, it does not look too interesting.
Chris R.
19:07:21 29/08
TO: dennis ward
“The lack of sunspots now does not equate to falling temperatures now. There is a lag of a number of years.
The commentators here are simply stating the obvious: as global temperatures start to fall sometime in the future, the hypothesis that human-emitted CO2 is an almighty driver of climate will begin to look sillier and sillier.”
Or perhaps not.
We are currently facing the threat of legislation to reduce or restrict the emission of certain gasses, CO2 being the current target. That legislation may start to take effect at about the same time as global temperatures start to fall. The AGW brigade will not be slow to take all the credit, and use the implied cause and effect as “proof” that the sun has no affect on climate.
I would rank that as my worst-case scenario.
>>>“May you live in interesting times” might be a curse
>>>instead of a proverb.
It always was a curse.
.