Guest post by David Archibald
Solar Cycle 24 is now over a year old, so it is appropriate to see how it is ramping up.
Solar Cycle 24 was a late starter, about three and a half years later than the average of the strong cycles in the late 20th century and almost three year later than the weak cycles of the late 19th century. It was almost as late as Solar Cycle 5, the first half of the Dalton Minimum. The last few months have seen it ramp up relatively rapidly.
[Note: Solar Cycle 22 and 23 are overlaid on solar cycle 3 and 4 above to show similarity]
Plotting up the last three solar cycles relative to the Dalton Minimum, another solar minimum is not precluded by the data to date.
With Solar Cycle 23 ending up at twelve and a half years long, applying Friis-Christenson and Lassen theory to the temperature record of Hanover, New Hampshire results in a two degree centigrade decline in the annual average temperature at this location over the expected twelve years of Solar Cycle 24, from December 2009 to late 2021. Given some record low monthly averages in the northeast US in the recent summer, and the current cold winter, this cooling is well under way.
I’m puzzled that there is any dispute over the late 20th Century having been dominated by a combination of strong El Ninos and a more active sun.
Even during the early 20th Century the sun was slowly increasing in the level of activity from earlier years and in the 30s there were again warm ocean surfaces from a positive oceanic phase.
Bob accepts that warmer ocean surfaces release energy faster to the air.
The satellite data has only been available since 1979.
Solar and oceanic cycles move in and out of phase to a small degree on all timescales but over millennia they appear to go to extremes and could create the difference between ice ages and interglacials.
wayne, thank you for your suggestions. It is helpful to have another perspective. It is indeed difficult to maintain consistency in blog posts and very easy to pick out inconsistencies in the posts of others.
My work is much more fully set out in my articles at climaterealists.com with more evidence in support than I could ever insert into a blog thread.
I would take seriously any real world observations that falsified my climate description. I have given examples of the types of observations that would achieve that.
I have been asking for such examples at every stage of my developing hypothesis (or conjecture if preferred) over a period of two years now. None have been advanced.
Neither Bob nor Leif have taken up that challenge.
The climate is the result of a complex balancing act but one has to look at the entirety from sun to sea to air to space and not just solar or just ENSO
I should also emphasise that there are at least three oceanic cycles on different timescales which I have made clear elsewhere but which may be part of the cause of Bob’s difficulty with what I say.
Furthermore I have pointed out several times that the data I would need simply doesn’t exist yet.
There has been no accurate measurement of the net latitudinal position of the global air circulation systems. Generally it is accepted that there is a basic seasonal shift and shifts greater than that have been noted but never analysed or quantified.
Likewise the raw speed of the hydrological cycle has never accurately been measured so as to discern changes in it’s speed on average globally.
Nor are there figures for changes in the rate of energy flow into or out of the oceans globally over time. If we had such data the ocean heat content issue would not be such a problem.
Nor are there figures for changes in the rate of energy flow from one layer of the atmosphere to another globally over time.
Until all that is done my suggestions cannot be confirmed or rebutted but they make sense and could explain a lot.
All I have done is look at the data that is available and draw what to me seem to be obvious conclusions.
Whatever anyone tries to say the whole global air circulation does clearly shift latitudinally in response to changes in average global sea surface temperatures. All I have done is to report what should be apparent to all and work it into a logical climate overview that also accords with basic physics.
No one else seems to have bothered as far as I can tell, especially since CO2 was first blamed.
Stephen Wilde (09:51:28) :
I’m puzzled that there is any dispute over the late 20th Century having been dominated by a combination of strong El Ninos and a more active sun.
More active compared with what? With the warmth in the 1930-50s? Or with the cold in the 19th century.
Neither Bob nor Leif have taken up that challenge.
For my part, it seems that your premise is wrong [so no need to take up anything].
Here is our best guess at the magnitude of the radial component of the heliospheric magnetic field since 1835 [which is a measure of solar activity]:
http://www.leif.org/research/Radial%20Component%20of%20HMF%201835-2010.gif
and here is more on solar activity in the past:
http://www.leif.org/research/Rudolf%20Wolf%20Was%20Right.pdf
Since the Sun has not been exceedingly more active in the last half of the 20th, but temperatures have been higher [so some say :-)] I do not see what solar activity [both sunspot count and magnetic field] has to do with anything.
Leif,
You miss the point. I have accepted the smallness of solar variability (in raw power output) from MWP to LIA to date. I reserve my position on solar variability having a greater effect via some other mechanism.
I have accepted your contention that any correlation with warm and cool periods may well be coincidental, with both ocean and solar cycles being independently variable. That suits me at the moment but many disagree with you and I await data to resolve the issue for once and for all.
However, whatever difference the solar variability does have can either offset or supplement the oceanic effects depending on the phasing of the two types of cycle.
Let me get something straight here. You and Bob are experts in your fields but neither of you are the only game in town in those fields.
I have previously said that my main problem in sorting out a plausible overall climate description is the conflicting information from different ‘experts’.
Climatology is an infant science packed with narrow specialisms but virtually no attempt at a conceptual overview and no one is currently ‘expert’ in attempting any such overview so you will just have to live with the fact that it amuses me to ‘have a go’.
I will adapt my climate description to accommodate what seems like sound advice as I have done with data kindly provided by you but as yet I do not see you as having the final word.
As regards Bob I can see why he has a problem with my description of the effects of multiple overlapping cycles with varying timescales from independently variable solar and oceanic behavior and I can use his objections to refine that part of my description but the fact is that he is not seeing the essence of what I am describing and I am not going to give up just on his say so however acerbic his comments become.
Bob’s input and yours is valuable to me and greatly appreciated however 🙂
Stephen Wilde (14:17:20) :
Leif, You miss the point.
I guess I do. At least I don’t see it anywhere.
I await data to resolve the issue for once and for all.
that may be a LONG wait. People are still used the VERY obsolete Hoyt & Schatten TSI reconstruction as long as it fits their pet theory. This may continue for another decade or two. Other people still believe in stuff from a hundred years ago, claiming all newer astronomy is a giant conspiracy.
I don’t mind how long it takes. At the moment I’m going by what you say but keeping an open mind.
The point was that it doesn’t matter to me how big or how small the solar effect is. It has some effect (even you don’t suggest zero) and whatever that effect is then it can either supplement or offset ocean cycles depending on the timing of the solar and oceanic cycles.
Stephen Wilde (14:49:07) :
It has some effect (even you don’t suggest zero)
So has starlight from a white dwarf that at times goes behind its binary companion briefly reducing the total energy we get from the system [it is not zero]. It is all a question of proper proportions.
Stephen Wilde (09:51:28) : You wrote, “Bob accepts that warmer ocean surfaces release energy faster to the air.”
But my posts illustrate that the primary influence on Ocean Heat Content are ENSO for most ocean basins…
http://bobtisdale.blogspot.com/2009/09/enso-dominates-nodc-ocean-heat-content.html
…and the NOA, AMO, and ENSO for the North Atlantic…
http://bobtisdale.blogspot.com/2009/10/north-atlantic-ocean-heat-content-0-700.html
…and the NPI for the North Pacific.
…http://bobtisdale.blogspot.com/2009/12/north-pacific-ocean-heat-content-shift.html
You wrote, “I would take seriously any real world observations that falsified my climate description.”
It is your responsibility to present data to substantiate your climate description.
You wrote, “Neither Bob nor Leif have taken up that challenge.”
Refer to preceding reply.
You wrote in a later comment, “I should also emphasise that there are at least three oceanic cycles on different timescales which I have made clear elsewhere but which may be part of the cause of Bob’s difficulty with what I say.”
My disagreement was with your statement, “…e.g. currently the ocean surfaces tend to be positive (warming) at the same time as the sun is more active…” You have subsequently changed your tune and now say that ocean cycles and solar variability can be out of phase.
You wrote, “You and Bob are experts in your fields but neither of you are the only game in town in those fields.”
I beg to differ. I’m a blogger who plots data, creates animations of ocean processes, etc., and who describes what the data and animations present. I am not a climate scientist who specializes in ENSO. Just a blogger.
Stephen, when I read a comment by a blogger–any blogger, not only you–or a statement made in a press release or paper that I know is not supported by data, I plot the data and illustrate the error.
You wrote, “As regards Bob I can see why he has a problem with my description of the effects of multiple overlapping cycles…”
My problem lies with your failure to rely on data to support your descriptions and your hypotheses.
Bob Tisdale:
“My disagreement was with your statement, “…e.g. currently the ocean surfaces tend to be positive (warming) at the same time as the sun is more active…” You have subsequently changed your tune and now say that ocean cycles and solar variability can be out of phase.”
Then let me clarify that specific point.
Look at the period from the 1600s to date. Throughout that period there has been a slow increase in solar activity, a slow drift of the ITCZ (Inter Tropical Convergence Zone) northward (a fingerprint of warming ocean surfaces) and a slow increase in global tropospheric temperatures.
The data backing that up is in the public domain and I do not need to demonstrate it ab initio.
It is likely that going back through the MWP, the Dark Ages, the Roman Warm Period possibly as far back as the last period of ice age conditions some 10,000 years ago that pattern would be similar with approximate 1000 to 1500 year cycling of sun and ocean approximately in phase i.e. ocean surfaces normally warm when the sun is more active and overall the sun and oceanic cycles changing in tandem more or less to this day. Hence my use of the word ‘current’ which is correct in terms of that periodicity.
Then we have the PDO periodicity on a timescale of 30 / 60 years approximately and the ENSO periodicity on timescales of 1 to 2 years.
I have said many times that the solar and oceanic cycling can apparently move out of phase over time. That applies seperately to EACH of the three observed periodicities.
Most of your observations are ENSO and/ or PDO based and I do accept that the term ‘currently in phase’ does not apply at this moment because currently as of today the sun is relatively inactive and the ENSO cycle is producing an EL Nino.
I also accept that the PDO and ENSO cycles are often out of phase with the solar cycles on those two periodicities but that does not take away from the observation that under the third longer periodicity the sun and oceans are still currently in phase. All that I need to point out is that the PDO and ENSO variations whilst clearly present and often in the short term out of phase with solar activity do not negate the longer term correlation between solar and oceanic cycles.
ENSO is the oceanic equivalent of changes in solar activity within a single cycle
PDO is the oceanic equivalent of changes in solar activity over about three 11 year solar cycles
The movement of the ITCZ and all the other air circulation systems from 1600 to now is a result of a longer term oceanic cycle which is the equivalent of the cycling of solar activity from Maunder Minimum to date.
So what we can have is ENSO in or out of phase with the sun at the same time as PDO is in or out of phase with the sun at the same time as the longer term cycling is in or out of phase with the sun.
During the period 1940’s to 1960’s the sun’s surface was very active but the oceans were negative, from 1970’s to 2000 the oceans were positive whilst the sun was active.
However to this day the longer term cycling remains in phase despite those shorter term changes.
So I was right to assert that the phasing changes over millennia, and that the phasing changes over decades and I would be right to assert that it changes over a year or two.
It is necessary to consider all three periodicities and it may be there are more over longer timescales that we currently have no knowledge of but I don’t need that at this stage.
Nor do I need to direct anyone to any more data than that which anyone even slightly aware of climate would already be well aware.
Stephen Wilde (03:54:33) :
Look at the period from the 1600s to date. Throughout that period there has been a slow increase in solar activity
There is very little support for this. It seems much more likely that solar activity picked up very abruptly in the 18th century. The cycle that peaked in 1787 was probably even higher than the one we had in 1958.
My problem with your statement is the unqualified ‘there has been’. There very likely has not been.
Leif Svalgaard (10:29:45) :
The cycle that peaked in 1787 was probably even higher than the one we had in 1958.
I meant the one before that, cycle 3. Cycle 4 was high too.
Leif Svalgaard (10:29:45) :
Stephen Wilde (03:54:33) :
Look at the period from the 1600s to date. Throughout that period there has been a slow increase in solar activity
There is very little support for this. It seems much more likely that solar activity picked up very abruptly in the 18th century.
Here is more on this:
http://www.leif.org/EOS/muscheler05nat_nature04045.pdf
Thank you Leif.
Applying smoothing to the chart shown there in your link there is a clear upward trend from 1500 to date which is good enough to suggest the presence of a solar cycle of 1000 years or so from trough to peak.
I never said it was a steady or regular progression and indeed it isn’t.
I agree that the jury remains out on the size of the solar contribution to the observed tropospheric warming but, as I said before, whatever it is needs to be added to or subtracted from the undoubtedly larger oceanic forcing depending on the phases of both solar and oceanic cycles.
Comparing variations in the effect of our sun on Earth’s atmosphere with the effect of a white dwarf’s variability seems like a bit of poetic licence don’t you think ? It’s a fair point in logical terms but daft in real terms :). Better for amusement value than for analytical purposes.
Whoops, I meant,
1000 years or so from trough to peak and back again.
Stephen Wilde (06:29:10) :
Applying smoothing to the chart shown there in your link there is a clear upward trend from 1500 to date which is good enough to suggest the presence of a solar cycle of 1000 years or so from trough to peak.
No, don’t look at the red curve [that is the dubious group sunspot number]. The real data is the heavy dark blue curves in the upper panel. It is derived from 14C. And shows no trend.
Stephen Wilde (06:29:10) :
Applying smoothing to the chart shown there in your link there is a clear upward trend from 1500 to date
And yet, there does not seem to be a matching temperature record:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/02/13/congenital-climate-abnormalities/#more-16395
Stephen Wilde: Regarding your 03:54:33 in general, you went to great detail to confirm that what you had originally written was wrong. Your original comment had nothing to do with the PDO, or ENSO, or variations in the ITCZ, or the LIA, or the MWP, etc. You originally wrote, “…e.g. currently the ocean surfaces tend to be positive (warming) at the same time as the sun is more active…” and it’s wrong, no matter how you try to spin it.
You wrote, “Look at the period from the 1600s to date. Throughout that period there has been a slow increase in solar activity, a slow drift of the ITCZ (Inter Tropical Convergence Zone) northward (a fingerprint of warming ocean surfaces) and a slow increase in global tropospheric temperatures.”
Please provide a link to the graph you’re using as reference.
You wrote, “The data backing that up is in the public domain and I do not need to demonstrate it ab initio.”
Actually you do. If it’s in the public domain then you should have no difficulty linking a readily available graph on Google that shows what you claim. Those who read your comments would appreciate it, not just me. Without a graph, you could be writing fiction for all we know. And based on the graphs of the data that I’ve presented in the past that contradict your assumptions, what you write is fiction.
You wrote, “Then we have the PDO periodicity on a timescale of 30 / 60 years approximately and the ENSO periodicity on timescales of 1 to 2 years.”
Hmm. More fiction. Your assumed 30 to 60 year periodicity of the PDO is not supported by the MacDonald reconstruction for the last 1000 years:
http://i49.tinypic.com/34zc7ys.png
Paleoclimatological data is available here:
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/recons.html
The MacDonald PDO reconstruction data is here:
ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/paleo/treering/reconstructions/pdo-macdonald2005.txt
You wrote, “ENSO is the oceanic equivalent of changes in solar activity within a single cycle.”
Another fictional statement. This is not supported by data in any way, shape, or form. Here’s a graph that includes 3 ENSO reconstructions. Please overlay solar data to prove your point. Using the Mann data, the minimum span between peaks was 21.5 years (1831.5 to 1853), while the maximum was 39 (1902 to 1941). The average time span was approximately 27 years.
http://s5.tinypic.com/8xke8p.jpg
You wrote, “PDO is the oceanic equivalent of changes in solar activity over about three 11 year solar cycles.”
Yet another fictional statement. This is not supported by data. Refer to above graph of the MacDonald PDO reconstruction.
You concluded, “Nor do I need to direct anyone to any more data than that which anyone even slightly aware of climate would already be well aware.”
Really? Anyone? Slightly aware of climate?
The misdirection didn’t work, Stephen.
I strongly suggest that you actually study data, not fantasize about it. In the future, please furnish graphs of the data needed to support your claims. I would find it much easier than digging through my files to find graphs that contradict what you’ve written. And I’m sure the audience you’ve attracted on this thread would appreciate it also, Stephen, because what you have written and what you continue to write in your comments appears to be about the fictional climate of a fictional world.
From your own links:
“The reconstruction indicates that a
~50 to 70 year periodicity in the PDO is typical for the past 200 years”
So each positive or negative phase lasts about three 9 to 11 year solar cycles. I didn’t say 30 to 60. I said 30/60 referring to the two phases totalling 60 years
Anyway the precise length matters not to me because the solar and oceanic cycles go out of phase over time so varying lengths would fit my hypothesis.
“When this happens for less than five months, it is classified as El Niño or La Niña conditions; if the anomaly persists for five months or longer, it is called an El Niño or La Niña “episode.” Typically, this happens at irregular intervals of 2–7 years and lasts nine months to two years.”
Who is doing the misdirecting here ????
And when I say ‘equivalent to’ I don’t mean that they match in length or timing merely that they are the same level of variability in terms of scale as opposed to the other levels of variability.
Further communication here is clearly fruitless. Plenty of others see what I’m saying so I’m not concerned about your responses.
Good luck with your future endeavours 🙂
Leif,
That Armagh temperature chart shows the slow temperature recovery from the LIA quite well enough.
Stephen Wilde (10:46:37) :
That Armagh temperature chart shows the slow temperature recovery from the LIA quite well enough.
But not matching solar activity in any way. I don’t think there is any doubt that the MWP was warm, the LIA was cold and Now is warm, but there is no evidence to link that to solar variations. And would it not be cherry picking to say that Armagh shows something that CET does not?
My criticism is about your categorical statements, e.g. ‘there has been …’
Leif Svalgaard (11:12:48)
Any link to solar variations (admittedly possibly very small on their own) has first to be filitered through the oceanic signal.
I am satisfied that between sun and oceans the rise in temperature since the trough of the LIA can be perfectly well enough accounted for.
I note that not everyone accords with your view that the solar effect is negligible. Your assertion that there can be no aspect of solar variability that translates into a significant climate response is itself somewhat conjectural.
There has been warming of the troposhere since the LIA. There has been a change in the level of solar activity during that period. The ITCZ has moved northward since then and it appears that it moves when the sea surface temperatures change.
The three phenomena are intricately linked but the size of the solar component remains open to question.
Stephen Wilde (11:49:26) :
I note that not everyone accords with your view that the solar effect is negligible.
And in good pseudo-scientific tradition you cherry pick the opinions that match your ideas. My point is that we do not have evidence, but doubt.
wayne (06:03:59)
I’ve had a look at Miskolczi’s work now. Thanks for the pointer.
He is saying that the Earth’s atmosphere is automatically regulated to stay at a certain optical depth such that the total of all greenhouse gases always remains the same and any necessary adjustment is achieved by a change in the quantity of water vapour.
That suits me perfectly.
One of my propositions is that the temperature of the troposphere is always being dragged towards the average global sea surface temperatures because the thermal inertia of the oceans is so huge.
Thus if there were to be more CO2 in the air the water below would seek to remove the extra energy in the air to return the system to an equilibrium set by the oceans.
The extra energy in the air cannot get into the oceans because of the evaporative barrier.
So instead the hydrological cycle speeds up and if necessary the latitudinal positions of the air circulation systems will shift to effect that change in speed. The total amount of water vapour changes to maintain the optical depth necessary to keep the system stable with the air at the surface remaining in line with sea surface temperatures despite any extra CO2 or any other GHGs.
That is what happens routinely to modulate the effect of warmer ocean surfaces but on a far larger scale than would be required to deal with a little CO2.
Thus if he is right then my climate description provides the real world mechanism by which the outcome is achieved.
Interesting.
Leif Svalgaard (12:10:08)
On the basis of our respective posts I appear to doubt more than you do.
Your expressed certainty as to the lack of a significant solar effect is far more dogmatic than my open mindedness on the issue.
Which of us is the greater pseud ?