UPDATE: New graphs from David Archibald added. See below.
The NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center (SWPC) has released their latest charts on solar activity and the news is not encouraging for solar watchers. Today, the sun has but a couple of anemic “sunspecks”.
Last month I wrote about how May had not continued the advances seen in March and April. Now according the the latest SWPC graphs of the three major metrics of solar activity, June appears to have slipped even further.
I see NASA’s Hathaway making another adjustment to his forecast soon. He wrote on July 1st:
The current prediction for Sunspot Cycle 24 gives a smoothed sunspot number maximum of about 69 in June of 2013. We are currently over two and a half years into Cycle 24. Three consecutive months with average daily sunspot numbers above 40 has raised the predicted maximum above the 64.2 for the Cycle 14 maximum in 1907. The predicted size would make this the smallest sunspot cycle in over 100 years.
More near real-time information on the state of the sun is available on our WUWT solar reference page
UPDATE: My friend in Perth, David Archibald, sends along this information.
Solar Update July 2011
Now that the UK Met Office is half way to admitting that solar activity is the main driver in climate, it is appropriate to check up on how the Sun is going.
Two and a half years after solar minimum, the Ap Index remains below the minima of previous solar cycles.
Dr Svalgaard provides a useful daily update on the F 10.7 flux at http://www.leif.org/research/TSI-SORCE-2008-now.png What the above graph shows is the ramp up of Solar Cycle 24 F 10.7 flux relative to the previous five solar cycles, aligned on the month of minimum. The current cycle has a very flat trajectory.
Similar to the Ap Index, the Interplanetary Magnetic Field is now up to the levels of previous solar minima.
This chart compares the development of Solar Cycle 24 with the last de Vries cycle event – the Dalton Minimum. The Solar Cycle 24 ramp up in terms of sunspot number is tracking much the same as that of Solar Cycle 5 but about a year ahead of it. All solar activity indications are for a Dalton Minimum repeat. There has been no development that precludes that outcome.
This graph shows the sum of the north and south polar magnetic fields on the Sun. It has yet to get down to the levels of previous maxima, and solar maximum may be still two to three years off.
David Archibald
July 2011
stephen richards says:
July 9, 2011 at 12:09 pm
R. Gates says:
July 9, 2011 at 11:47 am
Just because their models ,produce a graph that nearly mimics observed temps (not nearly really according to Lucia’s rather good analysis) doesn’t mean that CO² was the cause. It could mean that they had a bit of luck and that the graph was ‘forced’ well.
_____
The GCM’s are usually poor on details but excellent at trends, and of course, not useful for spotting tipping points. If the GCM’s say the Arctic will continue warming, and sea ice continue declining, what does it really matter if it an totally ice fee summer happens in 2080 or 2050 or 2030? Tipping points, natural variability, and currently unknown (and thus not included in the model) climate forcing are the limits to making the GCM’s even better. The first two things can’t ever be improved upon, but the last can.
Ok, I fess up to being the cause by going out and buying a H-alpha solar telescope to watch this “maximum”. It has been hardly worth taking out of its case.
R. Shearer says:
July 9, 2011 at 12:33 pm
Mr. Gates, three decades is not “too many.” Further, there is evidence that it was warmer in the arctic during the Medieval Warming Period, which occured less than 2000 years ago.
____
Please cite the research showing the Arctic was warmer during the MWP than now…I’d love to take a look at it.
Andrew 30:
I fully recognize that most of the energy on earth comes from the Sun, and that ocean cycles create no net warming, but merely are redistribution effects of energy already in the system. Over the long-term the ENSO cycle adds no net warming and no net cooling, etc. But also to be recognized is that CO2 fluctuates with the long-term global temperature cycle, which is ultimately driven by the Milankovitch cycles. But Milankovtich is only the trigger that sets in motion the full glacial advance/retreat cycle that we’ve seen during this current ice age. CO2 remains the thermostat that the Milankovitch switch initiates. If it weren’t such an excellent non-condensing greenhouse gas, it wouldn’t make such a great thermostat.
I still remember the comments on the WUWT solar posts from 2009: people debating, throwing all sorts of predictions around and describing various scenarios. Some even claimed that the picture would become much clearer in 1 or 2 years…
» to July 2011 and still the mysteries remain! It gets more and more interesting the longer we wait and observe.
I believe it’s really starting to look like we will be experiencing a grand solar minimum in our lifetime!
Cycle 24’s behavior is remarkably consistent, and it’s power is weak.
I compare that to the regional weather trends, which are likewise remarkably stuck in Lodi.
I do not see anything in either the Sun nor the Earth climate that says things are now changing.
The Sun struggles, as does the Earth’s climate to get out of its rut.
@R Gates
You seem to have changed from being 25% skeptic to simply taunting skeptics.
Have you been neglecting to wear your tinfoil hat?
Herre in Ottawa, the past three springs and falls (autumns) have been so miserable that I will be buying a rain and cold proof jacket for the first time since I left the UK – 30 years ago.
Billy Liar says:
July 9, 2011 at 1:31 pm
@R Gates
You seem to have changed from being 25% skeptic to simply taunting skeptics.
Have you been neglecting to wear your tinfoil hat?
______
Solar/GCR/cloud effects, UV stratospheric effects, solar-geomagnetic effects, etc. etc. etc.all remain quite interesting to me, but are currently unquantified. They are interesting and not to be completely discounted, hence I’m still a “skeptic”, but CO2 remains the best explanation for a large part of the warming we’ve seen over the later part of the 20th century, and which also made 2000-2009 the warmest decade on record.
Really don’t mean to “taunt” anyone, BTW
R. Gates says: July 9, 2011 at 1:11 pm
…..But Milankovtich is only the trigger that sets in motion the full glacial advance/retreat cycle that we’ve seen during this current ice age.
Sounds familiar:
http://judithcurry.com/2011/07/01/week-in-review-7211/#comment-82249
R. Gates says:
July 9, 2011 at 1:03 pm
—
Please cite the research showing the Arctic was warmer during the MWP than now…I’d love to take a look at it.
—
Here’s a reference for you:
“temperatures during the warmest intervals of the Medieval Warm Period,” defined as occurring “some 900 to 1300 years ago, “were as warm as or slightly warmer than present day Greenland temperatures”
Vinther, B.M., Jones, P.D., Briffa, K.R., Clausen, H.B., Andersen, K.K., Dahl-Jensen, D. and Johnsen, S.J. 2010. Climatic signals in multiple highly resolved stable isotope records from Greenland. Quaternary Science Reviews 29: 522-538.
You know about the settlements of vikings, no?
R Gates: “But here’s the larger point: Global Climate models, while far from perfect, have accurately predicted some of the earliest effects of increased CO2, namely the decline of Arctic sea ice and general warming of the Arctic. ”
And don’t forget falling sea level …. and more snow …
The Earth in the long-range either follows a continuosly increasing “Hockey Stick” temperature graph or more and more people will feel cheated and misslead.
R. Shearer says:
July 9, 2011 at 12:33 pm
Mr. Gates, three decades is not “too many.” Further, there is evidence that it was warmer in the arctic during the Medieval Warming Period, which occured less than 2000 years ago. And we know that 6-7000 years ago the arctic was ice-free and I hope you will not claim it wasn’t due to
“natural variaility.”
==============================================================
These guys document it…….
http://www.co2science.org/subject/m/summaries/mwparctic.php
R. Gates says:
July 9, 2011 at 1:03 pm
Billy is correct: Your posts are trollish.
This thread is about the Sun, what it’s doing, and where it heads from here.
You want a link? Here: http://www.robertb.darkhorizons.org/TempGr/uSC24vs13_14.GIF
And here: http://www.robertb.darkhorizons.org/DeepSolarMin10.htm
R. Gates: “the changes going on in the Arctic right now have not happened in at least 2,000 years,”
So, what? There is evidence that the arctic was clear of ice in the summers about 6000 years ago. Something happening or not happening in the last 2000 years is not evidence for AGW. 2000 years is less than the blink of an eye in earth time.
R. Gates: “while far from perfect, have accurately predicted some of the earliest effects of increased CO2, namely the decline of Arctic sea ice and general warming of the Arctic.”
Wow, impressive. I could make that prediction at any time in the past history of the earth and I would be right 50% of the time. If I made it during one of the natural warming trends I could probably push that to 98%.
R. Gates: “It’s been happening now for far too many decades to be “natural variability”.”
Where do you get that idea. The earth has warmed for hundreds of years at a stretch in the past before changing directions. It has done this since the end of the last ice age; and during all that time, the ice was shrinking. Natural variability operates in short and long cycles. The GCMs are currently hanging on by their error bands. Another 5 years of the current flat trend and they will all be falsified.
R. Gates: “And if”
If ifs and buts were fruit and nuts.
Some theories posit that solar anomalies ultimately result in the earth’s northen jet stream taking nose dives southward, driving cold air masses from the polar region down into Europe and North America. Indeed, much of the cold weather where I am (Southern US) this past winter was courtesy of such diving jet streams.
So what air is drawn into the polar regions to replace the air driven southward? Seems like it would have to be warmer air masses.
Someone likened the cold winters to the door of a refrigerator (the polar regions) being left open, cooling the room (northern hemisphere). If you leave the door to a refrigerator open, it will cool a room down somewhat (assuming the heat from the refrigerator’s condensor isn’t pumped back in the room. But what happens to the temperatures inside the refrigerator?
It gets warmer. No CO2 involved.
@ur momisugly R. Gates,
Wow, it seems you have launched an all-out attack on this thread.
Hope you’ve got some reserves.
The Sun is not your ally.
After reading this blog and other over the last several years, I am only sure of one thing: AGW is surely NOT settled science as we have been lectured about by Al Gore and his ilk.
Serious request.
Where can I get all of the sunspot forecast plots made by ISES? I want to create an animation of the prediction line falling as time progresses so I would like archive images from previous predictions. If I had thought of it, I would have saved them myself and will do so going forward.
R Gates
‘Please cite the research showing the Arctic was warmer during the MWP than now…I’d love to take a look at it.’
There is enough historical evidence to suggest that the Arctic was at least as warm during the MWP as today. There are also heaps of studies to suggest this – one at:
http://co2science.org/articles/V10/N4/C3.php
Billy: His job is probably to keep refuting for the AGW establishment. I would not be surprise that there is a concerted effort by the system to seed all the skeptical sites with “supposed experts” as they have realized that it has become the number one threat to the scam. LOL
I see Mr. Gates has pirated another thread off to the land of models.
Q: where does a GCM pirate go for confirmation?
A: The Argh-ctic.
Q: why not the Antarctic?
A: The Antarctic, she don’t fit so well.
Next time take me to Havana. Please.
I thought we were talking about solar cycles.
R. Gates says:
July 9, 2011 at 1:11 pm
Andrew 30:
“CO2 remains the thermostat that the Milankovitch switch initiates.”
And, because humans have emitted a puff of CO2 in a CO2-starved era, this time things will be different?
R. Gates,
With the world’s population being what it is, we all better pray we don’t have another little ice age! Especially since the idiots in the government are doing their utmost to destroy our electric generating capacity.