Guest post by David Archibald
Predicting the amplitude of Solar Cycle 24 was a big business. Jan Janssens provides the most complete table of Solar Cycle 24 predictions at: http://users.telenet.be/j.janssens/SC24.html
Prediction activity for Solar Cycle 24 seemed to have peaked in 2007. In year before, Dr David Hathaway of NASA made the first general estimate of Solar Cycle 25 amplitude:
http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2006/10may_longrange/
Based on the slowing of the Sun’s “Great Conveyor Belt”, he predicted that
“The slowdown we see now means that Solar Cycle 25, peaking around the year 2022, could be one of the weakest in centuries.” He is very likely to have got the year wrong in that Solar Cycle 25 is unlikely to start until 2025.
In this paper: http://www.probeinternational.org/Livingston-penn-2010.pdf,
Livingston and Penn provided the first hard estimate of Solar Cycle 25 amplitude based on a physical model. That estimate is 7, which would make it the smallest solar cycle for over 300 years.
This is figure 2 from their paper:
Livingston and Penn have been tracking the decline in sunspot magnetic field, predicting that sunspots will disappear when the umbral magnetic field strength falls below 1,500 gauss, as per this figure from their 2010 paper:
Dr Svalgaard has updated of the progression of that decline on his research page at:
http://www.leif.org/research/Livingston%20and%20Penn.png
With data updated to year end 2011, the line of best fit on Dr Svalgaard’s figure of Umbral Magnetic Field now intersects the 1,500 guass sunspot cutoff in 2030:
Using the Livingston and Penn Solar Cycle 25 amplitude estimate, this is what the solar cycle record is projected to look like:
And, yes, that means the end of the Modern Warm Period.
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Further reading:
Sun Headed Into Hibernation, Solar Studies Predict –Sunspots may disappear altogether in next cycle.
NASA Long Range Solar Forecast – Solar Cycle 25 peaking around 2022 could be one of the weakest in centuries.
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The sun effects Earths temperature. The magnetic activity of the Sun effects how much it radiates, which in turn has an effect on Earths temperature. But this is a marginal effect, on the order of 0.08 degrees centigrade. Further more, the terms ‘modern warm period’ and ‘little ice age’ have little meaning, given that these were mostly regional events. Granted, regional events all around the world, but at different times, at different rates, or for different lengths of time. If the Earth continues to warm (on average! You can’t claim stuff like the CET is a model of Earths temperature, because it contains temperatures of central England _only_) like it has been (as documented by everything from tree rings to thermometers, from the US to Europe to China, north to south, with only minor local anomalies in the data), that warming will far outstrip the cooling expected from the Sun’s lack of activity.
You appear to be disingenuous when you write, “… the terms ‘modern warm period’ and ‘little ice age’ have little meaning, given that these were mostly regional events. Granted, regional events all around the world, but at different times, at different rates, or for different lengths of time.”
These “regional events all around the world” fell within the same time range. They certainly didn’t always occur simultaneously, but each region experienced pronounced cooling during the range of the LIA and each area experienced notable warming during the MWP. The terms do have global meaning insofar as temperature is used as the measure for climate.
One cannot “document” future events; one “predicts” future events. Therefore, when you write ”
If the Earth continues to warm … like it has been (as documented by everything from tree rings to thermometers … with only minor local anomalies in the data), that warming will far outstrip the cooling expected from the Sun’s lack of activity” your conclusion “warming will far outstrip the cooling” is a prediction, not a documentation.
A prediction based on what knowledge?
You might find helpful Dr. Pierre Latour’s recent paper bringing into question the validity of the greenhouse warming effect theory, the very basis for AGW theory. John O’Sullivan’s recent article both discusses and contains Dr. Latour’s paper (http://www.webcommentary.com/docs/jo120117.pdf)
Dr. Svalgaard:
You may find this paper to be interesting as it mentions the Bond Cycles:
http://paleoforge.com/papers/EnvironArchaeo.pdf
Camburn says:
January 29, 2012 at 2:52 pm
You may find this paper to be interesting as it mentions the Bond Cycles
Yes, but with a lot less precise timing. The question of Bond Cycles is still not resolved.
The last figure above is good enough to be plagiarised by the UK’s Daily Telegraph:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2093264/Forget-global-warming–Cycle-25-need-worry-NASA-scientists-right-Thames-freezing-again.html#ixzz1ksaai1Qc
It is said that plagiarism is the sincerest form of flattery, but it is bit rude to then stick a copyright symbol on it. The Daily Telegraph says it is quoting a Met Office release, but it is channeling this WUWT post. Praise be to Anthony!
Note that my comments above refer to the most recent statements by “Catalyst23” on this topic (I was not responding to David Archibald whose work I highly regard).
David Archibald says:
January 29, 2012 at 9:16 pm
The last figure above is good enough to be plagiarised by the UK’s Daily Telegraph:
Their last Figure [400 years of sunspot observations] seems to be based on Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Sunspot_Numbers.png [prepared by Robert A. Rhode http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Dragons_flight “lead scientist for Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature”]. But the actual numbers on the scale are wrong and in any case different from your Figure that they lifted. Accuracy is not their strong side, apparently.
Bob Webster says:
January 29, 2012 at 9:47 pm
You might find helpful Dr. Pierre Latour’s recent paper …
A paper that claims that “gravity compresses gas and converts potential energy to kinetic energy closer to the surface from -80°C in the stratosphere to 14.5°C at the ground. Therefore atmospheres cause the surface to be colder than it would be if the atmosphere were thinner or non-existent. ” cannot be taken seriously. [think Venus]
Leif Svalgaard says:
January 29, 2012 at 9:54 pm
But the actual numbers on the scale are wrong and in any case different from your Figure that they lifted
The original Figure showed monthly means which causes large spikes for individual months. The DT Figure shows a thick smoothed curve looking like yearly means which distorts the plot and gives a wrong impression of the long-term behaviour.
@ur momisugly GeoLurking,
I remember reading what you posted about the SO2 signal. Over at Eruptions where you folks do such a top shelf job. But I must have missed some of the volume part. The honker seemed so short I couldn’t picture that much making stratosphere. Thanks, I stand sort of corrected. And welcome to WUWT!
Was it ever named, like the others btw, the not-so-strong ~1900 grand minimum?
And are you saying Leif, that the apparent diminishing strength of grand minima, such as typically portrayed e.g. here
http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2012/01/28/article-2093264-1180A572000005DC-276_468x290.jpg is an artefact caused by gradually changing principles of sunspot record-keeping?
mmmmmmmm………
DCA????
Are these not Archibald’s initials?
Manufacturing fawning believers.
Archibald is not a doctor nor a professor, although he appears happy for people to believe it. Could he also be operating under multiple aliases?
Leif Svalgaard says:
January 29, 2012 at 10:13 am
“I was giving an example of a high cycle. There were others nearby. The real test is the totality of the entire 18th century vs. the entire 20th. Looking at a few years is meaningless.”
A run of 7 warmer years through SC3 is not meaningless. The real test is to inspect each cycle to look for exceptions, such as the warmer but lower SC7 and the cooler but higher SC8.
Leif Svalgaard says:
January 29, 2012 at 10:13 am
“The point is that solar activity the two centuries was similar, but the climate was not.”
The point is that you went and said; oh look, SC3, a high solar cycle right in the little ice age, as if to say that high cycles do not make it warmer, but you picked a cycle where there is blatantly a warmer period. The trend over centuries has nothing to do with the immediate relative impact on temperatures.
Soren F says:
January 30, 2012 at 1:25 am
And are you saying Leif, that the apparent diminishing strength of grand minima […] an artefact caused by gradually changing principles of sunspot record-keeping?
Rather that the gradually increasing maxima are artificial
Ulric Lyons says:
January 30, 2012 at 4:17 am
A run of 7 warmer years through SC3 is not meaningless. The real test is to inspect each cycle to look for exceptions, such as the warmer but lower SC7 and the cooler but higher SC8.
Climate is the average over 30 years
The trend over centuries has nothing to do with the immediate relative impact on temperatures.
The trend over centuries is the climate.
Leif Svalgaard wrote:
A paper that claims that “gravity compresses gas and converts potential energy to kinetic energy closer to the surface from -80°C in the stratosphere to 14.5°C at the ground. Therefore atmospheres cause the surface to be colder than it would be if the atmosphere were thinner or non-existent. ” cannot be taken seriously. [think Venus]
Dr. Latour (in context) is talking about daytime stellar (solar) temperatures.
Think our Moon. It is much hotter on the Moon during its midday. No atmosphere. Therefore, Earth’s atmosphere cools the surface during the day to below what it otherwise would be in the absence of its atmosphere (see Moon).
“Noon” temperatures on Earth and its Moon compared:
Earth: 136°F, 58°C, 331°K
Moon 212°F, 100°C, 373°K
@ur momisugly Bob Webster – “If the Earth continues to warm [Possible Future] … like it has been …” [Documented past] Then that warming will outpace the predicted cooling. [Prediction of future based on past documentation]
http://nds.coi.gov.uk/content/detail.aspx?NewsAreaId=2&ReleaseID=422939&SubjectId=2
Even if the Sun drops to the Maunder minimum we will only expect 0.13C of cooling. This would not offset the projected 2-2.5 C expected warming.
Current Warming – http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs_v3/
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/globtemp.html
If the Earth continues to warm as it has been, as documented here, then that warming will outpace any cooling due to low activity on the Sun.
@Leif “Rather that the gradually increasing maxima are artificial”
Thanks. If global climate would be more solar-sensitive in a low solar grand-minimum effect range than in the alleged “grand-maxima” range, then it seems I could suppose grand-minimum strength driving longer-term OHC remains a viable hypothesis.
“Catalyst32”,
You wrote: “This would not offset the projected 2-2.5 C expected warming.”
Projected 2°-2.5°C “expected warming” based on what? A theory based on assumptions about climate change drivers whose foundation has been rocked by observations contrary to it’s predictions? (note the mid-tropospheric tropical GH warming signal missing in the real world)
One cannot prove a theory (or even support it evidentially) with computer-generated projections for the simple reason that the computer models are driven by the same assumptions as the theory!
There has never been any credible scientific “evidence” that greenhouse gases play a significant role in climate change over any meaningful time period (e.g., LIA, MWP, interglacials, ice age cycles, ice epochs, ice eras). In fact, there is massive geologic evidence that atmospheric CO2 and global temperature are uncorrelated over the past 600 million years. Until there is, AGW is simply speculation based on a dubious foundation.
When I wrote:
“In fact, there is massive geologic evidence that atmospheric CO2 and global temperature are uncorrelated over the past 600 million years.”
I should have clarified that there is no evidence that atmospheric CO2 is a driver of temperature changes over any time period and, in fact, over scale of tens of millions of years of the past 600 million years there is no correlation between atmospheric CO2 and global temperature.
There is correlation over the time frame of ice age/interglacial cycles, yet that correlation is based on temperatures changing before atmospheric CO2 (not very helpful evidence to support the AGW contention that atmospheric CO2 changes drive temperature changes).
@Leif Svalgaard says:
January 30, 2012 at 6:58 am
“Climate is the average over 30 years”
There is no point in looking at 30yrs when we are discussing the impact of one particular solar cycle on global temperatures.
“The trend over centuries is the climate.”
That is climate change.
Ulric Lyons says:
January 30, 2012 at 4:36 pm
There is no point in looking at 30yrs when we are discussing the impact of one particular solar cycle on global temperatures.
We are not discussing that. A single cycle [or a single year] does not impact the climate because of the inertia of the oceans.
This golden oldie myth of an impending ‘mini ice age’ has done the rounds before. It is, of course, total nonense and a quiet sun will not come close to offsetting the warming effect of increased CO2.
Peter Sinclair, aka greenman made a good video explaining this.
From the EPA’s website: http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/science/pastcc.html
Nobody can accuse the EPA of being an AGW skeptic.
How about the myth of “the myth of a global Little Ice Age”?
Also, when you write:
a quiet sun will not come close to offsetting the warming effect of increased CO2, you engage in pure speculation about what effect atmospheric CO2 has on global climate.
If you believe atmospheric CO2 causes climate warming, then it must be that atmospheric CO2 is highly correlated with global temperature.
So, please explain why atmospheric CO2 is dramatically uncorrelated with global temperatures over the past 560 million years:
Image courtesy http://www.geocraft.com, posted at http://www.webcommentary.com/images/climate/co2-levels-over-time1.jpg
@Leif Svalgaard says:
January 30, 2012 at 5:27 pm
Ulric Lyons says:
January 30, 2012 at 4:36 pm
There is no point in looking at 30yrs when we are discussing the impact of one particular solar cycle on global temperatures.
We are not discussing that. A single cycle [or a single year] does not impact the climate because of the inertia of the oceans.
Even a single year can have a large impact on climate, especially where the oceans are concerned, eg as in the lower solar wind speed responsible for the `97/98 and `09/10 El Nino episodes which both had a great impact on climate. And of course the warmer years (1775-81) through SC3 made a big difference to any 30yr period that that was included in.
Peter Sinclair believes a lot of funny stuff, so I wouldn’t put much credibility in what he broadcasts. I am banned from posting on his videos because he doesn’t like the links to papers that seem, at one time, to have shown up on his posts.