From the The Washington Times – By Willie Soon and William M. Briggs
Scientists have been studying solar influences on the climate for more than 5,000 years.
Chinese imperial astronomers kept detailed sunspot records. They noticed that more sunspots meant warmer weather. In 1801, the celebrated astronomer William Herschel (discoverer of the planet Uranus) observed that when there were fewer spots, the price of wheat soared. He surmised that less light and heat from the sun resulted in reduced harvests.
Earlier last month, professor Richard Muller of the University of California-Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature (BEST) project announced that in the project’s newly constructed global land temperature record, “no component that matches solar activity” was related to temperature. Instead, Mr. Muller said carbon dioxide controlled temperature.
Could it really be true that solar radiation — which supplies Earth with the energy that drives our climate and which, when it has varied, has caused the climate to shift over the ages — is no longer the principal influence on climate change?
Consider the accompanying chart. It shows some rather surprising relationships between solar radiation and daytime high temperatures taken directly from Berkeley’s BEST project. The remarkable nature of these series is that these tight relationships can be shown to hold from areas as large as the United States.
This new sun-climate relationship picture may be telling us that the way our sun cools and warms the Earth is largely through the penetration of incoming solar radiation in regions with cloudless skies. Recent work by National Center for Atmospheric Research senior scientists Harry van Loon and Gerald Meehl place strong emphasis on this physical point and argue that the use of daytime high temperatures is the most appropriate test of the solar-radiation-surface-temperature connection hypothesis. All previous sun-climate studies have included the complicated nighttime temperature records while the sun is not shining.
Read more: SOON AND BRIGGS: Global-warming fanatics take note – Washington Times
There are many solar outputs all have differnt effects on weather and climate
TSI is too broad brushed to really show the many real relationships that occur.
Crispin in Waterloo says:
September 6, 2012 at 10:28 pm
“That CO2 dominance explains why the temperature has been continuing to increase at the same rate from 1995-2012 as it did from 1976-1995, even though the sun has gone quiet now. The continuing temperature increase with CO2 increase should be very convincing.”
How can anyone claim that temperature increased at all from 1995-2012, let alone that the increase was similar as in the period 1976-1995?? Just have one look at the Hadcrut3 data:
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut3gl/from:1975/to:2012
Interesting observations in these comments. There was the warming period from 1900-1940 that requires explanation. Leif Svalgaard insists this warming period cannot be explained by increased solar activity. The IPCC rules out CO2. So what caused it?
We seem to understand depressingly little about the drivers of the climate system.
@ur momisugly Leif Svalgaard
I respect you.
However, the insolation graph you show still reminds me of a central heating system. (A sqaure metre is a very small area though). You come home at 6pm, it’s freezing cold outside your house is around 1°C. You turn your central heating system on, depending upon its efficiency, boiler/pump/thermostat/valves/insulation/size of house (there are always losses in any system), etc, it could take anything up to an hour or more to raise the internal temperature to a comfortable 18-20°C. The graph fits the analogy. Besides, until somebody can announce a genuinely complete assessment of how the Sun actually works, it’s effects upon the Solar System, the planets, & the Earth in particular, in a way that can make accurate predicitions of Solar behavoiur (always the fly in the ointment), to dismiss it as an insignificant contributer to the Earth’s Climate, apart from in the ancient past, is serious folly. It simply cannot be ruled out which is what some people at NASA & those at the UNIPCC have done! The Sun & Moon affect the global tides, the Sun gives us heat & light , around 99.99% of it, it possess 99.9% of the mass of the Solar System, its Solar flares can take out power grids on Earth & damage orbiting satellelites, it affects radio & tv communications when highly active, the BBC used to make announcements about it to allay peoples concerns about poor reception, etc. To say it doesn’t significantly affect the Climate is foolhardy! I recall the BBC 2 Horizon programme about the Sun, a wonderful tv documentary that was perfect right up until the last 5 minutes, when the narrator said at the end “No one can explain exactly how the Sun effects the Earth & its Climate, but whatever it is, it’s already been overtaken by manmade global warming!” accompanied by a clever cut from an image of the firey Sun, to a calving of an iceberg in Antarctica! Deja vu translation,…..”We don’t know exactly how Element ‘A’, affects Element ‘B’, but we know for certain that it is overpowered by Element ‘C’! Scientific nonsense. I suspect there will be an awful lot of scientists who will be remembered for their folly, leaving them exposed to challenges about their technical competence, which is sad for them, their families, & sad for science, leaving them with the lamest of excuses of “we based our statements on the best available science at the time!”
The classic “correlation does not prove causation.” The graphs that I have seen between solar and temperature are quite different. I’d like to see a resolution of those differences. Perhaps it’s because other studies used global rather than US temperatures. Probably there will be a discussion of the scientific literature on this topic at Skeptical Science. In the meantime, I am looking for a citation to a scientific paper. Did this study and its graph actually get published or it just a press release?
Peter Miller, adjust your last paragraph a bit to couple what you said with what Bart highlighted of John Christy’s explanation of GW being mostly night time Tmin increase, that is UHI, and Tmax being a better metric of any co2 influence and that pretty much sums it up, and right there I agree with all three of you and the best I can tell of the science involved.
The only thing I will leave in question is whether there has actually been a larger secular variance in TSI during the pre-satellite era. With all of the evidence I have read of says yes except those few with a belief in a completely static sun which flies in the face of all ancient observations.
She got lazy recently, but…..
http://www.carolmoore.net/articles/sunspot-cycle.html
😉
tallbloke says:
September 7, 2012 at 12:30 am
Until you manage to iron the data completely flat, a suitable scaling of the data will always reveal that pesky sun-climate relationship which you yourself say is a problem for the IPCC because they can’t manage without it for explaining climate variation prior to co2 rise, and so can’t really dismiss it as they have after the co2 rise either. All very inconsistent.
Forget about the climate. The issue is whether the ‘solar radiation’ curve on S&B’s graph is correct, and it isn’t. That IPPC is also wrong does not make everybody else right.
Kasuha says:
September 7, 2012 at 1:35 am
But what I notice is, even the worst of reconstructions you have on your graphs is always over 1363 while values in this graph are all below 1362. So I guess your guess is wrong.
Perhaps look again before you make an even bigger fool of yourself.
John Marshall says:
September 7, 2012 at 2:21 am
But it’s not just sunspots it is the whole panoply of radiation
The graph shows the total energy output of the Sun [the heavy black curve] except that that curve is not what the variation of the output has been.
Kasuha says:
September 7, 2012 at 1:35 am
Leif Svalgaard says:
September 7, 2012 at 12:03 am
Because the numbers on the Y-axis are what that radiation is. So now you know it too.
__________________________________________
So it’s just your guess from values on the scale. You don’t have any other evidence for that.
No – it’s not a guess. The mean amount of solar radiation which reaches the “top of the earths atmosphere” is around 1360 w/m2. It’s a well accepted figure.
I had to google Dr. Willie Soon, I am very impressed by his credentials, but not so much by the evidence presented in the article. I do not know if Dr. Soon has looked at the thread or at any of the responses, but if he does I would suggest a closer look at
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/GSC1.htm
my email is on the graph if may wish to know more.
Leif Svalgaard says:
September 7, 2012 at 12:30 am
Slabadang says:
September 6, 2012 at 11:04 pm
http://www.oar.noaa.gov/spotlite/archive/spot_sunclimate.html
states that “It is well documented that the early part of the 20th century was much colder than it is today.”
It is also well documented that solar activity today is back to what it was in the early part of the 20th century, but apparently temperatures are not…
Solar derived heat accumulated in the ocean during the long run of more active cycles in the later C20th. How long it will keep us warm now solar activity is slumping remains to be seen. The ‘rule of thumb’ is around a decade. The Sun dropped below the heuristically determined ocean equilibrium value of ~40SSN in 2004 so perhaps we’ll see the effects in one to two years.
@Leif,
“Leif Svalgaard on September 6, 2012 at 9:58 pm
The graph shows the radiation from the sun above the atmosphere, reduced to a constant distance to the sun.”
Accurately measured all the way back in 1600. LOL!!
“In 1801, the celebrated astronomer William Herschel (discoverer of the planet Uranus) observed that when there were fewer spots, the price of wheat soared.”
Interesting. Does this relationship hold up over time? Has anyone plotted wheat prices against sunspot number from 1801 to 2012?
Mr. Miller.
We most certainly do have records of the sun’s output, tho not in as great a detail, Some records mentioned in the earlier posts going back 5000 years, not just decades. And modern scientists have been looking at the sun for a couple of centuries. Sheesh!
Peter Miller says:
September 6, 2012 at 11:59 pm
…We obviously have no records of the sun’s output prior to the 1990s, ….
Peter Miller says:
September 6, 2012 at 11:59 pm
“At the end of the day, I suspect most readers believe in a small amount of AGW, which has been largely beneficial, and are fervent opponents of CAGW, which has no scientific basis. The global warming industry is totally dependent on promoting the hoax of CAGW by linking it to the mild amounts of AGW we have seen over the last half century.”
Well said.
If only CO2 controlled the temperature then why have there been ice ages and interglacial warm periods over the past 400000 years with only small increases to CO2 ie 280 to 300 ppm over the same period?
So, after a little investigation, I learned that this graph comes from unpublished work on the Berkeley/Muller web site. Remember that unpublished papers by Muller et al. support the notion that CO2 is largely responsible for recent warming. It used to be that scientists had to pay attention to “press releases” because they announced the work of soon to appear studies “in press.” There are too many real scientific studies being published to pay attention to premature announcements about unpublished data. In this case, the purported results are contrary to conclusions of Muller et al. who concluded that variation in solar radiation does not explain recent global warming. Has anyone studied the unpublished papers by Muller et al enough to understand why their conclusions are contrary to message of this press release?
But, this is a Chinese investigation that has gone back to the mid 1800’s. So why does it come out now? Is it because China’s levels of emitting co2 GHG! This is an obvious propaganda scam. A fail in my opinion!
Alan the Brit says:
September 7, 2012 at 3:51 am
However, the insolation graph you show still reminds me of a central heating
This reply also goes to all the other ones who are barking up the wrong tree. Regardless of what you may think about cause and effect, CO2 or central heating, IPPC and climate, etc. What I pointed out was that the graph shown by S&B of ‘solar radiation’ is wrong [looks like the discarded 20-yr old Hoyt & Schatten data, which today is not generally accepted].
It is amusing to see people on the one hand accepting the graph as correct and then saying that TSI is not the real cause and there are many other things involved etc. Most commenters here [as usual] suffer from a severe case of confirmation bias.
Leif Svalgaard says:
September 7, 2012 at 4:31 am
tallbloke says:
September 7, 2012 at 12:30 am
Until you manage to iron the data completely flat, a suitable scaling of the data will always reveal that pesky sun-climate relationship which you yourself say is a problem for the IPCC because they can’t manage without it for explaining climate variation prior to co2 rise, and so can’t really dismiss it as they have after the co2 rise either. All very inconsistent.
Forget about the climate. The issue is whether the ‘solar radiation’ curve on S&B’s graph is correct, and it isn’t. That IPPC is also wrong does not make everybody else right.
Do we know how they calculated it yet? IS the SI for the paper available? Arguing over sciene by press release probably isn’t worth the effort. But just to point out an inconsistency in your comment. How can we ‘forget about the climate’, when the two curves compared are ‘Solar total Irradiance’ and temperature data?
Soon multiplied recent TSI values with with the GHCN adjustments inherited by the BEST data for all we know…
JJ says
“And proximity to the brain is why aural, oral, and anal thermometers give valid measurements.”
Aural and oral yes but I do not see the connection with anal unless he has included some well-known climate scientists in his study. Kidding apart, I agree with his comments.
We are in a period of minimal sunspot activity, and yet the earth isn’t cooling. Temperatures have been pretty flat for the last 10 years. So something is keeping us warm despite the lower level of solar radiation. Greenhouse gasses?
Atlantic current therefor sea ice correlate with solar activity?
tallbloke says:
September 7, 2012 at 12:30 am
Until you manage to iron the data completely flat,
Here is what Schrijver et al. suggest the solar magnetic flux [which generally is accepted as the cause of the variation of TSI] looks like: http://www.leif.org/research/Solar-Magn-Flux-Schrijver.png [red dots] from http://www.leif.org/EOS/2011GL046658.pdf with their conclusion: “drivers other than TSI dominate Earth’s long‐term climate change”. Bottom line: the S&B graph is wrong [on solar radiation] and their article misleading in the extreme.
****
Leif Svalgaard says:
September 6, 2012 at 8:51 pm
****
Thanks. It must seem like an endless struggle….