Have we hit solar max?
NOAA’s SWPC recently updated their solar metrics graphs, and it seems to me like we may have topped out for solar cycle 24. There doesn’t seem to be any evidence of resurgence in any of the three metrics. Granted one month does not a cycle make, but it has been over a year now since the peak of about 95 SSN in October 2011, and there has been nothing similar since. Unlike the big swings of last solar max around 2000-2001, there’s very little variance in the signals of the present, demonstrating that the volatility expected during solar max just isn’t there.
It has been 7 years since the regime shift was observed in the Solar Geomagnetic Index (Ap) in October 2005, and the sun seems to be in a generally quiet magnetic period since then with no hint of the volatility of the past cycle.
UPDATE: Another indicator that we are at solar max is that the polar magnetic fields are about to flip, as tracked in this graphic from Dr. Leif Svalgaard. Click image to enlarge:
![WSO-Polar-Fields-since-2003[1]](http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/wso-polar-fields-since-20031.png)
Willis Eschenbach says:
December 12, 2012 at 12:51 pm
“The cause of geomagnetic jerks is still debated.”
So clearly, we don’t completely understand why the sun does what it does.
We are quite certain [as certain as you can be in science] that the Sun is not causing the jerks in the geomagnetic field.
when we don’t completely understand how the sun works?
But we do understand how tides and celestial mechanics work. The simple answer is one of magnitude. The effects of the planets is extremely small. There are many stars with much bigger planets much closer to the star [so tidal effects are millions of times stronger] and we have not yet found any with stellar activity synchronized with the planets. There is a small exception to this: Jupiter’s moon Io is within the planet’s magnetosphere and does electrically cause aurorae on Jupiter, and there are a couple of stars that may show a similar effect, but that is an external effect and not a modulation or generation of the basic activity cycle. The Sun’s ‘magnetosphere’ only goes out to about a tenth of the distance of the innermost planet. The solar wind is plasma that has left the Sun and is moving ‘supersonically’ away from the Sun, about 10 times faster than any electric or magnetic disturbance can move back to the Sun.
You have said before that you don’t know of any mechanism that could cause such changes in the sun due to the motions the planets, and neither do I.
I’ll modify that to say that none of the proposed mechanisms are adequate. I don’t buy the existence of [unspecified] amplification or feedback processes to compensate for the inadequacy.
So what is the basis of your certainty on that question? Be aware that I am not saying that the planets do influence the cycles of the sun … I’m just asking why you are so sure that they don’t influence it.
The observed lack of stars with planetary effects is a good starting point for that ‘certainty’. The lack of sufficient energy is another. And thirdly: the correlations are lousy [in spite of the claims to the opposite]. A lousy correlation can be tolerated if the mechanism is known and the energy is there. An example is the lousy [but real] relationship between sunspot numbers and geomagnetic activity.
but climate is not, the primary conclusion to draw is that said solar activity is not demonstrated to be a major driver of climate.
That is a pretty definitive statement to make, especially considering that if you take that statement as gospel you have to look within the Earth’s climate system for a reason for the known climate shifts between the Roman Warm Period, the cool period of the following mid millennia, the warming of the MWP and the subsequent cooling of the LIA and now our own warming. None of those climate fluxuations can be explained by industrial activity or even the more flimsy evidence of land use changes by the Romans and other societies.
To casually dismiss the sun as a driver of these climate shifts requires a much more complicated explanation related to internal feedback loops that are also missing greenhouse gas feedbacks. That seems to be a much taller order than to look at coupling in the sphere of solar/terrestrial influences.
We need to be looking that the couplings between vertical lighting and the solar cycle. We need to look at atmospheric density variations and how that influences the atmosphere’s denser layers. We should even look at Schauman resonances between the ionosphere and the ground that would be influenced by large variations in atmospheric density. These these studies revolve around studying what is jokingly called the “ignorosphere” between low orbital altitudes and the reach of high altitude balloons.
There is much we don’t understand about the solar/terrestrial interface but the good news is that if we are going into a Maunder minimum type period of solar activity this can be studied in detail and we will learn things that we don’t currently know about solar influence on climate, and that strong potential should be enough on its on to preclude definitive statements of the kind that you just made.
In the Northern Hemisphere there is a bit ‘less lousy’ correlation between the Ap (geomagnetic index) and major volcanic eruptions
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/Ap-VI.htm
There is even more intriguing correlation between solar activity and geological non magnetic records in the mid Atlantic ridge
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/SSN-NAP.htm
and in the Antarctic reasonable correlation of magnetic field changes
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/TMC.htm
But most important of all, there is a correlation between combining the Earth’s and solar magnetic field changes and the N. Hemisphere temperatures.
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/GSC1.htm
Could all the above be spurious correlations, I am not certain, but am inclined to think not.
.
Time will tell.
denniswingo says:
December 12, 2012 at 1:41 pm
you have to look within the Earth’s climate system for a reason for the known climate shifts between the Roman Warm Period, the cool period of the following mid millennia, the warming of the MWP and the subsequent cooling of the LIA and now our own warming. None of those climate fluxuations can be explained by industrial activity or even the more flimsy evidence of land use changes by the Romans and other societies.
Any complex system has internal fluctuations. You seem to deny that the Earth’s climate has such, so invoke internal fluctuations of the Sun…
To casually dismiss the sun as a driver of these climate shifts
My dismissal is not ‘casual’, but based on decades of thought about this.
There is much we don’t understand about the solar/terrestrial interface but the good news is that if we are going into a Maunder minimum type period of solar activity this can be studied in detail and we will learn things that we don’t currently know about solar influence on climate, and that strong potential should be enough on its on to preclude definitive statements of the kind that you just made.
Or to confirm my statement. If we come into a new Maunder Minimum and no LIA ensues, then what? Either you will say as I that that shows there is no climate relation, or you might say “there MUST be a solar connection, so now we have new and disturbing unknown reason for this seeming failure, and if you took that into account we can restore the sun to its a priory master driver”. Which shall it be?
vukcevic says:
December 12, 2012 at 1:52 pm
Could all the above be spurious correlations, I am not certain, but am inclined to think not.
Out of the infinitude of spurious correlations you pick five. That they are picked out, does not make them non-spurious.
Out of the infinitude of spurious correlations you pick five.
So how many of those are between the solar and Earth’s magnetic fields. Could you quote one that is not generally known?
Thanks for the explanation, Leif. The only parts I didn’t understand were these:
lsvalgaard says:
December 12, 2012 at 1:16 pm
If the sun is not causing the geomagnetic jerks, and you are sure that the actions of the planets are not geomagnetic jerks … what’s left?
The other question I had related to this:
The observed lack of stars with planetary effects is a good starting point for that ‘certainty’. The lack of sufficient energy is another.
Sufficient energy to do what?
If I have a hose on top of a building spraying lots and lots of water, moving prodigious quantities of energy around, it takes almost no energy to move it so it falls in an entirely different place …
My point is that the energy needed to alter the actions of a system can be quite small, and doesn’t require what you call “unspecified amplification or feedback processes” to work. For example, there are no unspecified amplification or feedback process involved in changing the aim point of my hose in the example, it takes very little energy, and despite both of those things being true, it can radically change the action of the system.
The same is true about say an athlete taking a jump. You put a finger on his shoulder at takeoff, and the whole jump goes awry … again despite any “amplification” or “feedback” mechanisms.
One more point about energy. Large changes can come from tiny pushes over a long period of time. It is this long-term accumulation of tiny forces, for example, that stopped the moon from rotating with respect to the earth … and to stop the moon from rotating would require a huge, huge amount of energy. But that energy is provided only in the small tidal forces. Despite that, and without any “amplification” or “feedback”, the rotation of the moon w.r.t. the earth was entirely stopped by just those tiny forces. The gravitational force of the Sun-Jupiter combination is about 2,000 times as strong as the gravitational force of the Earth-Moon combo, so why could it not have a corresponding effect?
Given all of those examples, I would say that the idea that tiny forces cannot possibly have large effects without amplification or feedback is simply wrong.
So … perhaps you can give us an estimation of how much energy it would take to slightly modify the circulation regimes in the sun, and some idea of how you estimated those numbers?
Finally, consider the Maunder Minimum. If it was not caused by the sun, then once again we’re back to a lack of a known physical mechanism to make the world that cold … so all that saying “it’s not the sun” does is to push the unexplained mechanism from the Sun to the Earth. Since whichever way we go we have an unexplained mechanism, I don’t see how that the lack of explanations favors one side or the other in any but a weak manner.
Again, please note that basically I agree with you (but without your certainty) regarding how much the variations in the sun affects the climate, because of the poor correlations and the lack of a known physical mechanism … but not for the other reason that you advance, that of insufficient energy. It doesn’t seem to me that we could even begin to say how much energy, applied exactly when, where, and for how long, it would take to make a detectable change in the sun.
w.
PS—The main reason I don’t think the changes in solar forcing are directly responsible for changes in the climate is that I don’t think that the temperature is controlled by the amount of forcing. Instead, my research shows that climate is determined by a variety of homeostatic mechanisms (clouds, thunderstorms, El Nino/La Nina alterations, etc.). As a result, I don’t think the slight solar changes make much difference to the earth … but for reasons that are located on the Earth, not in the heavens.
@Geoff Sharp:
Ah, the perils of talking about one part of a complex process for brevity (having been accused of being too prolix many times) and then getting slapped for not being complete enough… Can’t win.
OK, I’ll try to be as absolutely brief as possible while giving a h/t to other processes that matter on other time scales.
Solar Grand Min: I think that UV modulation of the stratosphere / ocean penetration heat matter here. Happens about once ever 180 years. OK, I didn’t dwell on a sporadic thing that we seem to be starting now. Why not? As it looks like it syncs with lunar tidal due to orbital resonance and the effects are known from prior cycles and we’ve got a pretty good history, it’s reasonable to look at the lunar ‘size’ this cycle and not worry about if the “moon tide” is the active agent or the “solar UV” as they both go together when they go (near as I can tell) so one being modest tells you the other ought to be modest too…
Moon Did It: As I was speaking specifically to the projection by Mr. Vuk., and how they matched a lunar model I’d seen, I figured it was reasonable to only point at something that might be a mechanism behind the cycles he found. I have no idea if / how-close those two (lunar / Vuk) will match the solar UV cycles too nor how much one is bigger or smaller than the other. We’ll know in about 30 years though, I suspect… But generally, I think the lunar tidal is about as big, or perhaps somewhat bigger than the solar-UV.
Most Likely: Some mix of (all working in the same direction) lunar / tidal changes, solar-UV changes, clouds via solar mediated Svensmark Theory. I.e. “The Sun Did It” is only a partial answer, and perhaps a minor one, so focus on it to excess (and certainly to exclusion) was a waste of many months of my life. I needed to look more broadly (though not to the exclusion of solar effects.)
Milutin Milanković: Yes, on 10,000 year time scales the full orbital mechanics set matters. Sun, moon, earth, precession, obliquity, etc. etc. etc. So? But no, the Holocene isn’t JUST a lunar shaped curve. The 10,000 ish year scale is Milanković shaped. Inside that is a 1500 ish year cycle that looks to be lunar shaped (with 200 and even some faster lunar cycles) influenced. Inside that there are (oddly synchronized) 180-200 year solar cycles that MAY be any of: Bigger, Smaller, Irrelevant coincidence, additive, or not. While I suspect they are additive and coordinated via orbital resonance, that is yet to be confirmed. (Rather like the volcanic lunar-tidal couple that could be anywhere from random to coincidence to correlated to causal lunar-> volcanic via magma and crustal tides.)
One hopes that make things more clear, while not being too “prolix”…
@climatereason:
I fully agree, but to quote one of my favorite and deep philosophers: “You cain’t fix stupid!”
So you have a stupid government. Buy a good set of sleeping bags and hang some insulting blocks in the window. i.e. depend on yourself. Nobody in government will be useful to you. (See BOTH of New Orleans and New York as existence proof…)
That’s WHY I’m “into urban preparedness”…
Oh, and reality doesn’t care if you like it or not… just sayin’…
Per the UK specific issues:
What part of ‘move to {Brazil, France, Australia} was unclear?
😉 Though I’d also suggest Florida. It’s very comfortable there and nobody thinks a person with an English accent is anything but yet another tourist… so you can stay forever and nobody notices… visa or not… Besides, get here soon and we’ll likely grandfather you in with free citizenship in the next round of ‘amnesty’ (by any name…)
But seriously. Your choices are:
Change your government. (Either the one you have, or via leaving to a different one)
Change your location. (Go to a warm one, and can fix #1 at the same time, but don’t need to.)
Change yourself. (Be self reliant and creative. Find ways to stay warm without that house heater. From electric blankets to making a sytrofoam igloo out of old shipping materials in your living room.)
http://www.amazon.com/Browns-Guide-Suburban-Survival-Field/dp/0425091724
helps. (I have Tom Browns older “Guide to Urban Survival”)
Anyone who dies of the cold INSIDE a home is just not being creative enough… Heck , just crumpling up the “pay your bills” paper notices and stuffing them between inner and outer pants / coats can make you warm 😉 (Variation on using leaf stuffing of clothing to survive outdoors in the snow…)
Yes, it’s a PITA and ought not to be that way. Your choices are:
1) Wallow in that and die.
2) Be self reliant and bitch about it while making your own solution.
I’ll take #2…
My Mum came through W.W.II in an England with very little heat available. “We talked”. She was absolutely thrilled with California and never thought any winter was all that cold… but one story was about how they would get one small lump of coal and cherish it. Waiting for the moment .. the day.. when they could put it in the stove and light it…
So you folks (and “my folks”) have dealt with this before, and worse.
Frankly, I think one could likely collect enough fuel from public waste baskets to avoid death from cold. Just put on a jumper that looks enough like the legit guys and even being caught on camera ought not raise flags… I can make a decent “rocket stove” in about one afternoon (and it needs all of trash tin and mud…) and put the vent into a removable window fitting so you only ‘deploy it’ when not subject to observation. (Clay can hold heat for most of a day…)
A crying shame? A horrid statement about governance? Yes. Your point? See choices 1 and 2 above…
(Maybe it’s an American thing… this not expecting anyone else to fix it for you and expecting your government to be more hindrance than help…)
@vuk: OK you’ve seen it..
@denniswingo:
AND the UV is differentially sorted. UVC into the upper stratosphere warming, UVB / A lower stratosphere, then skips down to deep ocean depths than the visible / IR that stay in the upper little bits.
Shifting TSI to less UV and more visible IR also means shifting stratsopheric warming profiles, ozone production / distribution and depth of ocean solar heating.
Not to mention I don’t need sunscreen now 😉
http://chiefio.wordpress.com/2012/12/12/tropopause-rules/
@Herkimer:
Well put. Personally, I don’t expect more than a ‘return to mid 1970’s’ level. Cold enough to botch PlanB but not a “little ice age”… I think that’s about all that lunar tidal / solar UV can give us this go round… To get further will likely take a lot of added volcanoes. IMHO of course.
@Deniswingo:
An important point to keep in mind:
Looking for the dominant cause may fail.
What happens if there is NO dominant cause? You never find anything using that measure.
So, say, you have all of:
1) Solar (UV or TSI or whatever)
2) Lunar / tidal.
3) Svensmark Clouds.
4) Natural oscillations of systems.
5) Volcanic cycling
6) Some gas dynamics.
7) Land use changes (Hey, cut down the N. H. forests and think nothing changes?)
8) Albedo changes
9) Comet / asteroid impact events
10) Orbital mechanics changes
and each one has an 10% effect. What are the odds you will ever figure that out looking for THE dominant cause? (Especially if several of them act in concert but each can be ruled out one at a time…)
Leif says
Any complex system has internal fluctuations. You seem to deny that the Earth’s climate has such, so invoke internal fluctuations of the Sun…
Not denying anything and I have never been one of those that scream about one cause or another. Yes any complex system has internal fluctuations. That is a reasonable position to take and it may very well be that the temperature variations of the last few thousand years can be perfectly well explained by ocean currents, which is where most of the internal heat at the surface is in the terra sphere. I scoff at the notion that an increase in CO2 that represents less than 0.013% of the atmosphere is driving these fluctuations. I am extremely interested in the solar/terrestrial connection having worked for S.T. Wu and the Center for Space Plasma and Aeronomic Research (CSPAR) for several years and have watched the evolution of our understanding of the solar/terrestrial interface and just how little we do know about the complexities of the interactions between the two. I was in the room when the incredulous results from the Gamma Ray Observatory’s BATSE showing a correlation between vertical lighting and terrestrial gamma ray production was first revealed so I have a pretty good feeling about what happens when a paradigm is overturned.
Leif says
Or to confirm my statement. If we come into a new Maunder Minimum and no LIA ensues, then what? Either you will say as I that that shows there is no climate relation, or you might say “there MUST be a solar connection, so now we have new and disturbing unknown reason for this seeming failure, and if you took that into account we can restore the sun to its a priory master driver”. Which shall it be?
I will be happy as a clam because one strong variable will be removed from a very complex equation. That is what science is all about. However, lets turn that around, what will you say if SC-25 is a Maunder type minimum and temperatures dive? I would hope that you would be happy as a clam and would seek diligently to understand what you missed in your understanding before. We have watched Hathaway be seriously humbled in the last few years as nature is far more surprising than what we think it is.
It is my personal opinion, backed by some data, that we seriously misunderstand the nature of coupling between solar radiation sources and terrestrial sinks. We are still ignorant children in the realm of quantum mechanics and I laugh when AGW proponents as well as scientists think that classical physics alone can explain our climate. There are some surprises coming from this direction and it is my opinion, based on evidence that is already out there, that this is the direction from which the linkage will be made….
Such is science, hypothesize, theorize, observe, confirm or not….. The journey is fun either way!
vukcevic says:
December 12, 2012 at 2:40 pm
“Out of the infinitude of spurious correlations you pick five.”
So how many of those are between the solar and Earth’s magnetic fields. Could you quote one that is not generally known?
From the infinitude? if not generally known, how would I know it?
Perhaps stop wasting time on this would do you good.
Willis Eschenbach says:
December 12, 2012 at 3:11 pm
If the sun is not causing the geomagnetic jerks, and you are sure that the actions of the planets are not geomagnetic jerks … what’s left?
As I noted upthread: “Bloxham (2002) suggests that jerks are surface manifestations of a superposition of torsional oscillations [sorry for the jargon: a special class of axisymmetric, geostrophic, hydromagnetic waves] in the liquid, outer core. Nagao et al. (2003) suggest that differences in the mantle conductivity could explain why the two hemispheres exhibit jerks at different times [they appear with a delay in the Southern hemisphere]. In any event, they are of internal origin for the simple reason that external changes cannot penetrate deep into the Earth [skin-depth too shallow].”
Details are still debated.
Sufficient energy to do what?
To change the ongoing process significantly
If I have a hose on top of a building spraying lots and lots of water, moving prodigious quantities of energy around, it takes almost no energy to move it so it falls in an entirely different place …
But to repeat that process ‘forever’ [as the sunspot cycle does] and have the water always fall in the same place is what is at stake here.
So … perhaps you can give us an estimation of how much energy it would take to slightly modify the circulation regimes in the sun, and some idea of how you estimated those numbers?
This is a big topic. A starting point would be http://www.leif.org/EOS/jagerversteegh-20063.pdf
Finally, consider the Maunder Minimum. If it was not caused by the sun, then once again we’re back to a lack of a known physical mechanism to make the world that cold … so all that saying “it’s not the sun” does is to push the unexplained mechanism from the Sun to the Earth.
It does not matter where we put the unexplained mechanism. Some fluctuations are just natural, and don’t need specific mechanisms.
Since whichever way we go we have an unexplained mechanism, I don’t see how that the lack of explanations favors one side or the other in any but a weak manner.
This is also an argument for no solar relationship.
(but without your certainty) regarding how much the variations in the sun affects the climate
Don’t overdo the ‘certainty’ bit. What I’m saying is that to ‘my satisfaction’ it has not been demonstrated that the sun is a major driver, on the contrary there are several reasons why it is not as we have discussed. Absolute ‘Certainty’ is rarely found in science, and on a scale from 0 to 10, my opinion on solar activity not being a major driver of climate is only an 8, on the lack of planetary influences a 9.5, on the Earth being 4.56 billion years old a shining 10 [46% of Americans disagree].
E.M.Smith says:
December 12, 2012 at 3:17 pm
………..
Mr. Smith
Also consider fact that the lunar tides act on all fluids, this would include effect on the outer core thermal convection, where the Earth’s magnetic field is generated.
http://www.maths.bris.ac.uk/~marrk/Tidal94.pdf
denniswingo says:
December 12, 2012 at 3:22 pm
I scoff at the notion that an increase in CO2 that represents less than 0.013% of the atmosphere is driving these fluctuations.
The issue of CO2 has IMHO nothing to do with whether the sun controls the climate and has no place in this discussion. Often people invoke the Sun in order just to combat AGW and that is wrong. The solar issue stands on its own.
what will you say if SC-25 is a Maunder type minimum and temperatures dive?
‘dive’ has to be specified. I would say that a 1.5 degree dive would cause me to seriously reconsider my position. Now, there are some that will invoke lags of unspecified lengths [ocean thermal inertia and all that], so if temps do not dive, they will say: just wait another 20, 50, 100 [whatever] years and you’ll see.
Such is science, hypothesize, theorize, observe, confirm or not….. The journey is fun either way!
But, please [and that was what irked me] do not think that I dismiss anything ‘casually’ [except the obviously nutcases – they know who they are]. The sun-weather-climate issue I have thought deeply about and investigated for forty years.
I see people here predicting a substantial cooling over the next 2-3
decades, because of the decline of solar activity and AMO.
But what if temperatures largely hold steady or decrease only slightly in
the next 2-3 decades?
As for effects of AMO: I did see a periodic component `in HadCRUT3.
I worked out its period as 62 years and amplitude (peak to peak) of about
.215 degree C, assuming it’s sinusoidal. The most recent peak of this
cycle was in 2004 (by using Fourier on several 2-cycle trials). I suspect
this is mostly AMO.
So, it appears to me that AMO or whatever that periodic component is
explains about .21-.22 degree C of the warming. Solar activity was
fairly steadily high since before 1950, so I doubt that explains the warming.
I think what remains is largely anthropogenic effects, measurement errors
and adjustment errors. A somewhat significant bit of the manmade
increase in “greenhouse gas effect” was from gases other than CO2,
whose increase was largely stalled in the early or mid 1990’s.
Increase in CO2 appears to me to explain about .2-.25 degree C of the
warming from 1973 to 2004. I expect increasing CO2 to roughly balance
or slightly outweigh the effect of AMO from 2004 to 2035. Whatever cooling
occurs in this period appears to me likely to approximate or be slightly less
than what solar variation alone would do.
The upcoming solar minimum, likely to be close to a ~11-year-cycle
minimum around 2032-2033, appears to me to be a combined dip of the
~210-year cycle and a somewhat irregular one that lately has had a period
around or a little over 60 years. I expect it to be steep and deep, fair chance
significantly deeper than the Dalton minumum – but briefly. I expect its
duration to be like that of the Dalton minimum or shorter. And, I expect
the upswing from the minimum to be as quick and steep as the descent.
I suspect TSI could decrease by 1.5 W/m^2 from 1,366 W/m^2 – which would
be quite a drop as far as TSI goes. This would be a roughly .542 W/m^2
decrease in solar and back-from-atmosphere radiation reaching and being
absorbed by the surface. (Assuming the Kiehl-Trenberth energy budget
model).
If feedbacks to this are the same as for CO2, then I expect this to have as
much effect as 22 years worth of increase of CO2. However, I am aware that
the lapse rate feedback is more negative to change of greenhouse gases
than to change in radiation factors (but negative to both). Also, changes in
solar activity could fairly directly cause changes in cloud cover. I have heard
of “Hale Winters”, where dips in solar activity cause harsh winters in some
regions where regional feedback is more positive than global-average. A bit
of the regional- specific feedback probably has a bit of effect on the world as
a whole.
So if the NH has reversed previously and the SH is in transition now would it still be possible to have maximum after the “flip”?
Project722 says:
December 12, 2012 at 7:00 pm
So if the NH has reversed previously and the SH is in transition now would it still be possible to have maximum after the “flip”?
The maximum will likely be long and drawn out, so it will be difficult to assign a precise date to it, and the polar field reversals are only one indication of a maximum. There are other solar indices and they all show slight;y different dates. “The sun is a messy place”.
A theory must be first understood before any judgement of “lousy” correlations is put forward.
I have created an instructional video that might help some.
There are now well respected scientists that are seriously looking at the very good correlations.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=07k6yrPegV0&w=560&h=315%5D
Also a graphic that might help Willis with the “trident” analogy below.
http://tinyurl.com/2dg9u22/images/trident.png
Geoff Sharp says:
December 12, 2012 at 10:16 pm
A theory must be first understood before any judgement of “lousy” correlations is put forward.
I have created an instructional video that might help some.
In addition to the erroneous first clause, the video does not present a theory or mechanism or physics, but is just an exercise in Astrology. Undoubtedly it will find fertile ground in unsuspecting viewers just like the horoscopes in your daily newspaper.
Its going to be cold, and get colder.
I told you so in 2008/2009
http://blog.chess.com/Rickj/towards-a-new-maunder-minimum-dalton-minimum-or-just-the-end-of-cycle-23
http://blog.chess.com/Rickj/more-on-the-maunder-minimum
But hey, what do I know?
lsvalgaard says:
December 12, 2012 at 7:16 pm
“The maximum will likely be long and drawn out, so it will be difficult to assign a precise date to it, and the polar field reversals are only one indication of a maximum. There are other solar indices and they all show slight;y different dates. “The sun is a messy place”. ”
So what are these indices and where can I find them? I would like to see the dates. Also, it is not uncommon judging from the past that reversals happen before the maximum. We had SSN peaks in late 2011 and once again in 2/2012. The 3 metrics of F10.7 flux, SSN, and AP continue to fall short of predictions month after month. So if the sun does not start posting fatter numbers soon what more will it take for a concensus that max has already passed and we are on the downhill slope?
Typo – I meant “Also, it is not uncommon judging from the past that reversals happen AFTER the maximum.
Project722 says:
December 13, 2012 at 5:25 am
So what are these indices and where can I find them?
You just mentioned some.
So if the sun does not start posting fatter numbers soon what more will it take for a concensus that max has already passed and we are on the downhill slope?
We won’t know until the maximum is over that we were there.
See http://www.leif.org/research/ApJ88587.pdf for when reversals were.
Project722 says:
December 13, 2012 at 5:25 am
So what are these indices and where can I find them?
You just mentioned some.
So if the sun does not start posting fatter numbers soon what more will it take for a concensus that max has already passed and we are on the downhill slope?
We won’t know until well after the maximum that it has passed. Look at cycle 14 and tell me when maximum was [and to what degree the concept of a distinct maximum makes sense]:
http:/www.leif.org/research/SC14.png
See http://www.leif.org/research/ApJ88587.pdf for when reversals were.
http://www.leif.org/research/SC14.png
****
E.M.Smith says:
December 12, 2012 at 3:17 pm
Solar Grand Min: I think that UV modulation of the stratosphere / ocean penetration heat matter here. Happens about once ever 180 years. OK, I didn’t dwell on a sporadic thing that we seem to be starting now. Why not? As it looks like it syncs with lunar tidal due to orbital resonance and the effects are known from prior cycles and we’ve got a pretty good history, it’s reasonable to look at the lunar ‘size’ this cycle and not worry about if the “moon tide” is the active agent or the “solar UV” as they both go together when they go (near as I can tell) so one being modest tells you the other ought to be modest too
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As an engineer, the first question about UV would be: How many W/m2 are getting into the water via UV? And to what extent does it change from solar cycles?
IMO the “barycenter theory” is bunk, but there is something potential from lunar tides. Something I read long ago analyzed the Keeling cycles. It discussed that mixing of the ocean top-layer was sensitive to tidal changes in a number of sea-mount areas — Hawaiian Island chain, Indonesia, & others due to irregularities of the underwater surfaces at critical mixing zone levels. Greater tides increased the mixing-rate in these regions & cooled the upper ocean layer, including the surface. Haven’t seen anything lately, but at least it’s plausible.