From the FECYT – Spanish Foundation for Science and Technology via Eurekalert comes this interesting note about solar forcing. It seems there’s a 2.3% per decade increase in solar radiation observed in Spain. Surely this is more than enough to account for the warming there? Cloud cover is said to be the issue, as Dr. Roy Spencer has previously pointed out, it only takes a small amount of cloud cover change to make a warming trend. – Anthony
Spain receives ever more solar radiation
Solar radiation in Spain has increased by 2.3% every decade since the 1980s, according to a study by researchers from the University of Girona and the Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) in Zurich. This increase is linked to the decreased presence of clouds, which has increased the amount of direct radiation reaching us from the Sun.
“The mean annual G series over Spain shows a tendency to increase during the 1985-2010 period, with a significant linear trend of + 3.9 W m-2 [2.3% more] per decade.” This is the main conclusion of a study published in the magazine ‘Global and Planetary Change‘ by researchers from the University of Girona and the Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich (ETH, Switzerland).
The season-by-season data show the same “significant” increase in solar radiation impacting the nation: + 6.5 W/m2 per decade during the summer, + 4.1 W/m2 in autumn, + 3.2 W/m2 in spring and + 1.7 W/m2 in winter.
“These data relate to global solar radiation, in other words the increase in direct radiation reaching us from the Sun plus diffuse radiation which is scattered previously by clouds, atmospheric gases and aerosols,” explains one of the authors, Arturo Sánchez-Lorenzo, currently a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Girona.
What is intriguing is that the scientists found a decrease in the diffuse component, because of which direct radiation has increased to a proportionately higher degree. Only in 1991 and 1992 did diffuse radiation rise, and this was due to the ashes from Mount Pinatubo. In general, however, we can observe a downward trend of – 2.1 W/m2 per decade between 1985 and 2010.
VIDEO: Solar radiation in Spain has increased by 2.3 percent every decade since the 1980s.Click here for more information.
“The explanation lies in the fact that in Spain the amount of cloud has decreased markedly since the 1980s – as we have ascertained through other studies – and the tropospheric aerosol load may also have decreased,” states Sánchez Lorenzo. “It seems to be very simple: fewer clouds result in higher solar radiation on the surface,” he continues.
According to the scientists, this increase may also go hand in hand with more ultraviolet rays, an excess of which presents a health risk, potentially leading to skin cancer.
More global brightening
The increase in global solar radiation is a phenomenon that has been observed in other parts of the world for almost 30 years, especially in developed countries, and it has been named “global brightening”. The fall in the diffuse component has also been observed in Central European and Eastern countries.
The team behind the study has not yet analysed the solar radiation data for 2011-2013 provided by the Spanish State Meteorological Agency, but the data from other European weather stations suggests that this brightening is still on the rise.
“Studies such as these may be of interest to the solar energy industry, especially in countries like Spain, where not only do we already have a lot of direct solar radiation but now we are getting even more,” affirms one of the other authors, Josep Calbó, who is a professor at the University of Girona.
References:
A. Sanchez-Lorenzo, J. Calbó, M. Wild. “Global and diffuse solar radiation in Spain: Building a homogeneous dataset and assessing their trends”. Global and Planetary Change 100: 343–352, 2013.
h/t to Dr. Leif Svalgaard
“””””….._Jim says:
June 7, 2013 at 6:16 am
george e. smith says June 6, 2013 at 6:43 pm
…
If those clouds get warmed by LWIR from the surface, they will simply radiate to space even faster.
…
I have no idea how clouds could produce a positive feedback. They can’t transport “heat energy” back to the surface; they can only lose it to space.
Do you have anything more than your conjecture to support this?
Temps aren’t all that warm ‘at altitude’ so the radiative efficiency isn’t going to be ALL that great … [some] satellite images, or sounder imagery/data ought to exist to support this……”””””
“””””…..I have no idea how clouds could produce a positive feedback. …..”””””
That isn’t a conjecture; it’s a simple statement of fact “I have no idea.” I would welcome YOUR ideas , on how “clouds might transport heat energy back to the surface.”
As you know, in the atmosphere “heat energy” consists of the random kinetic energies of gazillions of air molecules in constant collision with each other. Because of the natural altitude-Temperature lapse rate, the clouds are cooler than the surface. The second law implies that of its own accord, heat energy can only move from warmer to cooler Temperature locations. That would be upward to space; not downward toward the surface. That leaves EM radiation as a mechanism for energy to move from the clouds to somewhere else. That energy would consist of the specific resonance emission frequencies of the various infra-red active components of the atmosphere, i.e. the GHGs; plus the thermal radiation emitted by ALL bodies hotter than zero Kelvins, including the non-IR active gases. That of course is NOT black body radiation, since the atmosphere is not a black body (nothing is).
Now any EM emission from the clouds, is inherently isotropic in angular distribution, so half will go up towards space, and half down towards the surface. So that is certainly downward energy transport; it is NOT heat energy transport.
When that reaches the surface 70% of it is going to encounter water, and be absorbed in the top 10-50 microns of the water surface. That is likely to result in enhanced evaporation, rather than convective or conductive transport to the ocean depths; the evaporation keeps the surface Temperature lower than the underlying layers, preventing downward heat energy flow.
As for air Temperatures at altitude; warmer radiates faster than colder, no matter what the absolute Temperatures are.
We are told that surface emitted LWIR radiation, warms the atmosphere (above what it otherwise would be}. So does incoming solar radiation that is absorbed by GHG such as H2O, O3, and CO2. That warmer atmosphere will radiate faster, removing energy from earth faster, than if the atmosphere did not warm.
I have no dispute with the claim that GHGs warm the atmosphere; but that speeds up the cooling to space. Your car’s radiator, is pressurized, so it can rise in temperature without boiling, for the very specific reason, that that gets rid of heat energy faster, thereby cooling your engine better.
You don’t need satellite imagery to show that warm things cool by radiation faster than cool things. It is the hottest north African and middle eastern deserts, that cool the earth fastest, not the frozen wastes of Greenland or Antarctica. In fact the cool more than ten times faster, than the coolest places on earth.
I’m quite open to any explanation of how warmer clouds warm the surface (which after all was the very source of the heat energy, and the LWIR that heated the cloud in the first place
(along with the sun of course))
Leif Svalgaard says:
“No, the temperature has really no effect on the earth. The flow pressure and the magnetic field determine the effects on the Earth.”
Determine what effects on the Earth? Velocity/temp variations correlate far better to atmospheric teleconnections and ENSO than the pressure changes do.
Ulric Lyons says:
June 11, 2013 at 4:41 am
“No, the temperature has really no effect on the earth. The flow pressure and the magnetic field determine the effects on the Earth.”
Determine what effects on the Earth? Velocity/temp variations correlate far better to atmospheric teleconnections and ENSO than the pressure changes do.
Effects happen by the way of transfer of energy. Velocity in itself does not transfer energy to systems on the Earth. The flow pressure is a measure of the kinetic energy of the solar wind and is therefore the agent of interest.
Leif Svalgaard says:
June 10, 2013 at 12:56 pm
a good number for the radius of the core is 20% of the solar radius or 22 earth radii. Of course, the boundary is not infinitely sharp so the ‘radius’ is somewhat fuzzy.
Thanks Leif, that is the sort of answer I was looking for, I can work with 20% of the solar radius as a good estimate.
The fusion process is extremely gentle. The rate at which energy is generated is so low that it would take several weeks to bring an ordinary tea kettle of water to a boil.
Now that’s an interesting factoid I did not know! I’ve read similar tea pot analogies about pressure differences on earth.
I noticed that the sun is effectively blank again, this is normal for weak solar cycles but this has to effect the count, will it now be weaker than thought? and do you think we are now seeing a decline?
http://sdo.gsfc.nasa.gov/assets/img/latest/latest_1024_HMII.jpg
Sparks says:
June 11, 2013 at 11:07 am
I noticed that the sun is effectively blank again, this is normal for weak solar cycles but this has to effect the count, will it now be weaker than thought? and do you think we are now seeing a decline?
My prediction still stands at 70, but the final result will probably be a bit lower because of the Livingston&Penn effect, but it is hard to judge what the trend is, compare with cycle 14: http://www.solen.info/solar/cycl14.html
Leif Svalgaard says:
June 11, 2013 at 5:48 am
“Effects happen by the way of transfer of energy. Velocity in itself does not transfer energy to systems on the Earth. The flow pressure is a measure of the kinetic energy of the solar wind and is therefore the agent of interest.”
So how does a CME cause the thermosphere to heat up and expand? and do coronal hole HSS’s also heat and expand the thermosphere?
Ulric Lyons says:
June 11, 2013 at 6:21 pm
So how does a CME cause the thermosphere to heat up and expand? and do coronal hole HSS’s also heat and expand the thermosphere?
The main cause of the expansion of the thermosphere is ultraviolet light and x-rays from the Sun. Geomagnetic activity contributes to the expansion. The process is powered by solar wind magnetic energy added to and stored in the Earth’s magnetosphere. The magnetotail is unstable and the energy is from time to time released in explosive events that generate electric currents in the thermosphere. These currents help heat the thermosphere. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermosphere
Leif Svalgaard says:
“The main cause of the expansion of the thermosphere is ultraviolet light and x-rays from the Sun. Geomagnetic activity contributes to the expansion. The process is powered by solar wind magnetic energy added to and stored in the Earth’s magnetosphere. The magnetotail is unstable and the energy is from time to time released in explosive events that generate electric currents in the thermosphere. These currents help heat the thermosphere.”
The spikes correlate to the Ap index spikes, which is well after the x-rays and UV peak from the preceding flares, e.g. the X-flares early March 2012.
“Energetic particles rained down on the upper atmosphere, depositing their energy where they hit.”:
http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2012/22mar_saber/
Ulric Lyons says:
June 12, 2013 at 7:59 am
“Energetic particles rained down on the upper atmosphere, depositing their energy where they hit.”:
Which has nothing to do with solar wind velocity or temperature.
Leif Svalgaard says:
June 11, 2013 at 11:11 am
“My prediction still stands at 70, but the final result will probably be a bit lower because of the Livingston&Penn effect, but it is hard to judge what the trend is, compare with cycle 14:”
Just out of interest, with your suggestion to use cycle 14 as a comparison, Last night I plotted Jupiters distance from Earth derived from ephemerides DE 102 1875-2040 and added it to the Greenwich monthly sunspot area record 1875-2012, to look at the timing and periodicity between Solar cycle 14 and our current cycle.
The orbital periodicity between Jupiters distance from Earth and the current cycle 24 does appear to correlate with Cycle 14, I’ve also added a 24 month trend line, and there seems to be an interesting timing relationship. If the timing relationship does exists between the the suns magnetic cycles of activity and the timing of the solar-systems orbiting bodies, possibly as an artifact left over from the formation of the solar-system as the planets and sun both formed together, it should be possible to build a tool from the ephemerides data to help us accurately calculate the start of a solar cycle and the length of it and when it will end.
As for the modulation of a solar cycle (how active it will be) I have a very interesting resonance model that I’ve been trying to understand better, which has an interesting modulation and equal timing relationship to that of the sunspot record.
Greenwich monthly sunspot area record 1875-2040. Jupiters distance from Earth derived from ephemerides DE 102. 1
http://thetempestspark.files.wordpress.com/2013/06/sunspot_area_1875-2040-ephemerides-de-102-ej-dist-low.jpg
Greenwich monthly sunspot area record 1875-2040. Jupiters distance from Earth derived from ephemerides DE 102. 2
http://thetempestspark.files.wordpress.com/2013/06/sunspot_area_1875-2040-ephemerides-de-102-ej-dist-hi.jpg
Greenwich monthly sunspot number record 1749-2040. Ephemerides DE 102.
http://thetempestspark.files.wordpress.com/2013/06/sunspot-number-ephemerides-de-102.jpg
Leif Svalgaard says:
“Which has nothing to do with solar wind velocity or temperature.”
The CME early March 2012 caused the rapid heating of the thermosphere, not UV and x-rays as you claim. Now you’re tying to tell me that this has “nothing to do with solar wind”? Pull the other one it’s got bells on.
Ulric Lyons says:
June 14, 2013 at 12:58 pm
The CME early March 2012 caused the rapid heating of the thermosphere, not UV and x-rays as you claim.
The major heating agents are UV and X-rays. Occasionally a CME has a strong magnetic field which causes electric currents in the magnetosphere and thermosphere. This combined with a strong flow pressure [density spike] caused the heating. You can see the evolution of the solar wind around that time here
http://hirweb.nict.go.jp/sedoss/solact3/do?d=2012%2c02%2c09
http://hirweb.nict.go.jp/sedoss/solact3/do?d=2012%2c03%2c07
Note how the Kp index at the bottom follows the magnetic field spikes [orange curves]. It is the magnetic field and density spikes that are instrumental in geomagnetic activity and heating the thermosphere over and above what the UV and x-rays do.
Ulric Lyons says:
June 14, 2013 at 12:58 pm
Pull the other one it’s got bells on.
You might enjoy this very educational link:
http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2010/15jul_thermosphere/
Ulric Lyons says:
June 14, 2013 at 12:58 pm
Pull the other one it’s got bells on.
A good measure of thermospheric heating is the density at 400 km altitude [where many satellites orbit]. Here is a plot [upper panel] of the density compared to the solar wind speed [lower panel]. Note how poor the correlation is: http://www.leif.org/research/Thermospheric-Density-Solar-Wind-Speed.png
Leif Svalgaard says:
“The major heating agents are UV and X-rays. [..] It is the magnetic field and density spikes that are instrumental in geomagnetic activity and heating the thermosphere over and above what the UV and x-rays do.”
The density spike was on the 7th, yet the main heating event according to SABER was the 10-14th:
http://snag.gy/J9DC5.jpg
“You might enjoy this very educational link:”
I did thanks:
“According to Emmert and colleagues, low solar EUV accounts for about 30% of the collapse. Extra CO2 accounts for at least another 10%. That leaves as much as 60% unaccounted for.”
That would be the dearth of coronal holes and slow plasma from late 2008.
Does the CO2 and NO in the thermosphere have absorption bands for UV and X-rays?
Ulric Lyons says:
June 14, 2013 at 2:25 pm
Correction:
The density spike was on the 7th, yet the main heating event according to SABER was the 8th-10th:
http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2012/22mar_saber/
http://snag.gy/J9DC5.jpg
Leif Svalgaard says:
“A good measure of thermospheric heating is the density at 400 km altitude..”
So how are these plots created?:
http://science.nasa.gov/media/medialibrary/2012/03/22/both_spikes.jpg
Ulric Lyons says:
June 14, 2013 at 2:25 pm
The density spike was on the 7th, yet the main heating event according to SABER was the 10-14th
The were significant magnetic field spikes on the 8th and 12th, and a density spike on the 11th-12th when solar wind speed was low.
You are really twisting and turning here. You should know that looking at a single cherry-picked event without having a precise quantitative theory helping to interpret the data is next to meaningless.
“That leaves as much as 60% unaccounted for.”
That would be the dearth of coronal holes and slow plasma from late 2008.
No, what it means is that the models [dating back to the 1970s] that should account for the difference needs to be revised or recalibrated. You quote very selectively from Emmert, and ignored his poignant comment: “There’s more to it than just solar EUV and terrestrial CO2. For instance, trends in global climate could alter the composition of the thermosphere, changing its thermal properties and the way it responds to external stimuli. The overall sensitivity of the thermosphere to solar radiation could actually be increasing. The density anomalies,” they wrote, “may signify that an as-yet-unidentified climatological tipping point involving energy balance and chemistry feedbacks has been reached.”
Does the CO2 and NO in the thermosphere have absorption bands for UV and X-rays?
The main absorber is Oxygen.
Ulric Lyons says:
June 14, 2013 at 2:28 pm
So how are these plots created
measuring the radiation from those species.
Ulric Lyons says:
June 14, 2013 at 2:25 pm
yet the main heating event according to SABER was the 10-14th
Moving the goal posts also helps. According to SABER describing the plot you showed: “For the three day period, March 8th through 10th, the thermosphere absorbed 26 billion kWh of energy…”
Ulric Lyons says:
June 14, 2013 at 2:25 pm
“That leaves as much as 60% unaccounted for.”
That would be the dearth of coronal holes and slow plasma from late 2008.
Well, there were not any fewer CMEs than at the previous minimum in 1996-1997.
Leif Svalgaard says:
“You quote very selectively from Emmert, and ignored his poignant comment:”
It’s hard to imagine that explaining for the unaccounted 60%.
“Well, there were not any fewer CMEs than at the previous minimum in 1996-1997.”
Well the Ap index was much lower in 2008/9 than 1996/7.
Ulric Lyons says:
June 14, 2013 at 3:54 pm
“You quote very selectively from Emmert, and ignored his poignant comment:”
It’s hard to imagine that explaining for the unaccounted 60%.
Just shows how poor the model is. The model takes into account heating both from solar UV and X-ray and from geomagnetic activity.
“Well, there were not any fewer CMEs than at the previous minimum in 1996-1997.”
Well the Ap index was much lower in 2008/9 than 1996/7.
Because the solar wind magnetic field was lower.
You really has to come off your misconception that the solar wind speed/temperature is the driving force. Try to find something else to correlate with.
Ulric Lyons says:
June 14, 2013 at 2:25 pm
“That leaves as much as 60% unaccounted for.”
That would be the dearth of coronal holes and slow plasma from late 2008.
A careful analysis of the 2008/9 minimum with an updated model http://ihy.boulder.swri.edu/IAUWG/WEBPAGES/PAPERS/solomon.pdf
concludes “Measurements from instruments on the SOHO and TIMED spacecraft, and by suborbital rocket flights, indicate that solar extreme-ultraviolet irradiance levels were lower than they were during the previous solar minimum. Analysis of atmospheric drag on satellite orbits indicate that the thermosphere was lower in density, and therefore cooler than at any time since the beginning of the space age. However, secular change due to increasing levels of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases, which cool the upper atmosphere, also plays a role in thermospheric climate. Simulations by the NCAR Thermosphere-Ionosphere-Electrodynamics General Circulation Model are compared to thermospheric density measurements, yielding evidence that the primary cause of the low thermospheric density was the unusually low level of solar extremeultraviolet irradiance”
That should go a long towards settling your problem.
Ulric Lyons says:
June 14, 2013 at 2:25 pm
That would be the dearth of coronal holes and slow plasma from late 2008.No, as
Solomon et al. note “Solar EUV images indicate lower radiance from areas of “open” solar magnetic field known as coronal holes. Low-latitude coronal holes were particularly prevalent during the declining phase of solar cycle 23 and the minimum of cycle 23/24, which could offer an explanation for the lower EUV irradiance”..
Leif Svalgaard says:
“That should go a long towards settling your problem.”
It actually highlights the problem. Yes there were many trans-equatorial coronal holes during the weak period of solar activity in question, but you and I both know, as I remember you remarking upon it too, that the numbers of coronal holes were well down from late 2008 to early 2010. So we lose a bit of EUV because of low latitude CH’s, and then claw back a bit, because there were less holes, and many were very small, so it doesn’t really add up.
http://heliophysics.nasa.gov/SolarMinimum24/papers/Solomon2011.pdf
http://ccar.colorado.edu/muri/SolomonEtAlGrl2010.pdf