Guest essay by David Archibald
Recently, a number of newspaper articles spoke of the potential of cycle 25 to be “Weakest Solar Cycle In Almost 200 Years”. “We’re in a new age of solar physics,” said David Hathaway of NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama.
Here is a collection of solar measurements that illustrate the current state of cycle 24, as well as provide insight into cycle 25.
Figure 1: Oulu Neutron Count 1964 – 2013
This graph suggests that it may be a further six months or more to solar cycle maximum. Neutron count tends to follow the solar cycle with up to a one year lag so it may be another 18 months before we get to the minimum neutron count for Solar Cycle 24.
Figure 2: Oulu Neutron Count for Solar Cycles 20 to 24 aligned on month of minimum
In terms of neutron count, Solar Cycle 24 isn’t much weaker than the previous four cycles at a similar stage of development.
Figure 3: Ap Index 1932 – 2013
The Ap Planetary Magnetic Index has now spent the last couple of years below the levels of previous solar cycle minima, including an all-time record low for the data set.
Figure 4: Heliospheric Current Sheet Tilt Angle
Solar minimum is marked by the flattening of the heliospheric current sheet tilt angle. This tends to be quite sharp. Solar maxima are a lot broader with the current maximum the broadest of the instrument record. There is no indication yet from this measure that solar maximum is over.
Figure 5: Monthly F10.7 Flux 1948 – 2013
The F10.7 flux shows that Solar Cycle 24 is quite a weak cycle relative to the ones that have preceded it in the instrumental record.
Figure 6: F10.7 Flux of Solar Cycles 19 to 24 aligned on month of minimum
In terms of F10.7 flux, Solar Cycle 24 peaked two years ago. The relationship between F10.7 flux and sea level rise indicates that a flux of 100 is the break-over between climate warming and cooling. The flux level has been at about that value for the last three years.
Figure 7: Interplanetary Magnetic Field 1966 – 2013
The 1970s cooling period had a weak and flat interplanetary magnetic field over Solar Cycle 20. Solar Cycle 24 could produce a similar result with a slightly lower average value over the cycle.
Figure 8: Solar Cycle 24 sunspot count relative to the Dalton Minimum
All things considered, the current solar cycle is tracking Solar Cycle 5, the first half of the Dalton Minimum, fairly closely.
Figure 9: Predicting the year of maximum of Solar Cycle 25
Just over two years ago, Richard Altrock of the National Solar Observatory at Sacramento Peak published the latest version of his green corona emissions diagram.
He stated at the time that the progression of the Solar Cycle 24 was 40% slower than the average of the previous two cycles. That would make it 15.5 years long. Given that the cycle started in December 2008 and solar maximum is in 2013, that makes the Solar Cycle 24 fall time 11.5 years.
Figure 9 shows the strong relationship between fall time and the time from maximum to maximum. Based on that relationship, the Solar Cycle 24 fall time derives a period of 17 years from the Solar Cycle 24 maximum to the Solar Cycle 25 maximum – putting it in 2030.
Jtom says:
July 28, 2013 at 3:11 pm
I would put my money on Dr. Svalgaard’s approach from this snapshot we have seen, but I suspect even he would be surprised if he has indeed ‘nailed down’ a theory that would yield accurate predictions of solar cycles in the future
The problem is not to have understood ‘all the possible processes and variability’, but to have isolated the critical parameter [if one exists] that controls the cycle. Long time ago I and colleagues suggested on basis of the then understanding of the so-called Babcock-Leighton dynamo model that the magnitude of the polar fields of the Sun at the end of a cycle [before significant spots from the new cycle appear] would be that critical parameter and as such could serve as a precursor for the magnitude of the next cycle. The idea being that the polar fields would be dragged into the Sun and there be the ‘raw material’ for creating the next cycle. Model calculations seem to support the idea [even though they are primitive]. Ever since, the polar field precursor method has worked well for all cycles 20-24, so our confidence is strong that it will continue to do so. If not, we’ll learn something new [I almost wish the method would fail – as I’m always interested in learning something new]. For example, would it still work if we enter a Maunder Minimum? But so far, it does seem that we have a method that works.
Further to my comment July 28, 2013 at 10:28 am
re ocean temperatures remaining stable or rising while northern continental interiors cool, the current UNISYS sea surface temperature anomalies in the northern oceans are positive, whereas those south of the equator are more or less neutral.
http://weather.unisys.com/surface/sfc_daily.php?plot=ssa&inv=0&t=cur
I’m not saying this proves anything, but it is interesting.
Leif Svalgaard says:
July 28, 2013 at 2:58 pm
vukcevic says:
July 28, 2013 at 2:32 pm
Dr.S recommended to me this time scale breakdown
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/SSN-Vfspec.htm
Kinda takes the wind out of the sails for the astrological cycle theories
………………
Yep, but Eugene Parker left us a beautiful legacy
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/ParkerSpiral.htm
that explains it all.
So they can be sure to stick that in their GCMs and couple it.
Along with MC and Proctor I also would like to thank Mr. Archibald for this and prior contributions.
I would note in passing that our nearby 3000 acre lake is 4 degrees cooler this year than last.
Boys and girls, there’s little money to be made in all this solar prognostication. On reading the comments, however, it occurs to me that a bundle could be made on a sequel to Dale Carnegie’s “How to Win Friends and Influence People”. The new version would be authored by Leif “Lightnin’ Rod” Svalgaard. Who could resist buying a copy?
vukcevic says:
July 28, 2013 at 3:35 pm
Yep, but Eugene Parker left us a beautiful legacy
that explains it all.
No, that is complete nonsense. No electric or magnetic influence can travel upstream in the 11 times supersonic solar wind, apart from the fact that the magnetospheres of Jupiter and Saturn are much too tiny to have any effect. They take up about a millionth of the sky seen from the Sun. If they had significant influence on the Sun, we would sense that when the Earth is on the ‘line of influence’. Nobody has observed that.
Claude Harvey says:
July 28, 2013 at 3:47 pm
Boys and girls, there’s little money to be made in all this solar prognostication.
Actually there are many billions of dollars riding on this
Vukcevic: one hundred billion tonnes or more of oil in the Arctic…..that’s three years or more world supply at current rates of consumption….just a perspective on risks versus benefits.
Leif Svalgaard says:
July 28, 2013 at 3:56 pm
“Actually there are many billions of dollars riding on this”
======
On what ?, the predictions ?
The guesses are all over the board, some better than others admittedly, why throw the billions back in our faces ?
This is a great thread and is a debate that must be brought out to the public in general. I have been telling colleagues and environmental industry professionals for several years to look at the sun (with dark glasses of course) and have written articles published in my industry newsletter in regard to the predictions of Abdussamatov about the decline in solar activity. But please why did Archibald use as his first graph the one from the Mail on Sunday with all its inaccuracies? Apart from the ridiculously low prediction of Cycle 25, the most glaring error is the labeling of “End of Little Ice Age’ in 1899. This was the Little “Victorian” Ice Age – rather than the Little Ice Age which correlated with the Maunder Minimum not 1899, and the perpetuation of this labeling by those who know better does not help the general public to understand the arguments.
MC says:
July 28, 2013 at 9:47 am
Dear MC, thankyou for your kind words. I have dystopian visions in other fields of inquiry as well, all collected in a book that has been written but is not due out until 24th March, 2014:
http://www.amazon.com/The-Twilight-Abundance-Century-Brutish/dp/1621571580
“The Twilight of Abundance” can be ordered now.
All evidence points to the sun itself providing a consistent amount of energy to the Earth. If we accept this as true then the changes we see on Earth are due to changes in Earth systems. We already know that volcanoes appear to cool the surface by reflecting sunlight. It is clearly possible this might be the biggest factor in changes over an interglacial.
A series of strong volcanic eruptions cools the Earth leading to a cool period like the LIA and then as the dust settles so to speak, the Earth warms back up to its equilibrium temperature. As far as I can tell nothing else is required to explain changes over the last 10K years.
Not saying this is the case, but maybe we’ve been trying to make this more complicated than required …. Occam’s Razor and all that.
Richard, the Sun provides not merely energy, but varying degrees of protection from cosmic rays, influences on the magnetic fields that surround the Earth, and of course the changing solar wind.
It’s not such a simple system
Doug Proctor says:
July 28, 2013 at 10:59 am
Thankyou for your kind words. Hathaway’s mistake was to presume that 24 would be strong simply because the previous two cycles were strong. He guessed a number just under Dikpati. In fact, given that Dikpati was NASA’s golden child at the time, he wouldn’t have been allowed to have a prediction that diverged too much from hers or otherwise it would have lessened the credibility of Dikpati’s forecast. Schatten makes a living from predicting solar activity and in 2006 said that solar activity looked like falling to Maunder levels. Anyone in this field should have asked themselves what was the basis for Schatten’s prediction. My advice to anyone who wants to predict solar activity is to go to Ed Fix’s model and continue its development. The amplitude we are seeing in Solar Cycle 24 is the leftover momentum in the system.
Agreed that the Earth climate system is the warmest its been for a thousand years. The linear relationship shown is machine-generated. To not use the machine-derived line would introduce subjectivity. It is fabulous that we can predict the year of Solar Cycle 25 maximum. That prediction is derived from Altrock’s green corona emissions diagram, now over two years old. He’s up on Sacramento Peak, updating it, but hasn’t released it again. Solar maximum has occurred 15 months after “the rush to the poles” is completed. So Altrock knows the month of maximum. Solar maximum is also when the new cycle is initiated. That’s right now. If there is no or very little activity evident from the plot, that means that Solar Cycle 25 will be next to non-existent. All very important stuff. But Altrock can’t release his diagram again while there is a war on coal underway.
Patrick says:
July 28, 2013 at 7:46 am
Leif says…(paraphrasing) “Nothing the sun does affects the climate on Earth”. Well, he’s wrong.
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I’ve not reached that conclusion after reading Dr. Svalgaard for years. Your distillation of Dr. Svalgaard’s message is very clear, but where is the data to support your conjecture that the sun (operating within observed parameters) does affect our climate in any meaningful way?
David Archibald, nasty and brutish maybe (just like all the previous ones then) but why will the 21st Century be short? Is the coming collapse in solar activity going to cause a time distortion?
Melbourne Resident says:
July 28, 2013 at 4:23 pm
The Sunday Mail generated that graphic from a graph I produced a couple of years ago here on WUWT. It is part of Anthony’s introduction to the post and I thank him for it. I am too modest to have used it myself. I think the graph is correct in all aspects including its predictions. The Solar Cycle 25 forecast of 7 is from Livingstone and Penn. No one else has made a prediction of the amplitude of that cycle yet.
PJF says:
July 28, 2013 at 5:13 pm
Well said. The publisher has been alerted to the fact that the full title they have chosen suggests that a century can be a lesser interval than 100 years.
Dr. Svalgaard:
“Climate scientists” tried to get rid of the Medieval Warm Period. Can you understand how skeptics might be suspicious of an attempt now by solar scientists to get rid of the Modern Solar Grand Maximum?
Counting sun spot group numbers rather than sun spots has seemed to me to worsen not help solve the problem the procedure was meant to address. But coming at this point in the history of science, changing the system is naturally going to arouse suspicions, IMO. While you & your colleagues may well indeed be trying to advance science in an area where much depends upon good predictions, proposals for enforcing among solar scientists uniform acceptance of whatever new orthodox system emerges sounds troubling.
This effort also comes after discovery in the past decade from the SORCE program that there is short term variation in the UV part of the solar spectral array. I’ve learned that this primarily occurs in the UV-C band & progressively less so in the more abundant UV-B & UV-A. There are nevertheless possible climatological implications for this discovery, especially when considering man-made & natural (not that humans are unnatural) effects on ozone.
I am convinced by your statement that you & your colleagues have not been influenced in any way by the gaseous gate-keepers of climatological orthodoxy, but are simply interested in improving understanding of the sun as a not very variable star in both long & short terms. However I have for instance noted that the Stanford Linear Accelerator Web site has taken down the IMO good material it had on solar magnetic field modulation of cosmic rays & the possible effect such fluxes could have on cloud formation. With the CACCA Empire striking back against rebels throughout the system, I hope you can forgive some cynicism as to scientists’ motives.
Thank you for your continued commenting here. I wish that more of your colleagues in relevant fields shared your courage. patience & desire to educate. I hope that you too feel that at times you’ve gained something from participating in discussions here.
Leif,
Referring to the observation that El Nino seemed to coincide with quick rise in the Current Sheet Tilt Angle, e.g.
Richard M says:
July 28, 2013 at 7:11 am
It does seem on quick examination that there may be correlation between El Nino occurrence and Current Sheet Tilt Angles in the Middle of the Tilt Angle range. Has this been investigated?
If there were such a relationship, increased frequency of El Nino would correspond to cycles which (for whatever reasons cause this) had a preponderance of fluctuations of tilt angle in the mid range. And shorter cycles would necessarily lead to increased frequency due to quick rise and fall of the angle.
And If there is such a relationship, it suggests periods of warming are not related to length of cycle per se, but the preponderance of fluctuations in the mid range.
(greater frequency of el Nino – tendency to warming)
If longer cycles were less likely to produce this range of tilt angle -might this mean greater frequency of La Nina, period of cooling?
Have you looked at this?
Leif Svalgaard says:
July 28, 2013 at 6:53 am
I gleefully laugh at mine just about every time he comes on. Then I switch to the weather guy in the next city since he seems to be more pragmatic and less stuck on himself.
David, the title of your book is an allusion to the famous quote by Thomas Hobbes, describing the ‘natural state of mankind’ (if there were no governments to rule mankind).
“And the life of man, solitary, poore, nasty, brutish, and short.” -Leviathan, Thomas Hobbes, 1651, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Hobbes
The Russians are building icebreakers because they have studied paleo climatology and are aware unlike a certain solar scientist that during a transitional period toward cooling, some areas of the Arctic do get warmer as a result of renewed warm air advections caused by more powerful polar air masses reaching deeper southward (see Svalbard islands before the last glaciation). Kinnard showed indeed that Arctic sea ice extent during the LIA was reduced in some places.
Cycle 24 is closest to cycles 12 & 14 when I plotted them recently, Too high for 5.
So no Dalton Min yet…Why does cycle 25 appear so low on Davids diagram prediction. What are the reasons behind that very low cycle 25 prediction, Lief nof anyone?