From the University of Edinburgh , another one-paper syndrome in the making funded by an NGO research council with a political mission to grab a headline. And, another poorly written press release where they don’t even cite the name of paper. Sigh.
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Climate change has not been strongly influenced by variations in heat from the sun, a new scientific study shows
Climate change has not been strongly influenced by variations in heat from the sun, a new scientific study shows.
The findings overturn a widely held scientific view that lengthy periods of warm and cold weather in the past might have been caused by periodic fluctuations in solar activity.
Research examining the causes of climate change in the northern hemisphere over the past 1000 years has shown that until the year 1800, the key driver of periodic changes in climate was volcanic eruptions. These tend to prevent sunlight reaching the Earth, causing cool, drier weather. Since 1900, greenhouse gases have been the primary cause of climate change.
The findings show that periods of low sun activity should not be expected to have a large impact on temperatures on Earth, and are expected to improve scientists’ understanding and help climate forecasting.
Scientists at the University of Edinburgh carried out the study using records of past temperatures constructed with data from tree rings and other historical sources. They compared this data record with computer-based models of past climate, featuring both significant and minor changes in the sun.
They found that their model of weak changes in the sun gave the best correlation with temperature records, indicating that solar activity has had a minimal impact on temperature in the past millennium.
The study, published in Nature GeoScience, was supported by the Natural Environment Research Council.
Dr Andrew Schurer, of the University of Edinburgh’s School of GeoSciences, said: “Until now, the influence of the sun on past climate has been poorly understood. We hope that our new discoveries will help improve our understanding of how temperatures have changed over the past few centuries, and improve predictions for how they might develop in future. Links between the sun and anomalously cold winters in the UK are still being explored.”
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I’m not so sure this fellow is fully versed on climatology. His papers up to 2011 were all about cosmology, then all of the sudden he starts publishing on climatology issues. One wonders if his previous funding dried up to make such a dramatic shift in study. Then there is: “…climatic fingerprints of high and low solar forcing derived from model simulations…”. IPCC Models haven’t been able to reproduce the last ten years; what makes them think they are worth anything 100-200 years ago?
Here is the abstract: http://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/ngeo2040.html
Small influence of solar variability on climate over the past millennium
- Nature Geoscience (2013) doi:10.1038/ngeo2040
- Received 02 August 2013 Accepted 14 November 2013 Published online 22 December 2013
The climate of the past millennium was marked by substantial decadal and centennial scale variability in the Northern Hemisphere1. Low solar activity has been linked to cooling during the Little Ice Age (AD 1450–1850; ref. 1) and there may have been solar forcing of regional warmth during the Medieval Climate Anomaly2, 3, 4, 5 (AD 950–1250; ref. 1). The amplitude of the associated changes is, however, poorly constrained5, 6, with estimates of solar forcing spanning almost an order of magnitude7, 8, 9. Numerical simulations tentatively indicate that a small amplitude best agrees with available temperature reconstructions10, 11, 12, 13. Here we compare the climatic fingerprints of high and low solar forcing derived from model simulations with an ensemble of surface air temperature reconstructions14 for the past millennium. Our methodology15 also accounts for internal climate variability and other external drivers such as volcanic eruptions, as well as uncertainties in the proxy reconstructions and model output. We find that neither a high magnitude of solar forcing nor a strong climate effect of that forcing agree with the temperature reconstructions. We instead conclude that solar forcing probably had a minor effect on Northern Hemisphere climate over the past 1,000 years, while, volcanic eruptions and changes in greenhouse gas concentrations seem to be the most important influence over this period.
Figure 1: Simulations and temperature reconstructions.
a, Simulations with all forcings (red and green) compared with a reconstruction ensemble14 (blue), and instrumental HadCRUT4 (ref. 24) time series (centred on the average reconstruction over time of overlap, black).
The SI is here: http://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/vaop/ncurrent/extref/ngeo2040-s1.pdf
h/t to Dr. Leif Svalgaard
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Not a good start to a career in science. At least he likely won’t need to wait very long to see himself proven wrong.
nevket240 says:
December 25, 2013 at 6:11 pm
((Dr Andrew Schurer, of the University of Edinburgh’s School of GeoSciences, said: “Until now, the influence of the sun on past climate has been poorly understood))
and this clown calls himself a Doctor?? if the influence is so POORLY understood, why the high confidence in CO2?? Heellooooo!!!
Regards
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Did you not notice the word “past”. Past as in hundreds of millions of years.
We know within 10th’s of a percent what energy the Sun is kicking out now and what the variation in the solar cycle is (~0.2%).
And it’s not responsible for the warming during industrial times.
Bob Weber says:
December 25, 2013 at 8:14 am
Carla thanx for being part of the paradigm shift. Svensmark looks better every day. Get a clue you darned real climate deniers: its photons, protons, and electrons – not carbon dioxide – that have the controlling influence over weather and climate metrics.
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I beg to differ Bob.
Svensmark’s theory has been found by CERN to be orders of mangitude below the necessary to create hydrophilic neuclei.
And the power contained in CR, (not photons – as they are the vast majority of the Suns output), and electrons, are again orders of magnitude below the total output received by the earth’s atmosphere. And that always supposing they get through to the Troposphere.
It is accepted that an effect is likely for CR but they are galactic not Solar and serve only to stir the atmosphere a bit from the stratosphere. There is no extra energy added to the system.
http://arxiv.org/pdf/1308.5067.pdf
It is clear that the new results from CLOUD relating to aerosols 265 indicate that although
there could be a CR, Climate correlation by way of nucleation of aerosols, in the lower
troposphere it should be very small indeed (a consequence of the ‘high’ temperatures
there). All pervading in the aerosol arguments, however, is the uncertain removal
mechanisms which interpose themselves between the ultrafine condensation nuclei and
embryos, all less than about 2nm in diameter (UCN,CN) and the condensation nuclei
of 100nm and beyond (CCN,CD) stages ( see §1 ). In this context, Pierce and Adams
(2009) quote loss factor ( for CN to CCN ) between 10 and 20 in the best case. New
CLOUD studies are relating to the effect of aerosols other than those of H2SO4 and
ammonia which may be important in the atmosphere.
The fact that the CR intensity is rising again strongly militates further against a
CR/Global Warming connection (in the absence of unphysically long phase lags).
There are other arguments against a CR/Climate correlation, not referred to above.
These include a lack of atmospheric changes following nuclear explosions, nuclear ac279
cidents and natural radon variations (Erlykin et al., 2009a) and the non-observation
of correlations for the type of cloud that should be responsive (if anything is) to CR
ionization changes (Erlykin et al., 2009c).
http://iopscience.iop.org/1748-9326/8/4/045022/article
“Numerous searches have been made to try establish whether or not cosmic rays could have affected the climate, either through cloud formation or otherwise. We have one possible hint of a correlation between solar activity and the mean global surface temperature. This is comprised of an oscillation in the temperature of amplitude ±0.07° in amplitude with a 22 year period. The cosmic ray data show a similar oscillation but delayed by 1–2 years. The long term change in the cosmic ray rate is less than the amplitude of the 22 year variation on the cosmic ray rate. Using the changing cosmic ray rate as a proxy for solar activity, this result implies that less than 14% of global warming seen since the 1950s comes from changes in solar activity. Several other tests have been described and their results all indicate that the contribution of changing solar activity either through cosmic rays or otherwise cannot have contributed more than 10% of the global warming seen in the twentieth century.
We conclude that cosmic rays and solar activity which we have examined here, in some depth, therefore cannot be a very significant underestimated contributor to the global warming seen in the twentieth century.”
Bob Weber says:
December 25, 2013 at 8:14 am
Carla thanx for being part of the paradigm shift. Svensmark looks better every day. Get a clue you darned real climate deniers: its photons, protons, and electrons – not carbon dioxide – that have the controlling influence over weather and climate metrics.
——
Just a hobby for me..
Svensmark has a part of the puzzle. Like carbon dioxide is a part of the atmospheric puzzle.
Another puzzle is the current N. Hemisphere phenomenon, with the western hemi major portion of the U.S. having the frigid arctic blasts looming and hanging out since the beginning of Dec. Whilst the eastern hemi Russian area is experiencing above normal temps for Nov and Dec. Is this a stationary condition or just slow moving. Or is it that over the solar cycle the LOD changes. And because of the ongoing low amplitude of solar cycle 24, polar atmospheric circulation is still undergoing its change phase. The equatorial rotation is speeding up and the polar rotation is undergoing its rotation changes at a different rate and affecting polar circulation patterns. With stronger rotation at the equator perhaps driving stronger atmospheric uplifting of winds. Or maybe not.
But LOD in an extended solar cycle minimum period will be different. Weaker interplanetary magnetic field, weaker flares and CMEs, slower avg solar wind speed means less resistance to Earth in the course of its orbit about the sun and Earth rotates faster, with less resistance..
To add to your list of photons, protons and electrons,
ENA O H He Ne C and dust in the Interstellar wind.. ACR, GCR and Solar CR. The Van Allen Belts should be fun in the ongoing debate on climate change.
When I saw the headline I was instantly trying to figure out on WHAT grounds the evidence for the sun effecting climate as being minor was to be eliminated?
I mean “how” did they do this trick?
I was GOB smacked to learn their LACK of relationship to the sun is based NOT on the sun’s actual output and climate but a computer model. Folks, exactly how stupid can we get?
No wonder there no links to the original paper with data.
Here is a video that explains and shows a strong relationship between sun’s output and climate:
Funding and participants include Government of British Columbia, McMaster University, Carleton University, Queens University, Canadian Foundation for Climate and Atmosphere sciences (CFCAS), Ottawa-Carleton Geosciences center, University of Victoria, and
several more I failed to list.
The really funny part is the government is already using the above information to explain and manage why fishery stocks change.
In other words the above information is already being put to good practical use. This study is not the first nor the last in a long line studies that shows correlation between temperature changes and changes in the suns output.
Changes in the suns output are very important in this data. This sounds like one of those “hide the decline” kind of papers – something that not based on much if anything at all.