Guest essay by David Archibald
There were two papers published in 2013 that, when considered together, paint a bleak picture of North American climate and agriculture for the rest of the century and beyond. Firstly from the abstract of “Multidecadal to multi-century scale collapses of Northern Hemisphere monsoons over the past millennium”1 by Asmerom et al.:
“Late Holocene climate in western North America was punctuated by periods of extended aridity called megadroughts.” And “Several megadroughts are evident, including a multicentury one, AD 1350–1650, herein referred to as Super Drought, which corresponds to the coldest period of the Little Ice Age. Synchronicity between southwestern North American, Chinese, and West African monsoon precipitation suggests the megadroughts were hemispheric in scale. Northern Hemisphere monsoon strength over the last millennium is positively correlated with Northern Hemisphere temperature and North Atlantic SST.” And “the megadroughts, including the Super Drought, coincide with solar insolation minima, suggesting that solar forcing of sea surface and atmospheric temperatures may generate variations in the strength of Northern Hemisphere monsoons.”
So droughts in North America are coincident with solar insolation minima. We already know of the cause and effect relationship between solar cycle minima and East African rainfall. West African drought has been found to be linked to Atlantic sea surface temperatures2.
With that knowledge, all we need to predict the timing of the next megadrought in North America is a long term solar activity forecast. That was also provided in 2013 by Steinhilber and Beer3. They predict a deep low in solar activity starting straight away and continuing for 150 years. This is Figure 4 from that paper:
Figure 4 from Steinhilber and Beer – Prediction of solar activity on the left axis and total solar irradiance on the right axis. M, D and G refer to the Maunder, Dalton and Gleissberg minima respectively. The lighter grey band is based on FFT (fast Fourier transformation) and the darker grey band is based on WTAR (wavelet decomposition using autoregression). As the paper demonstrates, amplitudes of solar activity are better predicted by the FFT method than by the WTAR method.
In effect, Figure 4 predicts a megadrought for North America from at least 2050 to 2200. Generations of people will experience what a Dalton Minimum is like, all their lives. In the meantime it will get colder and drier. In terms of the effect on agricultural productivity, productivity of corn production in the Corn Belt falls by 10% for each 1°C fall in annual average temperature. The Corn Belt also moves south by 144 km for each 1°C fall in annual average temperature. Soil quality declines to the south of the Corn Belt though so farms won’t be as productive. For example, one hundred years ago Alabama had four million acres planted to cotton. Today only 1.3 million acres are devoted to all agricultural crops. Unable to compete with the Corn Belt as it is now, a lot of acreage in Alabama has reverted to pasture and woodland.
A fall in annual average temperature of 2.0°C might decrease production by 20% and the southward move to poorer soils might decrease production by 10% (purely a guess, but I do have a botany major). What drought might do on top of all that is a 30% fall for a total decrease in production in the range of 50% to 60%. Two big corne states, Illinois and Indiana, had corn production falls of 30% in the 2012 drought year:
The US could then feed 600 million vegetarians instead of the current 1.2 billion vegetarians. Food that we would want to eat will become expensive with wide price swings. That is what these two papers are saying about what the future holds for us.
David Archibald, a Visiting Fellow at the Institute of World Politics in Washington, D.C., is the author of Twilight of Abundance (Regnery, 2014).
References
- Asmerom, Y. et al., 2013, “Multidecadal to multi-century scale collapses of Northern Hemisphere monsoons over the past millennium” PNAS vol.110 no. 24 9651-9656
- Shanahan, T.M et al., 2009 “Atlantic Forcing of Persistent Drought in West Africa” Science, Vol. 324 no 5925 pp. 377-380
- Steinhilber, F. and Beer, J., 2013, “Prediction of solar activity for the next 500 years” Journal of Geophysical Research: Space Physics, vol. 118, 1-7
Leif I don’t see anything in Figs 3 or 4 to suggest that warming will continue for another hundred years. Common sense and the recent sharp decline in solar activity suggests that it is just at or a little past its maximum. I don’t see anything in Figs 3 or 4 to suggest that warming will continue.
As to conviction I say
” How confident should one be in these above predictions? The pattern method doesn’t lend itself easily to statistical measures. However statistical calculations only provide an apparent rigor for the uninitiated and in relation to the IPCC climate models are entirely misleading because they make no allowance for the structural uncertainties in the model set up.This is where scientific judgment comes in – some people are better at pattern recognition and meaningful correlation than others. A past record of successful forecasting such as indicated above is a useful but not infallible measure. In this case I am reasonably sure – say 65/35 for about 20 years ahead. Beyond that certainty drops rapidly. I am sure, however, that it will prove closer to reality than anything put out by the IPCC, Met Office or the NASA group. In any case this is a Bayesian type forecast- in that it can easily be amended on an ongoing basis as the Temperature and Solar data accumulate. If there is not a 0.15 – 0.20. drop in Global SSTs by 2018 -20 I would need to re-evaluate.”
Hardly “cyclomania”.
Is the temperature of the stratosphere and solar activity affects the climate, or not?
http://earth.nullschool.net/#current/wind/isobaric/250hPa/orthographic=-91.62,56.82,635
Dr Page says
If there is not a 0.15 – 0.20. drop in Global SSTs by 2018 -20 I would need to re-evaluate
Henry says
there is another problem
from 4 major global data sets it does look like we already dropped a little less than 0.1 from 2002
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1987/to:2015/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:2002/to:2015/trend/plot/hadcrut3gl/from:1987/to:2015/plot/hadcrut3gl/from:2002/to:2015/trend/plot/rss/from:1987/to:2015/plot/rss/from:2002/to:2015/trend/plot/hadsst2gl/from:1987/to:2015/plot/hadsst2gl/from:2002/to:2015/trend/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1987/to:2002/trend/plot/hadcrut3gl/from:1987/to:2002/trend/plot/hadsst2gl/from:1987/to:2002/trend/plot/rss/from:1987/to:2002/trend
However, my own data set (which has been artificially balanced) shows we already dropped 0.2
I am now busy updating that set, adding the last two years. So far, it seems to me the decline is continuing, even steeper, so we might end up more than -0.2 from 2000.
The point is: it looks to me they keep fiddling with the data, trying to hide the decline.
HenryP
So why scientists do not see? Approaching the solar minimum. Do you think that now the temperature rises? Solar activity will not increase.
It will be El Ninio? It will not be because the Pacific is cooled.
Doug Proctor says:
May 15, 2014 at 11:01 am
As far as I can tell, the first solar physicists to suggest that we are heading into a Maunder Minimum were Schatten and Tobiska in 2003. 2003 was the second peak of Solar Cycle 23. Nevertheless, they look ahead, sniffed the wind, and said Maunder. Why they felt compelled to say that and put the word Maunder in the title of their paper isn’t made completely clear in that paper. Perhaps they felt something in their waters, something unsettling, an uneasiness that necessitated a desire to put their thoughts to paper and warn the rest of us. They spoke once, and have been silent since. Others on their own efforts have subsequently attempted to untangle the solar record and derive a prediction from it. Thus Steinhilber and Beer, and from the tree rings, Libby and Pandolfi and the Finnish foresters. All are pointing down, steeply down from now. By the time of the CIA climate report in 1974, there was still a living memory of the colder years of the early 20th century, and an appreciation that humanity was in a special time of warmth and abundance. Now forty years on, the cold years that preceded the current warmth are less than a distant memory. Most think that this is the new normal. But the world wasn’t made for us to be comfortable. That we are comfortable now is only an accident of happenstance. In the absence of better quality forecasts, Maunder stands. Disregard the warnings of the wise ones at your peril.
Bonus prediction: 0.6 degrees C down by mid-2016, reversing most of the warming of the 20th century.
David Archibald says:
May 16, 2014 at 12:59 am
The first solar physicists to suggest that we are heading into a Maunder Minimum were Schatten and Tobiska in 2003.
They were not alone, the formula I written in the early 2003 with some relevant comments, I emailed to Dr. Joan Feynman (sister of RF) solar scientist at JPL.
Here is a brief extract from her reply:
Joan Feynman Jun 16, 2003
To vukcevic@……
…..
I would suggest that you write a draft paper on your work and discuss it in person with some local solar or space scientists. I’d suggest looking at the Journal “Solar Physics”.……
………..
Best of luck to you,
joan Feynman
Vukcevic
Here’s part of an earlier comment I made above addressed to Leif
“The 60 year temperature cycle is there. It is probably solar. You are better qualified to tease out the processes than I am – Get Busy!! Seek and ye shall find .You might start by looking at the
Saturn /Jupiter lap cycle of 19.589 X 3 = 59.577
Of course such an heretical suggestion is probably unlikely to arouse your interest I just put it out there to stir the pot a bit.”
Any Thoughts?
Mr. Archibald.
I’m confused about your recent post –David Archibald says: May 16, 2014 at 12:59 am–
It starts with:
Doug Proctor says:
May 15, 2014 at 11:01 am
But none of the rest is from the Proctor post with that time stamp. It looks like you may have accidentally(?) put a lot of words in his mouth.
And it concludes with predicting a very sharp cooling before 2016 – with no physical basis for that unrealistic assumption. Do you have Mt. Pinatubo loaded and ready? That’s what it would take.
Your first answer to my questioning your reversing the conclusion of the Steinhilber/Beer paper was to launch a personal attack on someone you incorrectly guessed was me. (see May 14, 2014 at 9:13 pm)
Then you provided links to a paper that makes very short-term claims (just the remainder of this solar cycle) over a very small area (4 weather stations in Svalbard).
In either case, I still feel that the compelling evidence is, as quoted from the Steinhilber and Beer paper you used as the basis for your essay: “As a consequence, the increase of global warming will be slightly attenuated until 2100 A.D. However, the subsequent increase in solar activity will further enhance the global warming.”
At this point I agree with what Doug Proctor said May 14, 2014 at 9:02 am
“I find Archibald’s thesis alarmist and better for sales of his book than for planning”
b fagan says:
And it concludes with predicting a very sharp cooling before 2016 – with no physical basis for that unrealistic assumption. Do you have Mt. Pinatubo loaded and ready? That’s what it would take.
Is the temperature of the oceans are the physical basis or not?
http://weather.unisys.com/surface/sst_anom.gif
I have a basic question about the solar dynamo and formation of sunspots.
over the course of a solar cycle, the sunspots are formed (in theory) due to differential rotation between the polar regions and the.suns equator, here is a standard representation of the process below.
http://www.astro-photography.net/images/figure%201-660.jpg
Why is it that sunspots always appear at the polar regions at the beginning of a solar cycle and gradually move towards the suns equator while increasing in number, and then continue to recede back towards the polar regions again?
Looking at various differential rotation models like the one above, they suggest that sun spots should form at the equator and move towards the polar regions while decreasing in strength along the way.
If we model how this differential rotation should behave, the faster moving equator should always cause a ripple of sunspots from the inside out or from the equator to the polar regions. But this is not what is being observed, Why?
@sparks
My theory is that it is not really the sunspots that are important if you want to know what it is going on. Just keep an eye on the strengths of the magnetic fields of the sun.
http://ice-period.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/sun2013.png
As the fields become weaker, more energetic particles are able to escape. Generally this means a “hotter sun”. For some reason (I believe it is intelligent design) earth has molecules in the upper atmosphere that react with these more energetic particles, causing more ozone, peroxides and nitrogenous oxides to be formed. In turn, (more of) these compounds deflect more sunlight to space, protecting us from certain death. So a “hotter” sun causes a “cooler” earth.
Hence the reason why we are (globally) cooling
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/05/14/studies-weaker-solar-activity-means-colder-and-colder-also-means-drier/#comment-1637756
Dr Norman Page says:
May 16, 2014 at 7:29 am
Yeah, I’ve got thoughts on that suggestion … but I suspect you don’t want to hear them, as they involve anatomically improbable acts …
I do note that you are using that perennial favorite, the Jupiter-Saturn synoptic cycle that I mentioned above …
w.
PS—As an indication of your lack of attention to detail, 19.589 X 3 is actually 58.767 … but I’m sure that won’t change your claim in the slightest. It’s one of the infallible marks of cycloholics. When you point out the holes in their math, they’ll cooper them up immediately with new claims.
@ren
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/05/14/studies-weaker-solar-activity-means-colder-and-colder-also-means-drier/#comment-1638112
Willis says
It’s one of the infallible marks of cycloholics. (this is not a word that the dictionary says does not exist)
When you point out the holes in their math, they’ll cooper them up immediately with new claims.
Henry says
I have stuck with mine from the point that my own investigations led me to the Gleissberg cycle.
Generally speaking I donot believe in a 60 year cycle, looking at the amount of energy coming in.
There are several investigations that will lead you to the Gleissberg, a 87/88 year cycle, namely
1) assuming Gleissberg himself (no reference?)
2) my own investigations
http://blogs.24.com/henryp/2013/04/29/the-climate-is-changing/
3) other people’s results
http://www.nonlin-processes-geophys.net/17/585/2010/npg-17-585-2010.html
4) Same 88 year solar/weather cycle was also calculated from COSMOGENIC ISOTOPES as related in this study:
Persistence of the Gleissberg 88-year solar cycle over the last ˜12,000 years: Evidence from cosmogenic isotopes
Peristykh, Alexei N.; Damon, Paul E.
Journal of Geophysical Research (Space Physics), Volume 108, Issue A1, pp. SSH 1-1, CiteID 1003, DOI 10.1029/2002JA009390
Among other longer-than-22-year periods in Fourier spectra of various solar-terrestrial records, the 88-year cycle is unique, because it can be directly linked to the cyclic activity of sunspot formation. Variations of amplitude as well as of period of the Schwabe 11-year cycle of sunspot activity have actually been known for a long time and a ca. 80-year cycle was detected in those variations. Manifestations of such secular periodic processes were reported in a broad variety of solar, solar-terrestrial, and terrestrial climatic phenomena. Confirmation of the existence of the Gleissberg cycle in long solar-terrestrial records as well as the question of its stability is of great significance for solar dynamo theories. For that perspective, we examined the longest detailed cosmogenic isotope record—INTCAL98 calibration record of atmospheric 14C abundance. The most detailed precisely dated part of the record extends back to ˜11,854 years B.P. During this whole period, the Gleissberg cycle in 14C concentration has a period of 87.8 years and an average amplitude of ˜1‰ (in Δ14C units). Spectral analysis indicates in frequency domain by sidebands of the combination tones at periods of ≈91.5 ± 0.1 and ≈84.6 ± 0.1 years that the amplitude of the Gleissberg cycle appears to be modulated by other long-term quasiperiodic process of timescale ˜2000 years. This is confirmed directly in time domain by bandpass filtering and time-frequency analysis of the record. Also, there is additional evidence in the frequency domain for the modulation of the Gleissberg cycle by other millennial scale processes.
end quote
5) Without mentioning Gleissberg, it appears that William Arnold found it,
(in hindsight admitting that there is a lag between energy in and energy out)
http://www.cyclesresearchinstitute.org/cycles-astronomy/arnold_theory_order.pdf
he was only out by about 7 years
\
again@Willis
now bring your science to prove that Gleissberg is not real.
henry says
“cycloholics. (this is not a word that the dictionary says does not exist)”
Henry says
sorry
that should read
cycloholics. (this is a word that the dictionary says does not exist)
I like it, though
Thanks HenryP,
I’m trying to understand the limits of the solar dynamo in regard to what works and what does not.
The graph of the North-South polar field you posted above for example, I’m able to build a program and map out or simulate a physical process that matches the North-South Polar field and it has the correct sequence of sunspot formation and the Heliospheric current sheet, all three have the timing and are intrinsically linked to a single explainable “physical process”. The only issue I have with replicating solar cycles is the current explanation that I mentioned (in the comment above).
btw, I’m able to simulate the differential rotation between the suns equator and polar regions as part of the same process that produces the “shape” of the North-South polar field, sunspot foration and the Heliospheric current sheet.
(The process I’m referring to here is not planetary in nature).
Regarding Planetary orbital resonances and timing.
The most accurate match to the sunspot cycle is the planet Uranus, Its unusual rotation is an exact match to the suns polar field reversal.
http://thetempestspark.files.wordpress.com/2013/09/uranus-solar-4-rbg2.gif
http://thetempestspark.files.wordpress.com/2014/01/ssn-1600-2012-uranus-n-s-poles-equator-degrees-rbg.gif
Dr Norman Page says:
May 15, 2014 at 10:03 pm
Leif I don’t see anything in Figs 3 or 4 to suggest that warming will continue for another hundred years.
In your Figure the several earlier ‘1000-yr’ peaks have a certain size. The last one [which we are in now – see that one?] has a much smaller size. This suggests to ‘common sense’ that it still has some way to go [see that?], say another 100 years at least.
Sparks says:
May 16, 2014 at 9:39 am
I have a basic question about the solar dynamo and formation of sunspots.
If we model how this differential rotation should behave, the faster moving equator should always cause a ripple of sunspots from the inside out or from the equator to the polar regions. But this is not what is being observed, Why?
Although the details are wrong, the old Babcock model contains enough of the basic ideas to provide you with an answer: http://www.leif.org/EOS/Babcock1961.pdf
Of cycles, Sun, Earth, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus …
Two Cyclo(p)s, sons of Uranus and Gaia, were Brontes who was a cyclophobe and Acmonides a cyclophile, suffered from one eye debilitating vision of the heavens, continuously arguing who did see the correct one
Their father Uranus got fed-up with this cyclomania from both of his sons and duly locked them up.
Cronus (Saturn), another son of Uranus and Gaia, freed the brothers, but they still carried on with the everlasting cyclo-arguments, so Cronus ordered for them to be separated and guarded by a female dragon known as Camp-e.
Saturn’s son Zeus (Jupiter), thought this to be far too cruel, after all discussing the cycles of heavens should be a matter of free speech, and freed his cyclo-uncles.
As a token of their gratitude they empowered their nephew Zeus with the command of lightning bolts, which became Zeus’ main weapons.
As Zeus was getting old, his lightning bolts become more and more rare, to remedy this his grandson Helios decided to help out with his ’wind’, since then became a well known phenomenon, but I digress and strayed into subject of the ‘Solar wind to lightning link discovered’ thread.
lsvalgaard says:
May 16, 2014 at 1:36 pm
Thanks Leif,
That’s somewhere along the lines of my point.
In Fig2
“The submerged lines of force have been drawn out in longitude and wrapped around the sun by differential rotation, With a consequent amplification of field strength that depends on latitude.” and the paragraph below it.
It physically describes the formation of sunspots and by this process sun spots should form along the lines moving away from the equator, but in reality sunspots form along the lines from the polar regions first and they move towards the equator, then move from the equator to the polar regions during one average 11 year cycle.
A toroidal field as described would have greater interaction nearer the equator and will always dissipate local magnetic fields toward the poles. Yet this is not the case.
Sparks says:
May 16, 2014 at 2:45 pm
That’s somewhere along the lines of my point.
No, not at all. Equation 9 and Figure 4 show how spots move from higher latitudes towards the equator as the cycle progresses.
lsvalgaard says:
May 16, 2014 at 4:25 pm
“No, not at all. Equation 9 and Figure 4 show how spots move from higher latitudes towards the equator as the cycle progresses.”
It does explain how sunspots can move from the equator to the polar regions and how they are magnetically balanced and conforming to known principles, it does not explain however, how the solar cycle begins with sunspots at the polar regions that follow these theoretical lines towards the equator and then travel from the equator to the polar regions.
Please read and try to understand my question before you throw stones.
I read every stone you throw Leif. 😉
Sparks says:
May 16, 2014 at 5:38 pm
It does explain how sunspots can move from the equator to the polar regions
No, it explains how sunspots move from higher latitudes towards the equator. It even has a Figure 4 that shows that. In ‘stages 4 and 5’ it explains how the magnetic field moves from the equator back to the poles to complete the cycle.