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Has solar activity influence on the Earth’s global warming?
A recent study demonstrates the existence of significant resonance cycles and high correlations between solar activity and the Earth’s averaged surface temperature during centuries. This provides a new clue to reveal the phenomenon of global warming in recent years.
Their work, entitled “Periodicities of solar activity and the surface temperature variation of the Earth and their correlations” was published in CHINESE SCIENCE BULLETIN (In Chinese) 2014 No.14.
The co-corresponding authors are Dr. Zhao Xinhua and Dr. Feng Xueshang from State key laboratory of space weather, CSSAR/NSSC, Chinese Academy of Sciences. It adopts the wavelet analysis technique and cross correlation method to investigate the periodicities of solar activity and the Earth’s temperature as well as their correlations during the past centuries.
Global warming is one of the hottest and most debatable issues at present. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) claimed that the release of the anthropogenic greenhouse gases contributed to 90% or even higher of the observed increase in the global average temperature in the past 50 years. However, the debate on the causes of the global warming never stops. Research shows that the current warming does not exceed the natural fluctuations of climate. The climate models of IPCC seem to underestimate the impact of natural factors on the climate change, while overstate that of human activities. Solar activity is an important ingredient of natural driving forces of climate. Therefore, it is valuable to investigate the influence of solar variability on the Earth’s climate change on long time scales.
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This study also implies that the “modern maximum” of solar activity agrees well with the recent global warming of the Earth. A significant correlation between them can be found (Figure 2).
As pointed out by a peer reviewer, “this work provides a possible explanation for the global warming”.
See the article:
ZHAO X H, FENG X S. Periodicities of solar activity and the surface temperature variation of the Earth and their correlations (in Chinese). Chin Sci Bull (Chin Ver), 2014, 59: 1284, doi: 10.1360/972013-1089 http://csb.scichina.com:8080/kxtb/CN/abstract/abstract514043.shtml
Science China Press Co., Ltd. (SCP) is a scientific journal publishing company of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS). For 60 years, SCP takes its mission to present to the world the best achievements by Chinese scientists on various fields of natural sciences researches.
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lgl says:
June 5, 2014 at 1:34 pm
Even with Leifs adjusted numbers there is a modern maximum
And there is a 19th century maximum and a an 18th century maximum, too. Some of those are particularly Grand or stand out compared to the other ones.
lgl says:
June 5, 2014 at 1:34 pm
Even with Leifs adjusted numbers there is a modern maximum
And there is a 19th century maximum and a an 18th century maximum, too. None of those are particularly Grand or stand out compared to the other ones.
Leif said:
Now, there is a concerted effort to push the notion of a Modern Grand Maximum in order to provide a natural [?] explanation for ‘Global Warming’. Unfortunately, it doesn’t hold water.
= = =
Now there is a concerted effort by historical revisionists to portray the current temperature regime on Earth as unprecedented so that an unnatural carbon-dioxide forced explanation of the non-warming situation can be used to manufacture consent for genocidal social engineering goals.
But yesterday, i.e., THEN (when warming was real)– it was the sun to blame:
Khwarizmi says:
June 5, 2014 at 3:21 pm
it was the sun to blame
Sure, you blame the one [rightly or wrongly] that fits your agenda.
lsvalgaard says:
June 5, 2014 at 3:35 pm
Leif, the problem we are faced with is that there is no known causal mechanism that vaguely explains intermediate to short geological scale changes. By “short” geologically, I mean variation on the millennial to century level, and by “intermediate” variation on millennial to multimillennial time scales less than Milankovitch scales. The obvious culprit would be the sun, but you say not. It is self-evident to any one that is not a “team” member, and who IS conversant with real paleoenvironmental data that there is nothing unusual about the current “warming,” even if it is not an artifact of “adjustments” by folks like Hansen and Trenberth who blame the data rather than the models. Do you have any “culprits” you consider plausible?
Climate is a complex coupled non-linear system. Complex = many factors. Coupled = the factors interfere with each other. Non-linear = some effects appear random. Even over modest timescales, no factor, including the sun, is likely to have a nice clear-cut linear effect. A factor which has a clear-cut effect over one period of time is likely to have a different effect over other periods. IOW, Jack Eddy was right (Jimmy Haigh. June 5, 2014 at 10:41 am). My understanding is that the best that a study such as this can ever do is to provide clues. Assuming that the work is valid (I have no reason to doubt it) this CSSAR/NSSC study has done that, and Dr. Zhao Xinhua and Dr. Feng Xueshang should be congratulated by all of us for conducting genuine climate science in a world where that is not the norm. Next, mechanisms are needed.
Duster (June 5, 2014 at 4:10 pm): I like your question, but beware the logical fallacy it can lead to. Absence of an alternative theory does not demolish criticism of a proposed theory. IOW, Leif may be right in his criticisms of solar-climate theories even if he can present no alternative. OTOH, my feeling is that Leif’s criticisms of some solar-climate theories [NB solar-climate, not solar] tend to lean on linear thinking and thus may themselves be invalid.
Perhaps I am just a dumb ass, and if so go ahead and call me out but this has me a little troubled:
“Figure 1: The global wavelet coherence between Sunspot number (a), Total Solar Irradiance (b) and the anomalies of the Earth’s averaged surface temperature. The resonant periodicities of 21.3-year (21.5-year), 52.3-year (61.6-year), and 81.6-year are close to the 22-year, 50-year, and 100-year cycles of solar activity.”
OK, 21.3 (21.5) is close to 22 and 52.3 is close to 50 (not so much the 61.6) but what really troubles me is the claim that an 81.6 year cycle is close to a 100 year cycle.. In only 5 cycles you will be an entire cycle off.
What…no Vuk tech talk?
Some people get their knickers in a twist. The conclusion said that the effect of the sun is non-negligible.
Duster says:
June 5, 2014 at 4:10 pm
Leif, the problem we are faced with is that there is no known causal mechanism that vaguely explains intermediate to short geological scale changes
My aim here was much simpler and more direct: did we just have a Modern Grand Maximum? The best data we have says ‘no’, so any claim that something, e.g. climate, is due to the Modern Grand Maximum becomes spurious. This is regardless of whether one is a believer or not of ‘it’s the Sun, stupid’.
Leif, I’m no way near as knowledgeable as yourself and many others on here, I’m wondering if you had some good links to the ‘no solar maximum’ hypothesis. I’m not being facetious I’m really interested in learning about it.
Alex – in science, the wrong result is bad science, but so is the right result for the wrong reason. That’s why some people who think the effect of the sun is significant can still criticise this study.
I thought Willis just debunked any 11-year cycle
=========
Willis sailed south from England and didn’t hit America. From this should we conclude that Willis proved America doesn’t exist?
Compare the rate of temperature change (first derivative of temperature) to the length of the solar cycle and report back.
To understand why this is, Imagine that you are trying to correlate the amount you press the gas pedal to the distance you travel in your car. When you start, you are pressing the gas pedal a lot, but the car is not moving very much. When the car is at speed you are not pressing the gas pedal very much, yet the car is traveling a lot of distance.
We know from experience that the gas pedal does control distance traveled, yet we can see from the above that the relationship does not lend itself to simple statistical analysis. So why should temperature and sunspots be any different?
lsvalgaard says:
June 5, 2014 at 9:06 pm
“My aim here was much simpler and more direct: did we just have a Modern Grand Maximum? The best data we have says ‘no’, so any claim that something, e.g. climate, is due to the Modern Grand Maximum becomes spurious. This is regardless of whether one is a believer or not of ‘it’s the Sun, stupid’.”
Leif, what’s the best data? What’s wrong with these?
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/3/32/Carbon14-sunspot-1000px.png
http://www.mps.mpg.de/3196311/standard_sans_both.jpg
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/sidc-ssn/plot/sidc-ssn/trend/plot/sidc-ssn/from:1800/trend/plot/sidc-ssn/from:1900/trend
Do you think at all that there’s multidecadal and/or multicentennial variability in solar magnetic activity?
Mike Jonas
Grandma knows how to suck eggs
The change in TSI (0.5 W/m^2) is too small to account for the change in temperature (0.8 C). TSI can only account for 0.03 C. If the sun is the cause of global warming, there must be something else other than TSI. Maybe it affects the clouds that produces a bigger forcing.
Edim says:
June 6, 2014 at 12:09 am
Leif, what’s the best data? What’s wrong with these?
Since about 1947 the sunspot number measured in Zurich [and Locarno which all other sunspot counts are normalized to] has been artificially inflated by about 20% by counting larger spots more than once: http://www.leif.org/research/The-Effect-of-Weighting-in-Counting-Sunspots-and-More.pdf
First, the change in TSI is uncertain too (different constants, seasonal cycle..). Second, i think nobody claims it’s the change in TSI and there are many plausible mechanisms. Even a small variability in latitudinal distribution of clouds could do the trick of global warming/cooling.
Dr. Strangelove
TSI variation from 1979 to 1998 was somewhere between 4 and 5 watts per sq mtr
http://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/stp/solar/solarirrad.html
Alex says:
June 6, 2014 at 1:37 am
TSI variation from 1979 to 1998 was somewhere between 4 and 5 watts per sq mtr
No, http://www.leif.org/EOS/2011GL046658.pdf
Alex says:
June 6, 2014 at 1:37 am
TSI variation from 1979 to 1998 was somewhere between 4 and 5 watts per sq mtr
No, http://www.leif.org/research/SSN/Froehlich.pdf
lsvalgaard
We are speaking about different things. The paper you referrred me to has nothing to do with TSI measured by satellites. I was just mentioning to Dr Stranglove that his figure of 0.5 watts didn’t seem to match the satellite data. BTW the different satellites seem to give different readings. The difference is up to 10 watts per sq mtr.
When people are discussing earth energy balance and referring to fractions of watts per sq mtr as making some sort of significance then I get suspicious. Particularly as ‘we’ cant even get it right as far as incoming energy from the sun/universe
Off topic
At least we sceptics argue with each other-healthy.
The AGW ers agree with each other-unhealthy
Alex says:
June 6, 2014 at 2:04 am
We are speaking about different things. The paper you referrred me to has nothing to do with TSI measured by satellites.
It most certainly has, but let me give you a few more:
http://www.leif.org/EOS/swsc130036-TSI-Climate.pdf
http://www.leif.org/EOS/TSI-Record-Climate.pdf
The various differences between satellites are due to calibration errors [e.g. correcting for stray light and degradation] and are well-understood. We can measure TSI with precision.