By Frank Bosse and Fritz Vahrenholt
In February 2016 our sun’s activity was, as in almost every month of the current cycle, well below the average. The observed SSN (SunSpotNumber) was 57.2. The average of the cycles 1 … 23 for this month is 80.8, thus the observed activity was 71% of the average value in the current 24th cycle.
Fig.1: The current activity of the cycle 24 (SC 24, red) compared to the average activity of the cycles 1 … 23 (blue) and cycle 5 (SC5, black).
A comparison of the cycles to each other:
Fig.2: The activity of the cycles 1 … 24. The values are generated with the addition of the monthly anomalies (the differences between the observed SSN values and the average value, as they are drawn in blue in Fig. 1)
In total only 57% of the SSN of the average cycle was observed during cycle 24. Most likely, the cycle will be one of the three weakest since observations began in 1749, and will be close to the Dalton Minima cycles (ca. 1790-1830, SC 5 … 7).
What is the likely continuation after the SC24? Previously (most recently here ) we indicated that the first clue for the nature of the next cycle is the strength of the polar fields of the Sun at the minimum of sunspot activity prior to the start of the cycle. Although we have not yet reached this point, we will nevertheless already take a preparatory look at these fields. We have processed the data that we obtained from here up to the end of February 2016. We used of the smoothed data (in the series with the “f” for low-pass filter) because the unfiltered data are too much affected by short-term variations.
Figure 3: The smoothed series of polar fields of the sun, the average (black) from the northern hemisphere (Nf, blue) and inverted southern hemisphere (-SF, red).
The polar fields of the sun oscillate out of phase with the spot cycle: at the maximum of these, the polar fields see a polarity reversal (zero crossing) and vice versa. Especially the fields of the NH grow significantly slower after the SSN Maximum in 2013 than measured after the reversals since the mid-70s. The SH (red in Figure 3), however, behaves quite normally and pushes the average (black in Figure 3) upwards.
The next figure looks at the differences between the two hemispheres:
Figure 4: The hemispherical differences of the polar fields of the sun. Positive values indicate stronger fields of NH, negative ones stronger fields of the SH.
It is obvious that different field strengths are not unusual. However, it should be noted that throughout the cycle since 2008 the fields of the SH were stronger than those of the NH (except during the reversal in 2013) and we currently record the largest difference in the fields since 1976, the beginning of the available data. Several papers deal with such a phenomenon, i.e. Munoz-Jaramillo et al. (2013) and Ashish Goe et al. (2007) . They link an asymmetry of the polar fields to a hemispheric decoupling of the solar dynamo. The latter paper also discusses the idea that a strong asymmetry of the solar dynamo might have been one of the causes of the Maunder Minimum (a period of very low solar activity 1715 to 1645). A closer look at the different field strengths of the polar fields therefore seems to make sense. We are curious of the behavior during the next one to two years, after this time the fields should already be at their maximum and the prediction of the next cycle should be quite possible.
Broken temperature records
The global temperature in February announced by GISS was 1.35 °C above the average from 1951 to 1980. This is an impressive record, 0.8 ° C (!) warmer than in February 2014. What is behind such a large jump in a relatively short time? One of the reasons is of course the current El Nino. Another element is the Indo-Pacific Warm Pool (IPWP). It extends from 90° East to 180° East and 20° South to 20° North:
Fig. 5: The IPWP (turquoise highlighted). Source: “Google Earth”
This sea area receives heated water of the tropical Pacific from South / Central America, driven by the trade winds under neutral conditions of ENSO (El Nino Southern Oscillation) and during La Nina situations. We explained it here in more detail. Largescale, the globally highest ocean temperatures occur in this IPWP area, about 28.5°C. The heat that comes from the entire tropical Pacific is stored down to 500m water depth. The following figure shows how temperatures in this depth range developed since 2004:
Fig. 6: The vertical temperature distribution of IPWP (dbar = m water depth). Figure base on “Argo Global Marine Atlas”.
Clearly recognizable: Small El Nino 2004/2005 (blue = cooler), the La Nina 2008 caused a warming of IPWP, the El Nino 2009/2010 cooled, the La Nina 2011-2012 brought back the heat. Since 2014 a marked cooling occurs over the entire depth interval. For the discussion of the current global heat pulse, we concentrate on the period after January 2013.
Fig. 7: The temperatures of IPWP to 500m water depth (blue) since 2013, and the history of global temperatures (GISS, red) respectively to December 2015. (Data: GISS, Argo)
The average temperature of the IPWP has decreased by about 1°C since spring of 2013. Since the beginning of the Argo measurements in 2004, it has never been cooler than today. Note that this refers to a huge water mass of about 16 million cubic kilometers. For comparison: The energy that has been released from here corresponds to the amount that the whole earth receives from the sun by the solar radiation flux during a 4 days period. This huge amount of energy increases the global surface temperature which leads to increased radiation of a good part of the heat into space. An El Nino in the end therefore generates a heat loss of the system earth. The current pulse of warming is partly a consequence of this natural process. The recent temperature records therefore are more related to the natural ENSO cycle than to global warming of probably about 0.01° C / year by the effect of moderate greenhouse gases, when allowing for a reduced CO2 climate sensitivity.
Notes: A german version of this post appeared on the Kalte Sonne Blog. English translations of parts of this post have been featured on the Notrickszone website.
” We used of the smoothed data (in the series with the “f” for low-pass filter) because the unfiltered data are too much affected by short-term variations.”
That just does not sound right ??
It is right. The filter removes the 1-year [viewing aspect from Earth] variation due to the fact that the planes of the Earth’s orbit and of the Sun’s equator have a 7 degree angle.
..I was talking about the grammar !! LOL
Is data singular or plural? I have seen it used both ways. Perhaps dataset/datasets would have been a better choice.
What exactly is the “20nhz low pass filter”? They do not seem to state that on the WSO page
http://wso.stanford.edu/Polar.html
It is a filter that removes variations faster than 1.5 years.
Datum is the singular, data infers plurality.
“Data” is plural, and plural only. The singular is “datum”. The same goes for medium – media and spectrum – spectra, ridiculum – ridicula (not “ridiculae” as used on this site), focus – foci, genus – genera, species – species (here, singular and plural are really equal), biceps – bicipites. It even goes for visa – visum, although the latter singular seems to have been buried entirely, as seems to be happening to the others also.
The use of the proper plural as a singular isn’t so bad, but the proliferation of fictitious forms – “specie”, “bicep”, “medias”, “datas”, “spectras” – is getting annoying. I have even seen “spectra” used as the singular and “spectrums” as the plural in the same text. What’s next – “medias” as the new singular and “mediass” as the plural?
Thanks for the reply Doc. What I was asking it which filter was used. eg running average, gaussian, loess?? and what parameter to accurately state what was used.
“20nhz” is what ? FWHH , -3bD, it’s a very vague way to specify a filter.
The exact details are not important as the result is not heavily dependent on the filter:
http://wso.stanford.edu/gifs/Polar.gif
@ShrNfr: Data is plural; the singular is datum. However, the word ‘data’ is often treated as a collective singular, so people say ‘data is’ rather than ‘data are’.
You probably won’t get any complaints from most people if you use ‘data’ in the collective singular sense even though the word is technically plural. I’ve used it in the collective singular sense myself many times. What is probably far more important in science is what you are saying about the data rather than how you are treating the word ‘data’ gramatically.
Well it would be preferable for them to state what filter was used. It would be nice if they got the units written correctly too, just to reassure that we’re not dealing with a summer student.
I’m guessing that the 20nHz ( ie 1.58y ) filter is rather leaky at the frequency so they”re going a bit wide to remove most of the 12mo cycle. I’d still expect top scientists to state clearly what they use.
Fair enough, but scientists tend to concentrate on what is important, and the filter details are not, as the errors in the data are larger than any side effects introduced by the filter.
Good grief, it’s a translation from German, expect the grammar to be imperfect.
Omit the “of” to make better sense. “Data” is plural of “datum” meaning fact or item.
Quite right, Alf, talk about being anal retentive!
http://www.leif.org/research/Comparing-HMI-WSO-Polar-Fields.pdf
“Preliminarily it looks like a repeat of Cycle 24, or at least not any smaller”
http://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1602/1602.02460.pdf
Very interesting paper.
“Past suggestions that the sunspot activity during the Maunder minimum was restricted to only one solar hemisphere also support this notion.”
What is the evidence for these “past suggestions”, Leif?
slide 33 of http://www.leif.org/research/Asymmetric-Solar-Polar-Field-Reversals-talk.pdf
re: slide 35 we’ve talked before about the alternating shapes of the peaks of cosmic rays from flat to pointed, and I’ve pointed out that this is a possible mechanism(if the shapes of those peaks are important) by which an oceanic oscillation, the PDO, can be driven in clockwork fashion with the sun’s cycles. You’ve recognized this as a possible lower order effect.
Have you since had any further thoughts about this effect?
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Since the evidence for Cosmic Ray control of the climate is weak to non-existent, that is even more true for a tiny second order effect.
To review, one phase of the PDO with two solar half cycles of one shape and one of the other, followed by the next phase of the PDO with one of the one and two of the other.
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During one phase of the PDO I lived in Texas, during the other phase I lived in California…
Thanks, Leif; admirable little clock, though. Tick, tock, tick, tock.
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I’m sure you got the best of weather in both places. Now, that would drive a clock.
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A fine little mechanism, multi-jeweled with thermodynamic and albedic facets; by Golly, there is even a biological gear, its wonders to perform. And so much time to synchronize, let me count the days.
=================
Greg, there is evidence that the LIA occurred also in the southern hemisphere too.
Leif, do you have cliff notes version of Joy’s Law referenced in the PDF?
Joy’s Law describes sunspots and states that their tendency to be “tilted” (with the leading spot closer to the equator than the following spots) grows with the heliographic latitude of these regions.
http://www.leif.org/EOS/Joys-Law-Tlatov.pdf
Thank you thank you for all these links!
Dr. Svalgaard, do I see this spiral of activity currently on the far side as being continued in the NH west by 2519 and continuing northeast? Filament activity has also been high in the spiral of ARs.
Can I correctly assume this is a manifestation of the dynamo pattern?
http://www.lmsal.com/solarsoft/latest_events/20160320_165530_n7euA_350.png
Although sunspots are formed by the solar dynamo, the precise pattern of spots on the surface is much influenced by random fluctuations such as not to show the waves in any clear way. So, on any single day we are seeing solar ‘weather’, not the underlying causes directly.
So the solar weather was different than now and since during the Maunder Minimum. The wonder would be if that did not affect weather on Earth.
========================
It did, to the tune of 0.1-0.2 degrees [conventional wisdom]. Some speculate that if there were no dark sunspots to dim the Sun, that solar energy output might have been higher during the M.M…
Thanks, again. I love your use of ‘conventional wisdom’ and ‘speculation’. Frank you are, but not Baxter.
============
Speculation is fine [actually necessary for progress] as long as it is clearly labeled as such.
Leif: “Some speculate that if there were no dark sunspots to dim the Sun, that solar energy output might have been higher during the M.M…”
Some (?) but not you I hope. This would contradict most of all we know about sunspots, faculae, UV, TSI- records in relation to the solar cycles, and, and… Or do you think during MM it was upside down?
This would contradict most of all we know
What we think we know…
Consider this speculation: we know from the cosmic ray record that the solar cycle [dynamo] was still active during the M.M., so the magnetic field was generated. Perhaps the mechanism that concentrate the magnetic field into sunspots was working less efficiently, then there would be no contradiction. Perhaps the Livingston-Penn effect is showing that something like that is possible. The past 20 years the number of spots per active region has declined to half of what is used to be [at least[ the last 160 years; perhaps it can decline further and make visible sunspots rare…
Leif, thanks for mentioning the L/P-effect. I see in the plots
http://www.leif.org/research/Livingston%20and%20Penn.png
that there is a saturation and no linear continuitation after 2010. How do you interpret this? It seems that the field strength doesn’t go below 2000 G. And of course you are right: The most we are sure to know must not be true forever, anyway: I would prefer to stand by the knowledge that sunspots dimm the visible light but this is overcompensated by the faculae which produce more blue and UV light:
http://stereo.gsfc.nasa.gov/img/stereoimages/preview/LoopingArcs060907.jpg
untill the opposite is evidenced. 😉
The point is that the faculae are caused by the magnetic field so the faculae would have been present during the M.M. [because there was enough field to modulate the cosmic rays] while the spots were not… so, you are correct that the faculae overwhelm the [non-existing] spots, hence TSI during the M.M. was higher than today…
And EUV, would that be lower during periods of low to no sunspots or is that yet to be determined ?
That is well established: http://www.leif.org/research/Reconstruction-of-Solar-EUV-Flux-1740-2015.pdf
Leif, regarding Fig 20 in http://www.leif.org/research/Reconstruction-of-Solar-EUV-Flux-1740-2015.pdf, an interesting anecdote:
https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=7P3RAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA204#v=onepage
Thanks for the reply upthread.
Thank you for that. Observations in the 1740s are rare, so every scrap counts.
Indeed. Though sobering reminders of terrestial natural variability remain. Bliain an Áir, the Year of Slaughter:
Leif: Now I got it! Thanks! The thesis is: during MM there were faculae due to the fields but no visible spots! I think this is ongoing science so here is some suspense for the results. I hope you inform in realtime about the progress of this research!!
Here is an interesting correlation that ties in with your comment “…..that there is a saturation and no linear continuation after 2010. How do you interpret this?” “.
Take a look at Cryosphere’s Antarctic sea ice anomaly page, and note that the sea ice anomaly starts to increase around April/May of 2011. It then steadily rises to a record high in mid 2014, which matches closely with the umbral magnetic field graph which also peaks around mid 2014. After the umbral MF peak in mid 2014, it then decreases until late 2015. Simultaneously, the southern sea ice decreases from it’s peak and falls 2 mil/sq kms to a low at the end of 2015. There is an upward spike of the magnetic field to a new high peak at the end of 2015, and the sea ice spikes up 1.5 mil/sq kms then drops by early 2015 along with a sharp drop in the magnetic field. There is a spike up on the magnetic field around May 2015, and Antarctic sea ice spikes up for the last time before falling around 2.5 mil/sq kms by Oct 2015. Notice that the magnetic field stays low until around Sept/Oct of 2015. Then there is a small rise in the magnetic field, and there is a last small rise in the sea ice anomaly trend. The sea ice anomaly trend has been close to the zero line ever since late 2015. Your umbral magnetic field graph looks like it ends in late 2015. If there was a connection between the two graphs, then I would expect that the umbral magnetic field graph would have decreased further than shown into early 2016. Then the last several months should show a slight rise in the umbral magnetic field.
I agree, the next solar cycle (sc25) will be similar in size the this solar cycle (sc24), this is due to the speed of the suns polar field as it rotates and reverses. take note of the dips in planetary data when the polarities of the suns polar field slow down and solar cycles become longer and weaker!
the suns polar field as it rotates and reverses
The polar fields do not ‘rotate’ [from one pole to the other]. but simple weakens and is replaced by growing amount of new polarity flux.
The ‘planetary data’ is just nonsense.
The polarities do rotate, they rotate around the sun from the geographical ~North and Southern hemispheres reversing polarity at the equator, where the continue to reverse…
No, Sparks, they do not rotate the way you describe. Observations indicate that they slowly weaken by new polarity flux arriving from lower latitudes cancelling out more and more of the old flux. Then at some point, they have weaken all the way to zero. From then on, continued new polarity flux marching polewards eventually builds up the new [and reversed] polar fields.
The planetary data is pretty accurate Lief…
Their connection with solar activity is the nonsense.
Their timing unfortunately is not.
Both the timing and the amplitude have no correlation with solar activity as your graph so clearly showed.
The polarities rotate and reverse, they are produced by the sun by way of E=mc2, and are those very same polarities that produce a field that shorts out forming sun spots.
So far out that nothing is gained by trying to educate you on this, sorry.
The planets orbiting the sun interact and have a relationship with the sun, including the rate of which it’s magnetic poles rotate and reverse producing its various states of observed activity.
No amount of bloviating can change this fact, it is you who needs educated sir 🙂
Apologies about the commentary mix up Lief, entirely my fault, I was getting sidetracked by the reply system, using wordpress… interesting as always regardless.
I said “polarities” not “polar field” you are correct in saying that the “polar field weakens” this is due to the polarities shorting each other out, anything else? 🙂
It is even less true that the polarities [you didn’t say of what] rotate. Sunspots are born and die in place. Their magnetic flux [the polarities] marches to the poles [both polarities at the same time] and slowly reverse the polar fields. See e.g. slides 22-23 of http://www.leif.org/research/Asymmetric-Solar-Polar-Field-Reversals-talk.pdf
That’s a lot of warm water that got discharged and then cooled.
Are there data sets that measure the amount of radiation that reaches the earth’s surface? Sunspots tell part of the story, but solar radiation from the sun that doesn’t reach the earth won’t cause any warming. You can have an extremely hot sun, but a dense cloud layer will reflect most of that radiation away from the earth. IMHO the warming oceans demonstrate that more radiation is reaching the earth, regardless of solar output. Are there measurements that show that more radiation has been reaching the surface? If CO2 causes fewer clouds and therefore more radiation reaching the earth, then maybe there is something to this CO2 driven AGW theory, but I doubt it. Anyone know of any evidence or data showing more radiation reaching the earth? Did the clean air act result in clearer skies allowing for the warming of the globe? Is man contributing to global warming by cleaning the air?
https://youtu.be/QowL2BiGK7o?t=28m42s
Solar Activity influences radio active decay rates on earth.
This a 5-6 year old issue but what is interesting is that it defies conventional wisdom.
http://www.purdue.edu/newsroom/research/2010/100830FischbachJenkinsDec.html
a link to an earlier wuwt article:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/08/23/teleconnected-solar-flares-to-earthly-radioactive-decay/
This is not established. The evidence is weak. It is not a question of being against conventional wisdom, but a question about being against strong observational data. So, at this point it is just speculation.
Old textbook knowledge reconfirmed: Decay rates of radioactive substances are constant
http://phys.org/news/2014-10-textbook-knowledge-reconfirmed-radioactive-substances.html
I did read that and I also read the following, the measurements having been made by the same group.
http://arxiv.org/pdf/1211.2138v1.pdf
If you look at figure 2 there is periodicity in the decay of Ba.
“Figure 2: Spectrogram of measurements of the decay-rate of [133] Ba made at PTB over the time interval June 1999 to November 2008. There is evidence of an annual oscillation from 2003 to 2005. There is also evidence of the first harmonic of this oscillation. The power, S, is represented by the color bar.”
In the conclusion:
“our studies to date suggest the following: (a) not all nuclides exhibit variability in decay constants; (b) among nuclides that do exhibit this variability, the patterns of variability (e.g., amplitude and phase of any oscillation) are not all the same; and (c) for nuclides that do exhibit variability, the patterns themselves may vary over time.”
Which are the typical signs of no effect at all. Just over-interpretating noise.
I have to agree with Leif on this one. We see the same sort of thing with cold fusion.
SC24 slightly below or above average, doesn’t matter much too much the the climate change consideration.
What matters is the drivers, there appear to be two primary drivers
a) Solar Activity
b) Northern Hemisphere High Latitude Volcanic Eruptions
From the CET 360 year long record it can be concluded that: When both a and b are high temperatures go up.
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/3D.gif
Your graph contradicts your claim.
It wouldn’t if the data wasn’t readjusted over and over again. Nothing should be taken for granted, the Met Office data, Svalgaard’s data or vukcevic’s claim. Nature proceeds along its cyclical ride regardless of what any of us think or say today or the day after.
It wouldn’t if the data wasn’t readjusted over and over again
Nonsense.
No it is not nonsense.
How many times sunspot data was adjusted? I would suggest that was more often (with max values for some periods up to 20%) than the CET data. I know only of one minor adjustment to the CET( less than 0.1C) , since I personally was instrumental in encouraging and suggesting the method to the Met Office to do it.
The sunspot number has been corrected for KNOWN defects.
vukcevic,
I don’t see where anyone has proposed that Cosmic Rays, specifically high energy cosmic rays (which Dr Svensmark deals with exclusively), are ‘constant’ in this thread. sounds dangerously close to attempting to introduce a ‘Red Herring’ into the thread. HE Cosmic rays vary based on several factors including, location of the solar system in the Galactic plane, strength of the solar & earth magnetic field, etc.
It is wrong to use the LOW Group Number estimate. Use the average [most likely] values.
Most likely? Oh, really? Or may be un-likely?
I assume since there were + or – 20% ‘corrected for KNOWN defects’ (LOL) that at least there is some, however doubtful certainty about Low estimates.
High estimates in the 1700s, period I question, are 40% higher than the low ones. Even low estimates have eliminated Grand Maximum, but your high and to some extent the average numbers, not only obliterated Grand Maximum, but move it 200 years in time, from the late 20th century to the late 18th century.
No surprise, that according to such data, you can claim there is no direct effect of solar activity on the climate change.
The way an ‘error band’ works is to enclose the likely values within the band. It is not correct to assume that the actual value is always at the lower end of the band.
according to such data, you can claim there is no direct effect of solar activity on the climate change.
Exactly. You got it. Congratulations.
Here is what the Cosmic Ray record says:
http://www.leif.org/research/Comparison-GSN-14C-Modulation.png
That got me burst into laughter, hey we agreed at least on thing. WUWT is a wonderful place; we are all friends again.
So if you agree that it is wrong to use the LOW estimate why do you then still use it?
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/NGM.gif
I take it that “11y average” is not in fact as stated multiple times on the graph but an 11y RUNNING average. It would be more informative to see that with a proper filter.
I hope the “20nhz” [sic] filter is not running average as well, though it would not surprise me.
The filter is a proper filter removing variations faster than 1.5 years. Not a ‘running average’. You may safely assume that the WSO scientists are not morons.
Sadly there seem to be many people who I do not regard as morons that don’t seem to be able to get away from using running averages as their prefered low pas filter.
Who, for example, prepared that C14 – GSN graph, a competent scientist or a moron?
That includes the Belgian group who run offical SSN record. I discussed it with them and they agreed it was bad…. but then decided to carry on using as the basis for their LP data series instead of using a proper filter. Go figure.
That high level of solar activity during the 1700s was also related to a warming period was it not?
Greg
It looks as if it is a ‘moving average’ but as you can see not great deal of difference with LPF.
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/GSN-LPF.gif
Stephen Wilde
CET was high in the early 1700s, but during the late 1700s, period I suspect to be overestimated for Sunspot count, CET was just fractionally above Dalton minimum or more than 1C down on 2000, see graph at http://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/03/20/the-sun-in-february-2016-and-the-latest-heat-records/#comment-2170405
Don’t comment on things you don’t know. The 20 nHz filter is not a moving average.
but during the late 1700s, period I suspect to be overestimated for Sunspot count
So you expect the cosmic ray counts to be overestimated too, and in just the same way. Get real.
Dr. S
I never said so, or mentioned 20nHz, perhaps you need to read my comment again.
I’ve just compared GSN moving average and output of a low pass filter.
No, I have no confidence in the cosmic rays records based on the ice cores to be a good proxy, the SSN is not only variable involved, but that is another story for another time.
I never said so, or mentioned 20nHz
You commented directly to Greg. But let that slide, if Greg is happy with it. As I said, the filtering doesn’t make much difference anyway.
No, I have no confidence in the cosmic rays records based on the ice cores
The graph I showed was based on 14C from tree rings. not too many of those in ice cores. BTW, what you have confidence in just reflects your bias anyway.
Not so.
a) Remember that for your estimates of the low to high GSN, the difference is 40% for the late 1700s.
b) Trees or ice cores, makes no difference, problem is, as you well know that the secular variations of the Earth’s magnetic field are by far the strongest modulator of GCR impacting the atmosphere. However, C14 data is obtained by smoothing the magnetic dipole value on the centenary scale, ignoring the geomagnetic decadal variability.
Another unknown about cosmic rays is their variability before entry into the heliosphere.
Everyone who uses GCR as a proxy for one thing or another assumes that cosmic rays intensity is some kind of a ‘Cosmic Constant’.
Well, IT is NOT!
No one has measured temporal variability of the GCR, at any time scale whatsoever before their entry into the heliosphere. This is well known fact, but is routinely ignored.
Dr Svalgaard,
You appear to be a man of far more patience than I am. I congratulate you.
Not a scientist and I don’t play one on TV, nor did I spend the night at a Holiday Inn Express, but, the statement “but during the late 1700s, period I suspect to be overestimated for Sunspot count” strikes me as very ‘Velikovskian’ in nature. If you are allowed to rearrange historical data at your whim it will naturally support whatever hypothesis you wish to propose.
” If you are allowed to rearrange historical data at your whim it will naturally support whatever hypothesis you wish to propose.”
That statement applies to NOAA/GISS as well as Mr Vukcevic.
Greg,
There is a [good] reason for this, namely to maintain the historical procedure. In any event, it makes little difference.
vukcevic March 20, 2016 at 2:39 pm
b) Trees or ice cores, makes no difference, problem is, as you well know that the secular variations of the Earth’s magnetic field are by far the strongest modulator of GCR impacting the atmosphere. However, C14 data is obtained by smoothing the magnetic dipole value on the centenary scale, ignoring the geomagnetic decadal variability.
Sigh, again you have no idea. In calculating the modulation parameter, the latest and greatest geomagnetic data is used.
vukcevic March 20, 2016 at 3:13 pm
Everyone who uses GCR as a proxy for one thing or another assumes that cosmic rays intensity is some kind of a ‘Cosmic Constant’.
Well, IT is NOT!
It is very constant on the time scales of interest because the interstellar magnetic field scrambles any variation in time and space. r.g. here is high-resolution map of the cosmic ray intensity over the sky:
http://imagine.gsfc.nasa.gov/Images/science/galaxy_cr.gif
from http://imagine.gsfc.nasa.gov/science/objects/cosmic_rays1.html
In addition, even if varaiable it would be quite a miracle if the variation matched that of solar activity.
So, it is time that you decrease your pollution of WUWT.
Leif, now that is cool. I clicked on the map’s link, and then I wondered if the link to the link was just a string of broken links. Till I read the text. Subtle you are not. Says one non-subtler to another.
vukcevic March 20, 2016 at 2:39 pm
“Not so.
a) Remember that for your estimates of the low to high GSN, the difference is 40% for the late 1700s.”
___
Thank you for that, I was reading this discussion up to that point and looking at the smoothed plots and proxy ‘data’ presented (can we call it that?) and the ‘disagreement’, and thinking, “what the? … why are these people treating the trend lines of edited and re-edited proxies like they’re meaningfully accurate, on this level of assertiveness?”
Clearly the uncertainty around those smoothed plots could do with a shaded error range area on either side, to better illustrate just how imprecise these actually are (no, the ‘data’ is not enough for this) and a footnote below to explain how many times they’ve been edited and revised. At least then we would understand that any assertiveness or conclusiveness is drawing a very long and dubious bow.
Without buying-in to sides here I remain bemused at Isvalgaard’s lurking at WUWT to jump on suggestions of solar variability connecting with weather variability (and also the attempt to berate such a discussion in other places). It doesn’t add up, and we could take it as reliance of empiricism, except the data, simply since accurate, but it is a moving feast. And as we go forwards, more and more regularly, the past that was, is claimed to be different. This “New and Improved Formula” approach reminds me of advertisement-agency tactics for selling more soap.
The credibility of the then practice and purported ‘data’ comes firmly into question, for onlookers, when that keeps happening, because it really doesn’t improve our understanding, or our trust that in ten years it won’t be substantially altered again.
Given what we’ve all seen with editing ‘data’ in raw temp datasets (and others) I have little sympathy for assertive views that a new ‘data’ set is superior to the former (especially for direct measurements).
No, it is not, it was highly uncertain before and the edit just accentuated the uncertainty and ultimate unreliability.
That’s bad enough, but OK, that’s proxies for you, but now we must have this continuous variability of the uncertainty and imprecision we know exists, still being called ‘data’, just because it was carefully edited … and bestowed a new ‘authority’ and reverence … that it never had, to begin with? At best these are relative indicators. And the older it is the less reliable it becomes. So wench the assertiveness?
But one wonders why it’s important when the test of all claims will be in future observations (mostly decades, to many decades or centuries from now) and not in the inaccurate and uncertain proxies of the past.
Clearly the uncertainty around those smoothed plots could do with a shaded error range area on either side, to better illustrate just how imprecise these actually are
One of the problems here is that people [like you] do not take the trouble to look at the construction of the data set, which is fully described in papers linked to several times [in other threads]. Here is the peer-reviewed fundamental paper:
http://www.leif.org/research/Reconstruction-of-Group-Number-1610-2015.pdf
and a graph with an error band:
http://www.leif.org/research/New-GN-Large.png
The table in the paper gives the estimated error for each year.
Shame on your unfounded knee-jerk reaction.
That’s not what you use though, is it? How about depicting the ‘data’ as error ranges minus trend line?
Frankly, given the ‘data’ uncertainty that would be a better representation of the situation, than what gets continually and fruitlessly presented. Just error bounds as a shaded area with no bold trend line present. As that’s about all the precision of plot this ‘data’ really merits.
This would also remove the time-wasting tendency to over interpret or over correlate and become assertive about details in the trend line ‘data’, as plotted as a ‘trend’. That discrete trend line depiction is after all more or less irrelevant. It’s the error and uncertainty level that people should be most aware of, as a trend just gives an impression of precision that’s misleading and more or less argumentatively meaningless.
Apparently, you still do not take the trouble to do simple due diligence before putting foot in mouth…
Yes, Los Ninos cool the ocean, and the heat is lost irreversibly to space.
I continue to believe that the ‘large, sparse, and primarily Southern Hemispheric’ sunspots during the Maunder Minimum are a clue to the mechanisms by which the sun can affect Earth’s temperature.
There was(is) hemispheric assymetry, there was(is) suppression of smaller spots, and heh, there were(are?) volcanos on Earth. Radio-isotope date is indeterminate. If not cosmic rays, if not ultry-violet rays, then what, if anything?
===================
And I’m still not quite sure why tiny tidal forces might not have an effect, difficult though it is for us to imagine or measure it. Clearly, at polar reversal, the forces are balanced on a knife edge.
==============
at polar reversal, the forces are balanced on a knife edge
What forces? The tidal effects are of the order on millimeters, and nothing is on a ‘knife edge’ at [solar] polar reversals.
Leif, I’m sure you have a much better understanding of the sun and its forces than do I. Most of what I know came from you or Frank Baxter in ‘Our Mr. Sun’. But the variability demonstrated around reversal argues for some increased sensitivity.
Also, how about them Maunder Spots?
======================
@Kim,
You write, “Yes, Los Ninos cool the ocean, and the heat is lost irreversibly to space.”
But this post said:
So what are you referring to? (Sincere question.)
The ocean is continually recharged by the sun. The heat lost irreversibly is during each El Nino. Have I resolved your question?
================
I would question the source of heat for the Le Nino’s, is it solar ? Or does it come from below the thin oceanic crust in the Western Pacific. And is the activity of that modulated by cosmic rays ? It has been put forward by others that this could be a factor in volcanic activity.
@ J Martin, I totally agree with you. I have also often wondered about that. Especially when just in the past few years scientists have found the so called “smokers”, well below the surface of the ocean. Which, beside the fact that they were never seen before, also opened up a whole new, never seen before field of living organisms and an environment and a whole new, never seen before field of biology. There are many discussions on this and other sites that sound too much like “the science is settled”, it never is and that is why this and other sites are fun to follow.
Warm water mixed into the top choppy layers (as it does during the much more windy La Nina) is thus stored in the oceans while even more is added by the Sun under much sunnier La Nina skies. Warm water that layers onto the top calm layer (as it does during the much less windy El Nino) and spreads out like an oil slick, rapidly evaporates away while less shortwave infrared insolation is available to recharge the ocean under much cloudier skies.
I am reminded of a post from years ago, and I admit I no longer remember where it was posted but it’s very succinct.
“It’s the sun, stupid.”
Not entirely on topic, but can someone comment on my conclusion, for someone who works in Telecom.
First, the sunspot activity, or lack of it, would suggest that the sun is going into a phase in its cycles where we expect less energy to reach the earth. Is that correct? Second, the El Nino has given up a fair amount of energy, (heat), from the Pacific. That heat manifests itself in the atmosphere, for a brief boost to atmospheric temps. However, the heat is then Lost to Space, (not to be confused with a 1960’s sci-fi TV show). This means the earth should show some cooling in the next 12-18 months, (data adjustments not withstanding) … However, the cooling may be a continued leveling of temps or it may be an actual drop, anyone’s estimate is as good as the next, depending on the model specification, given our current understanding of climate.
Does that pass for an acceptable Cliff-Notes version?
Thanks,
Mark
expect less energy to reach the earth. Is that correct
Yes, but the deficit is very tiny [less than one in a thousand] so no noticeable effect is to be expected.
Isn’t there a half percent difference in TSI from Max to Min? That would be a one in two hundred difference, and I’ve thought that that difference is measurable.
However, your ‘one in a thousand’ may be about right for the rest of this cycle. Just not quite the whole story.
Mark, we should watch ARGO, with Pielke Pere.
============
kim, i thought it interesting to note that the ukmo argo data, as young as it is, dovetails quite nicely with the solar cycle. Cooling ’til about 2010 and then warming since then. We should all, as you say, “watch ARGO”…
lsvalgaard
“Yes, but the deficit is very tiny [less than one in a thousand] so no noticeable effect is to be expected.”
Unless hypothesis about solar amplification mechanisms are correct, in which case we should get a noticeable effect.
Could the hiatus be a noticeable effect?
First: what would be the amplification process?
Second: no clear effect has been observed.
And, what could keep an amplifier, capable of changes on Earth from Solar influence, under control?
===========
lsvalgaard,
“First: what would be the amplification process?”
Several amplification mechanisms have been proposed in the literature, from non linear effects on clouds, ozone, upper atmosphere changes, trade winds effects, and so on. I do not subscribe any one of them, and they have failed to convince the majority of scientists, but that doesn’t mean they are all wrong. The amplification could be real even if we don’t understand it.
“Second: no clear effect has been observed.”
What clear effect would you expect? I think that if there is an amplification mechanism and the Sun reduces its output we should expect over the long term, with a delay depending on the unknown mechanism, a reduction in the rate of warming that cannot be properly explained by known forcings. I am not saying that the hiatus is such effect, but it could certainly fit the bill in my humble opinion.
If cycle 25 is as low as 24 and for the next 15 years we don’t get the expected warming, would you consider that the quiet Sun might have something to do with it?
As an aside – with regard to ARGO – does anyone know if the floats that supposedly showed inconvenient cooling were actually decommissioned, switched off or taken out of service in some way?
Or were their inconvenient results only removed from the end analysis.
i.e. are the floats that Willis didn’t like still out there and reporting, or have they been retrieved or abandoned.
I ask only because, all is not lost, if at some point a real scientist were put in charge who understood the simple principle that preferential removal of certain unwanted results is a case of cherry-picking as serious as preferential inclusion of only specific cherry picked results.
Do we have a name in science for cherry picking by removal of selected bad/naughty data in order to skew the average?
If we can’t point out that this is also unacceptable then in the end these fools will be telling us that they didn’t pick any of the cherries – they only removed all of the “spurious” cake.
And the alarmingly warming cherries, “just happened” to reveal themselves as all that remained.
Depending on the motive it could be called fraud.
OTOH there have been instances of too much reliance on reputation. Michelson – speed of light. In the current case it might just be “can’t contradict conventional wisdom”.
From a observational p.o.v. slowed solar activity equals slowed Nino cycle. A resultant temperature difference of just 0.55C year over year on peak is like that last confetti pop and horn compliment on new years eve.
It “can’t” be the sun stupid, because the sun is “too weak”, so it must be “something else”. “Science” says so.
Frank Bosse and Fritz Vahrenholt write, “The average temperature of the IPWP has decreased by about 1°C since spring of 2013. Since the beginning of the Argo measurements in 2004, it has never been cooler than today. Note that this refers to a huge water mass of about 16 million cubic kilometers. For comparison: The energy that has been released from here corresponds to the amount that the whole earth receives from the sun by the solar radiation flux during a 4 days period. This huge amount of energy increases the global surface temperature which leads to increased radiation of a good part of the heat into space. An El Nino in the end therefore generates a heat loss of the system earth. ”
Unfortunately, that is a severely limited perspective of the effects of an El Niño. The heat loss from the Indo-Pacific Warm Pool is temporary. An El Niño does not consume all of the warm water that had traveled east. Some of that leftover warm water (ENSO residuals) will return to the Indo-Pacific Warm Pool (slow-moving Rossby waves) this year.
The severely limited perspective also overlooks the fact that the loss of heat is only from the tropical Pacific. Outside of the tropical Pacific there can be ocean heat gains in response to an El Niño due to changes in atmospheric circulation (more sunlight reaching the ocean surfaces, slower trade wind strengths, less evaporation, less coastal upwelling of cool subsurface waters, etc.). And after the El Niño, some of the ENSO residuals (leftover warm water) will be redistributed to the oceans adjoining the tropical Pacific.
And the severely limited perspective fails to consider the increases in surface temperatures (and outgoing longwave radiation) outside of the tropical Pacific that were also caused by changes in atmospheric circulation.
Last, the temporary heat losses from the Indo-Pacific Warm Pool in responses to the 2014/15 and 2015/16 El Niños was dwarfed by the loss during the 1997/98 El Niño.
Cheers.
As usual, Bob’s got it; it’s not so simple after all.
===============
Bob, I find the following article an interesting attempt at modeling the past 800,000 years in abrupt climate change. They propose a heat source(s) that causes the Antarctic to go through a relatively uninterrupted rise in temperature, then one in the Northern Hemisphere that leads to a peak, followed by a fall again into glacial advance. I wonder if that heat source is the buildup of left over El Nino waters over time, a concept you alude to in your description of El Nino waters not being entirely consumed during an El Nino period. Here is a quote from the article:
“Our formulation of the thermal bipolar seesaw concept is qualitatively analogous to that of (9) in that it implies the existence of a heat reservoir that convolves the northern signal, producing a southern signal with a longer characteristic time scale. Our approach is slightly different in that we relate the rate of Antarctic temperature change directly to the northern temperature anomaly. Indeed, we note that for some long stadial events, particularly those associated with glacial terminations, Antarctic temperatures appear to rise unabated until an abrupt warming event occurs in the north (19).”
http://science.sciencemag.org/content/334/6054/347
(Note: I joined the site for free in order to read the full article and download it.)
I have a related question if I may, and I am not really sure how to ask it properly, but here it goes.
My question revolves somewhat around radiation and sources of such.
40 years ago, as an example, we had a few satellites communicating to ground stations and back. Radio and TV station towers broadcasting OTA at a fairly saturated rate in urban areas. Radar arrays and microwaves also in growing numbers etc.
Today, using simple tools, I detected hundreds, if not thousands, of WiFi hotspots, cell phones, cell towers etc., while simply traversing the city of Tampa ( likely many billions of such a global scale). Now, that said, how does such an increase in emitted radiation/energy impact things around it. There are probably hundreds of other type things emitting some form or radiation/energy and many things that didn’t exist 40 years ago.
We always hear of the incoming solar radiation/energy in the form of watts per square meter, but what about the terrestrial based/created radiation/energy output? I am aware of the IR/LWR solar influences and spectrums, EMF etc., but can’t find much on anthropogenic technological energy emission influences measured in aggregate.
So I guess my question is, what impact does our ever increasing use of energy emitting technologies, from vast and varying sources, have on our environment/atmosphere?
This thought was generated from a conversation with an engineer who worked on military radar systems years ago and his recently recalled comment. “If you walk in front of that radar dish, you will fry to a crisp”. I don’t know if he was correct, but it certainly made me think of how things have changed over the last 40 years and how that change could be impacting things.
Thoughts, critique?
Regards
Ed
The energy in radio waves is exceedingly minute. By way of illustration, the total energy picked up by all the radio telescopes in the world since they were invented in the 1930s is less than the kinetic energy of a single snowflake falling to the ground. So there is no expected effect of the man-made radiation.
Think of the 2.4 GHz band WiFi coming from your router, as an example, that gets interference from your microwave oven operating at the same frequency. This is not just about conventional radio waves Leif.
Well, they are microwaves and the energy they emit are still minute.
http://www.who.int/peh-emf/publications/facts/fs304/en/
ossqs: There are no “not conventional radio waves” there are only radio waves and it’s energy is 10 exp5 ( in your case of Ghz-frequencies) lower than visible light due to E=h*f ( h is the Planck-quantum).
AND the sun emits much less radio waves then visible light:
http://qdl.scs-inc.us/2ndParty/Images/Charles/Sun/SolarSpectrum2_wbg.png
No chanche for radio waves!
Thanks for the feedback, it is appreciated.
My question relates more to environmental/atmospheric impacts, not human. Never the less, there is a relevant data point in the 2006 WHO article linked.
“To date, the only health effect from RF fields identified in scientific reviews has been related to an increase in body temperature (> 1 °C) from exposure at very high field intensity found only in certain industrial facilities, such as RF heaters.”
Now that is an extreme example, but that article was from 10 years ago at the very beginning of the wireless revolution and I would venture to say we have added many, many billions of devices etc. to the totals (7-8 billion cell phones as of 2014). I am still in search of data with respect to aggregate energy injected into the environment by our technologies. Yes, individually perhaps not much, but in aggregate globally, how many molecules are being excited, even a little bit, by what we produce from our technologies.
Regards
Ed
The energetics is against you. Billion of devices working at, say, 1 Watt is nothing compared to to the 200000000000000000 Watt we get from ordinary sunlight …
Dangit Leif, you destroying my AGW thesis grant request, but your rebuttal is well recieved.
Now, did you really count all those zeros without commas? 😉
Counted keystrokes: 1, 2, 3 ,4, … 17
At 100 Watts/human, if all those 18 digits were converted to the sustenance of humans, a practically impossible maximum, then the Earth could support on the order of half a million times more human souls than it does at present. As stated, this is an ideal maximum, quite impossible to achieve, but it illustrates that a tiny percentage increase of our use of the sun, a la Norman Borlaug, can sustain many times our present population in a lifestyle to which we would all like to become accustomed.
Limited carrying capacity for the earth, bah! The adherents of that root of Malthusian ignorance have a low carrying capacity of imagination, and a very high one for fear.
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“The energy in radio waves is exceedingly minute. By way of illustration, the total energy picked up by all the radio telescopes in the world since they were invented in the 1930s is less than the kinetic energy of a single snowflake falling to the ground. ”
But then again, there’s an illusion of knowledge in theoretical physics.
http://emdrive.com/
But then again, there’s an illusion of knowledge in theoretical physics
Here is that illusion put to good use:
http://teachingboys.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/015.jpg
Thanks Leif for bringing the physics into attention ( just like I tried) because I’m a ham ( radio amateur) and we have to fight against the superstition of “dangerous radio radiation”. 🙂
In order to calculate the heat gain from all of those billions of electronic devices, their actual RF output is a rounding error compared to the amount of heat generated by their power supplies. A simple .05 Watt wifi router might draw (pick a number) 10 Watts from the mains. The difference is lost (as heat) in conversion from AC to low voltage DC, regulation and the rest of the business. Battery powered devices are even less efficient. This is true of every electronic device. Ask Leif how much power was required for all the radio telescopes in history to detect energy less than a falling snowflake. (Just to be clear, an incredibly huge knowledge return on investment of energy IMHO)
Soooo…. To save the world, just get everyone to shut off their computers, phones, radio telescopes, etc. If the True Believers could be sold this crock, the world might indeed be saved – by taking all of them offline and letting the rest of us get on with understanding reality.
True…I worked on relatively low average power airborne attack radar…I once put my hand in front of the antenna for a moment to check if it out and it certainly got hot quickly…. It reminds me of the proposal for Solar power satellites (SPS) that would collect electrical energy and transmit it to the surface as radio and convert it back to electrical for the grid… https://www.technologyreview.com/s/400104/beam-it-down/
Technically feasible, not yet economic; it would warm the earth. Hey, maybe we could stop the next ice age with a nice little array of these.
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Again, it is about emmissions in addition to the supposition. Add land use and all the “A” (anthropogenic) things we study and such, and the math starts adding up. The forcings and feedbacks of such still prove to be very much unknowns in most respects to any natural variability …… whatever that is since we spend nothing on that part of the equation.
Kim, could certainly phase it better than I 😉
still prove to be very much unknowns in most respects to any natural variability
We cannot [should not] base policy on things “very much unknown”.
” I worked on relatively low average power airborne attack radar…”
Carrier radar, from some related work, has a bit of a kick to it.
But I still don’t see it warming the planet.
More energy brought in will warm the planet. More will leave, but the reset will be at a higher temperature, analogous to the argument that a higher CO2 level resets the temp higher, all else unchanged.
============
A 500 W microwave radiates most of that energy. A falling snowflake is not going to heat your chicken. In the case of the microwave we prefer to keep most (the vast majority) of that energy confined. For a radar set we want most of that energy to get into “space”. And it does.
Same for all the other human designed intentional radiators.
At a distance from the radiators the power density is low. But that power remains in space until it is absorbed.
In the early days of transistor radios there were designs for radios that could amplify the signal received using the power collected by the antenna. The power is small but it is not (in some cases) insignificant.
Nice comment thread between Vucevic and Isvalgaard–what I had though I knew about solar influences on weather cycles is more indeterminate than I had thought.
Willis: “Unfortunately, that is a severely limited perspective of the effects of an El Niño. The heat loss from the Indo-Pacific Warm Pool is temporary. An El Niño does not consume all of the warm water that had traveled east. Some of that leftover warm water (ENSO residuals) will return to the Indo-Pacific Warm Pool (slow-moving Rossby waves) this year.”
As I read the post there is no contradiction as there is noted:
” One of the reasons is of course the current El Nino. Another element is the Indo-Pacific Warm Pool (IPWP).”
Do you disagree with the summary: “An El Nino in the end therefore generates a heat loss of the system earth. The current pulse of warming is partly a consequence of this natural process. The recent temperature records therefore are more related to the natural ENSO cycle than to global warming…”?
Willis: “Last, the temporary heat losses from the Indo-Pacific Warm Pool in responses to the 2014/15 and 2015/16 El Niños was dwarfed by the loss during the 1997/98 El Niño.”
From what data do you make this claim? The heat content of 0…-700m? Before the Argo measurements one should it use with care and in the post, as I understood it, they used the full Argo-data since 2004 for 0…500m depth.
Cheers
“Willis” should read “Bob”?
It may be very difficult to total the whole heat budget over all these basins, but I believe the general point holds, that Las Ninas allow recharge of the ocean heat, by keeping more in, and Los Ninos inhibit recharge by letting more out. The earth radiates more when it is hotter, less when cooler.
Incidentally, I’ve long considered Josh Willis to be one of the most conflicted men on earth. I trust ARGO, though, because I consider him an honest scientist. My judgement is from eavesdropping on an email correspondence he, Pielke Pere, and Kevin Trenberth had several years ago about transport of heat to the deep. He would not fall into line with Kevin.
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And, heh, I’m pretty sure that that ‘Willis’ does read that ‘Bob’.
============
Sorry, Willis=Bob ( in this case 🙂 )
>> The global temperature in February was 1.35 °C
>> above the average from 1951 to 1980.
Why 1951-1980???? Why not 1921-1950 or 1981-2010 ?
I think we know the answer to that.
Further, why do decadal ranges quoted by climate scientists
invariably begin with ‘1’ … is this an indication of their numerical
sophistication ? ( sarc )
“Why 1951-1980???? Why not 1921-1950 or 1981-2010 ?”
Long ago I wrote a program to answer this question.
1. The answer didnt change no matter which 30 year period you selected.
2. The period with the most temperature reports starts around 1953.
3. If you select the 1951-1980 period you get a little less noise in your base period because of the extra stations.
4. As I recall hansens first papers on tempertures were in the late 80’s so he could not have picked 1981-2010.
5. There are some good reasons to select 1961-1990 ( station counts more equal in each hemisphere)
But the bottom line is this
1. It doesnt matter which period you pick, c03 still warms the planet
Mosher … ” c03 still warms the planet.”
Now we have to worry about Carbon Trioxide too? : )
..Thomas, just wait till he starts telling us about CO4, that’s when it gets really scary !! LOL
co4 is definitely exothermic. As to c04? I’m not familiar with that.
” c03 still warms the planet”
There is no evidence of a loss of nightly cooling since 1940, in fact cooling is slightly more than warming.
Because a calendar decade begins in year xxx1 and ends in year xxx0.
Rex: “Why 1951-1980???? Why not 1921-1950 or 1981-2010 ?”
The official reference-period for the anomaly of GISS is 1951…1980, see: http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/tabledata_v3/GLB.Ts+dSST.txt . You can change the base periode, nothing will change in the relative anomalies.
OMG! You mean anthropogenic CO2 emissions have caused solar magnetic activity to decline! we’re doomed unless we can get Al Gore and Michael Moore and Michael Mann to do implement the UN’s global neo-Marxist agenda right away ! /sarc
An interesting analysis. Thank you Guest Blogger, Frank Bosse and Fritz Vahrenholt
Bob,
Kim wrote, “It may be very difficult to total the whole heat budget over all these basins, but I believe the general point holds, that Las Ninas allow recharge of the ocean heat, by keeping more in, and Los Ninos inhibit recharge by letting more out. The earth radiates more when it is hotter, less when cooler.” (Good Spanish by the way; “Los Niños” is the correct plural of “El Niño.”)
Do you disagree with that statement?
It seems to me that the warming of the troposphere, which we measure during an El Niño event, is mostly caused by heat transferred from the Pacific Warm Pool to the atmosphere. Heat that was trapped below the ocean surface is transferred to the air, and the hotter air then radiates more heat to space, so the net result is heat loss from the total system (ocean & atmosphere). If that’s true, Los Niños events are actually cooling events. Our thermometers measure heat that is passing through the troposphere on its way out of the system.
There may be some additional heat entering the system in an El Niño, due to less cloud or other ocean / atmosphere circulation effects, but once the El Niño passes, and the heat is lost to deep space, there could be less heat in the overall system.
Likewise, during a La Niña event, we measure a cooler global air troposphere because the trade winds cause surface heat to be stored beneath the ocean in the Pacific Warm Pool. Water is a poor thermal conductor, and the topography of the region may prevent a Pacific equivalent to the Atlantic Gulf Steam, so a lot of heat could accumulate in the warm pool.
Bob, you wrote, “Unfortunately, that is a severely limited perspective of the effects of an El Niño. The heat loss from the Indo-Pacific Warm Pool is temporary. An El Niño does not consume all of the warm water that had traveled east. Some of that leftover warm water (ENSO residuals) will return to the Indo-Pacific Warm Pool (slow-moving Rossby waves) this year.”
I don’t disagree with your statement but, even if some all of the heat is not lost, that does not mean that an El Niño does not result in an overall loss of heat. When accumulated heat is transferred to the extra-tropics, and then radiates to space, doesn’t that mean the entire system probably lost heat that was stored during earlier Las Niñas events?
Thomas wrote: “Likewise, during a La Niña event, we measure a cooler global air troposphere because the trade winds cause surface heat to be stored beneath the ocean in the Pacific Warm Pool.”
When you say that surface warmth is stored beneath the surface (in the IPWP), you are talking about downwelling of warm surface water, which must be matched somewhere by upwelling cold deep water – presumably off the coast of Peru. So, if Figure 6 included the Eastern Equatorial Pacific, you MIGHT find that it is currently much warmer than usual because upwelling of cold water had slowed. (When the trade winds stop blowing warm water to the west, sea level in the Eastern Eq. Pacific rises, making upwelling more difficult.) So some of the heat that is missing from the IPWP may be found here, rather than on the surface. (I don’t have Bob Tisdale’s expertise.)
Since the surface of the ocean is warmer, it can transfer heat to the atmosphere despite what is going on below the surface. The region of above normal SSTs in the Easter and Central Equatorial Pacific dominates the surface coolness in the Western.
http://www.agcanada.com/countryguide/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/Screen-Shot-2016-01-14-at-2.44.23-PM.jpg
Thomas,
“If that’s true, Los Niños events are actually cooling events.”
That is correct. Los Niños constitute a short-circuit that discharges a lot of heat directly to the atmosphere and to space instead of being taken poleward by the Meridional transport. They appear to be a byproduct of the Latitudinal thermal gradient, as they did not take place during the Holocene Climate Optimum, only during the last 7000 years, and they also do not take place or are very much reduced during Bond events.
If it wasn’t for Los Niños, that heat would have to be transported to the poles by the atmosphere and the global conveyor and would eventually result in more surface warming and more sea ice melting. Also during an El Niño the warm surface waters are constantly covered by clouds reducing the incoming solar radiation by increasing the cloud albedo.
Javiar,
You wrote, “Also during an El Niño the warm surface waters are constantly covered by clouds reducing the incoming solar radiation by increasing the cloud albedo.”
I’m curious to know what source you based that statement on.
It’s Javier.
Cess, R.D., M. Zhang, B.A. Wielicki, D.F. Young, X. Zhou, and Y. Nikitenko. 2001. The Influence of the 1998 El Niño upon Cloud-Radiative Forcing over the Pacific Warm Pool. Journal of Climate. 14, pp. 2129-2137.
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Bruce_Wielicki/publication/249611279_The_Influence_of_the_1998_El_Nio_upon_Cloud-Radiative_Forcing_over_the_Pacific_Warm_Pool/links/551bd27e0cf2909047b96a6d.pdf
Thanks Javier.
Thomas,
First, fogive me, a short grammer lesson, which might be of interest to everyone. I appreciate your use of the Spanish keyboard for the correct Niño spelling. In Spanish, “el” means “the” and is generally not capitalized. You could argue that El Niño is a proper name and no one would object.
However, in writing, saying “the el Niño” is the same as saying “the the Niño.” /end Spanish lesson for the day/
For the rest, if el Niño is indeed a “charge/discharge” capacitor within the coupled, semi-chaotic climate system, in order for that system to remain in (semi)-stasis, its heat gain/loss must equalize over time. Pick your time scale.
As Bob T. and others have pointed out, the net gain/loss is far from being understood with certainty. Too bad we don’t have the Argo data for 97/98.
The question I want to ask is this: The authors of the paper mention an amount of energy “radiated” by el Niño, to which Bob T. responds appropriately with the uncertanties. But the answer is very imporant in the AGW debate.
What is the magnitude of the heat gain/loss of el Niño/Niña compared to CO2? How about the sun? IMHO, natural events are orders of magnitude greater than any CO2 effects. Understanding and articulating these (even as uncertanties) are key to shifting the debate.
In legal jargon, it is not necessary to prove that CO2 is “guilty” of creating global warming, it is only necessary to prove “reasonable doubt.” Gracias a Dios for WUWT providing a forum for reasonable doubt. I want to argue that it is time to start putting numbers on the magnitude of the doubt.
Gracias por la lección de gramática, señor. : )
It’s true there are many uncertainties but I still think it’s probably that Los Niños move heat from the ocean, through the troposphere, to deep space.
CO2, as everyone recalls, holds less heat, than standard air mix.
It’s sole – sole capacity to raise energy somehow is still unexplained.
The nitrogen/oxygen bath and greenhouse gases heat up together. At the temperature – or so – of the earth in general, CO2 and H2O start emitting light to space as radiant emission.
This – both these – constitute additional mass light is radiated from
after the general nitrogen/oxygen bath have been warmed, with them, and continue as the two – CO2/H2O – continue emitting infrared light enegy, to lower energy regions.
We’re thinking ‘spaceward’ at that point, and that’s good enough.
In fact water, while involved in the well known rise and fall inside a storm cell, originally of course evaporates out of the giant basin, of chilled water, that covers the earth.
When it evaporates, cooling the ocean it left, it eventually loses energy and falls back toward earth as ice.
It rarely though, makes it back down in one trip because as it falls,
it goes from ice, right back to the evaporated state again; not once
several times. This re-evaporation is due to absorption of heat energy directly from the stream of rising air, inside the convective-evaporative cell.
The way the water eventually makes it to the surface again is by cooling the region it’s in, until there isn’t enough energy to evaporate it any more: and thus chilled, the evaporated coolant returns to the ocean.
I started in applied chemistry when I was 8 years old, many many years ago in a business where the chemistry of gas is simply everyday work.
In all these years I have yet to have someone explain how water – so well known for it’s capacity to evaporate and cool – doesn’t simply neutralize any warming,
the way it has since before time began. It evaporates from the pool of it covering 70 percent or more of the earth, chilling the surface, considerably.
Then it cycles in the air itself: repeating this refrigeration cycling over, and over.
This is all, in the description of an evaporative cooler.
Furthermore there’s CO2’s presence in such tiny, tiny quantities – and all it can do – is – again – part of the definition of this deal is that these gases emit light at the same temps earth does –
contribute additional radiating mass, molecule by molecule, many thousands of meters above the surface of the planet – in fact the presence of water and CO2 comprise
additional radiators of earth derived temps, which serve to reduce the temperature of the planet, not raise it.
You can not raise the temperature of an object through immersing 70% of it’s surface in frigid evaporating refrigerant, and say you have made a heater.
And you cannot evaporate matter from the surface to scatter it many thousands of meters above that surface – hastening radiant release from the surface through creating a much larger overall surface that’s radiating –
and that is a heater.
The oceans are filled with chilled to liquid, phase-change refrigerant. 70% of the surface of the earth is covered in it, and for that reason those regions won’t ever reach a temperature above, what will evaporate off.
Evaporating liquid from a surface to chill it is cooling it and the earth’s surface is covered in evaporating phase change liquid, which refrigerates not just everything on the surface it condenses on – as in cools and contracts, to liquid or ice – to then leave – when re-heated;
but the water particularly is well known, for it’s action scrubbing the nitrogen/oxygen atmosphere at large, through which it’s cycling, of heat.
This I feel is why natural scientists find so many problems with the claims of green house gas atmosphere pseudo-chemistry.
The people telling the story simply don’t recognize the enormity of the temperature inversion they are trying to cover up. I think the original people who Al Gore outed in his movie did: Mann, Hansen, Trenberth, Jones, Briffa – these people all had degrees, they had their grants scamming operation put into a movie and it became cover-their-ass time
but there’s too much inversion when chilled oceans of evaporative refrigerant become massive heaters; and the frigid winds blowing energy off sun warmed rocks, are heaters.
It’s an unlikely way for a bunch of scientific scamming to be uncovered – through one of their own political heroes movie about their ”work”
but that’s what happened.
When I worked for NOAA back in the early 70s, we lived in the Table Mesa area. (table table area)
(This was in Boulder, Colorado.)
how about a steak served “with au jus”?
Drives me nuts.
uncertainties. I’m certain.
” When accumulated heat is transferred to the extra-tropics, and then radiates to space,”
And there is evidence of this, it cools slightly more at night than it warmed the previous day.
FranK, Fritz or Leif: TSI is power; energy/time. It can add to or subtract from the heat content of the planet. “Solar activity” is not power, it can only act indirectly, for example by changing albedo. “Solar activity” can be measured by different techniques: sun-spot number, magnetic field strength, magnetic field strength as assessed by cosmic rays (C14 and B11 production), neutron flux?, etc. Where can I see changing solar activity convincingly modify albedo or some other aspect of the climate system that is clearly connected to temperature?
FranK, Fritz or Leif: TSI is power; energy/time. It can add to or subtract from the heat content of the planet. “Solar activity” is not power
Solar activity = sunspots per day, thus power.
TSI received by Earth over surface per day is energy, not power.
You should be careful about being pedantic.
Leif: Thanks for the reply. I didn’t intend to be pedantic; I’m frustrated, because I don’t understand the excitement about solar variability. If changing solar activity is only about changing TSI, the papers I have read (and ClimateDIalogue) suggest that the Maunder Minimum represented a global forcing of -1 W/m2 or less (TSI 4 W/m2). And that appears almost trivial compared with current and future GHG forcing. So I’m looking for solid evidence that something more significant is involved.
Unless I’m deluded (and plenty of blog commenters are), TSI is measured in W/m2 – technically a power flux. Sun spot number is not a power flux – one needs a formula for converting SSN into W/m2 (which only appears possible during the satellite era (3+ cycles, the only reliable TSI data), possibly supplemented with a few cycles of neutron flux data. The same goes for other solar proxies such as C14 and B11.
FWIW, dimensional analysis shows that a radiative imbalance INITIALLY produces a RATE of temperature change: (J/s)/m2 / {(J/K-m3) * m} = K/s, where the last m is the depth perpendicular to the flux of the material whose temperature is changing. A +1 W/m2 change in forcing/radiative imbalance is capable of warming/cooling a 50 m mixed layer and the atmosphere at an initial rate of 0.2 K/yr. Equilibrium warming, of course, depends on ECS. That would be about 1 K (5 years at the initial rate) for an ECS of 3.7 W/m2; and about half of as much if you believe ECS from energy balance models. By the time we get halfway to equilibrium at constant forcing, the radiative imbalance (and warming rate) have been reduced by 50% by Planck feedback and the negative exponential approach to equilibrium has become obvious. Technically, one is integrating a shrinking radiative imbalance from time equals zero to infinity to get the energy (power*time) transferred and (with the help of heat capacity) equilibrium warming. Pinatubo also shows that heat transport below the mixed layer is significant within about a year, further slowing the approach to equilibrium warming.
I’m frustrated
You are frustrated because you have a hard time accepting that the data simply shows that solar variability is but a minor player [of the order of 01. degree].
And TSI intercepted by the Earth over any time interval is not a power, but a measure of energy. Because the area of the Earth is fixed we can simply used the measured TSI as proxy for the energy entering the environment.
Leif: I understand that the most familiar data (TSI in the satellite era) shows that solar variation has negligible impact on our climate. I’m frustrated that other data on solar “activity” is presented as if it had an important effect on our climate, but without a clear mechanism. So, we may be in agreement.
Since ECS is used to convert a forcing in terms of W/m2 (power) into an equilibrium temperature change, numerous blog authors and commenters confuse power with energy and temperature. They forget that heat capacity is needed to convert energy into a temperature. They don’t understand that a constant forcing produces a gradually shrinking radiative imbalance (due to Planck feedback). They expect to see a full equilibrium response, for example, during a transient forcing – from volcanos for example. You may add to the confusion by writing:
“TSI intercepted by the Earth over any time interval is not a power, but a measure of energy. Because the area of the Earth is fixed we can simply used the measured TSI as proxy for the energy entering the environment.”
TSI intercepted by the Earth is a measure of power; TSI intercepted by the Earth OVER ANY TIME INTERVAL is a measure of energy entering the environment – after correcting for albedo. And dividing by 4 before comparing with OLR and calculating radiative imbalance. Finally, neither can be simply converted to a change in temperature without additional information.
If there weren’t so much misinformation floating around, your characterization – pedantic – would be appropriate. I’d prefer “precise”.
TSI intercepted by the Earth is a measure of power
The power input as such is not useful. What is important is the energy received over a relevant time scale and total area [e.g. a day – because of the rotation of the spherical Earth]. That we use TSI in units of power is just a convenience as that is what we measure [actually it is the electrical current to keep our sensor’s temperature constant that is measured]. There is no confusion on this point and any pedantry on this is counterproductive.
I’d prefer “precise”.
The subtlety of “precise” is lost on 99% of everybody.
Re Michael Palmer
“………. “medias” as the new singular and “mediass” as the plural?
Surely media-ass is appropriate?
lsvalgaard
March 20, 2016 at 4:38 pm
Define “little difference”.
Inverting peaks and troughs getting the recent solar max at a time, three months later, when there was in fact trough in activity may seem like “little difference” to you.
Similarly, there are significant differences in the graph the Vuk’ posted reworking the GSN (thought again I would like to know what filter he used rather then calling it “LPF” )
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/GSN-LPF.gif
Note the large swings in late 18th c. and in the 20th c. This is exactly my point. If both time series are showing such distortions due to defective filtering it hardly helps assess the degree of correlation. It may be degrading a true similarity in the data or spuriously giving the impression they are more similar that they really are.
This is why using well-behaved filters SYSTEMATICALLY is important in science and engineering. Oddly solar physicists ( among others ) seem to think good practice makes “little difference”.
The argument that SSN has been badly filtered for over a hundred years because it traditionally had be done with paper pencil is as convincing as saying we should still be using the horse and cart as our main means of transport.
I would not cost a dime to provide the “legacy” running mean data for historical comparison while providing properly filtered SSN data for anyone wishing to work in the 21st century.
Greg.
1700s numbers are not accurate readings, they are just ESTIMATES of most likely low and high values, whereby high estimate is 40% higher than low numbers.
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/GSNe.gif
Result is that the 20th century solar Grand Maximum is wiped out of existence, and moved over to the late 1700s, when the known instrumental temperature records from number of European countries show significant drop, and were much lower than the present one.
The task is accomplished: sun couldn’t possibly have any major effect on the long temperature variability.
p.s. Uncertainty in any data from centuries past is not to be blindly accepted, it needs to be questioned, there are just too many attempts, left right and centre, to present uncertain data as if cast in stone.
One more time: the numbers are actual observations [~1100 of them during 1750-1799] . All observations have uncertainties and the low-high range simply expresses the estimated uncertainty of the yearly averages.
just too many attempts, left right and centre, to present uncertain data as if cast in stone
Rather there are too many attempts [including yours] to bend the data to fit peoples pet theories. That is why we have paid great attention to the getting the numbers correct. As a further test we are observing the sun with 18th century telescopes [with all their flaws of spherical and chromatic aberration] and finding that the results justify the estimates we made [a factor of three needed to adjust the old numbers to match the modern scale]. Here is a sample:
http://www.leif.org/research/ATS-SSN.png
It is time for you to stop polluting WUWT with your nonsense.
lsvalgaard March 20, 2016 at 4:55 pm
here is high-resolution map of the cosmic ray intensity over the sky:from
http://imagine.gsfc.nasa.gov/science/objects/cosmic_rays1.html
Selectiveand misleading quoting of NASA’s article. NASA shows a spatial map of a moment in time as seen from the Earth:
“The magnetic fields of the Galaxy, the solar system, and the Earth have scrambled the flight paths of these particles so much that we can no longer point back to their sources in the Galaxy. If you made a map of the sky with cosmic ray intensities, it would be completely uniform.”
NASA has no idea where GCR come from, NASA concludes :
“Perhaps they (cosmic rays) come from outside the Galaxy, from active galactic nuclei, quasars or gamma ray bursts. Or perhaps they’re the signature of some exotic new physics: superstrings, exotic dark matter, strongly-interacting neutrinos, or topological defects in the very structure of the universe. ”
Neutron count according to most recent measurements varies only about 15-20% between solar max & min, your 1700s GSN data has 40% estimate difference for the solar max estimated values; plenty of room for tree rings data uncertainty.
Thanks to our good friend Dr. Mann, the tree rings science is given bad name, regardless how good it is.
” If you made a map of the sky with cosmic ray intensities, it would be completely uniform.”
Of course, does NOT mean it will be constant in time, which I think was your original point about the modulation time series.
As the intensity we see is the result of millions of years of scrambling by the turbulent interstellar magnetic field, time variations on the time that we are interested in [millenia] are completely washed out.
Again you have no idea what you are talking about.
1) because of the scrambling in space, the counts are also scrambled in time. The estimate is that we are seeing the average intensity over the last 2 million years.
2) What NASA didn’t know is the origin of the very rare ultra-high energy cosmic rays which are irrelevant for the modulation
3) The cosmic ray modulation is not a measure of the total intensity of the particles, but only of the change induced by solar activity so you cannot compare sizes as you did.
“Thanks to our good friend Dr. Mann, the tree rings science is given bad name, regardless how good it is.”
What Mann does is dendrothermometry which is a new “science” made up out of thin air to approve a political agenda. This has nothing to do with dendrochronology which is an established field of study.
You would do the latter a service if you avoid woolly term like “tree-ring science” that only serve deviant pseudo-scientists like Mann in falsely assimilating his Mickey Mouse tree-ring thermometers and trying to steal the credibility earned by decades os work by genuine scientists in dendrochronology.
Do you know where that “C14” data comes from? I’d like to do this properly, since the author of that graph seems incapable.
No I have no idea where the C14 graph data is available, else I would had a go at it too.
dccowboy:
” If you are allowed to rearrange historical data at your whim it will naturally support whatever hypothesis you wish to propose.”
‘That statement applies to NOAA/GISS as well as Mr Vukcevic.’
Howdy DC
Thanks for the comment, it is highly relevant to the discussion.
As it happens, I am protesting that‘ my bellowed Solar Grand Maximum’ by rearranging historical sunspot data has been moved from the late 1900s, two hundred years back to the late 1700s, where, oh what a “shock and awe”, no one ever before considered to be its place.
Recently I complained about the UK’s Met Office annual temperature data, and guess what, they followed my suggestion and changed the method of calculation after 60 years of doing it their way.
I also have been known to change one or two numbers in my equations when I realised the errors.
all the best to you.
Tom Halla
“Nice comment thread between Vucevic and Isvalgaard–what I had though I knew about solar influences on weather cycles is more indeterminate than I had thought.”
Hi Mr. Halla
Thanks, but not many people here would agree with your sentiment. Dr. Svalgaard is Stanford’s scientist with work of the global renown and importance, I am just an ordinary engineer, novice and amateur, often castigated for daring to question the highest of the authority. So far so good, as long as the exchanges are kept on a civilized and polite terms.
As it happens, I am protesting that‘ my bellowed Solar Grand Maximum’ by rearranging historical sunspot data has been moved from the late 1900s, two hundred years back to the late 1700s, where, oh what a “shock and awe”, no one ever before considered to be its place
Not true. Up until 1998 it was well established that the 18th century was very active. Hoyt & Schatten questioned that with their new Group Sunspot Number. We know now that their analysis was flawed, see e.g. http://www.leif.org/research/Recalibrating-the-Sunspot-Number-CEAB.pdf
The traditional filter used by solar physicists on the sunspot number is meant to suppress the rotational [27-day] variation and does well enough for that while making comparisons with earlier work easier and discouraging petty food-fight over which filter is ‘better. The modern 20 nHz filter used for the polar fields is meant to suppress the annual variation and does a good job at that. The filter used by Hathaway and myself in http://www.leif.org/research/The-Waldmeier-Effect.pdf works well too. Filters are often constructed for specific purposes and the distortions [as all of them have] are well-known and rarely troublesome.
The traditional filter is also used to suppress fluctuations on a time scale of about a year. There are two steps: first monthly means are calculated, then the monthly means are averaged with the monthly means shifted by one month. The ‘filter’ is not really a filter in our modern use of the concept, but has historical standing which is why it is still used. To my knowledge, no scientific finding or result has been distorted by the use of the historical procedure.
Well what is this sliding average supposed to be if you don’t want to call it a filter? I suppose it’s a “smoother”, right?
If you want to take monthly averages what is the aim of the exercise? Is it to re-sample the data, reduce ‘noise’ or both?
The correct way to re-sample data, especially in the presence of known, strong periodicity like the 27d cycle is use an anti-alias filter before re-sampling. This is like data processing 101. Seems like the SSN boys slept through that one.
What is the aim of re-sampling by taking a monthly average and then “sliding” it to retain the same number of data points. It clearly because it is hoped that this will be some kind of FILTER. The naive assumption that averaging will effectively and correctly reduce noise, so sliding average will remove noise while retaining the time resolution is never even checked.
All filters can be said to distort that data, that is the object of filtering. The aim is get the distortions you want, not just any distortions that are ignorant of because you have never examined the frequency response of your filter, and for some reason imagine that it is not “really” a filter at all.
If you want to remove h.f. ‘noise’ you had better chose a filter that does not introduce more h.f. by INVERTING part of the signal.
It would also be more scientific if running average was labelled as running average an not called “11y average” in axis labels and graph comments. That is very sloppy and unprofessional.
The objective is to suppress short-term fluctuations. The smoothing is the traditional one in order to make comparisons with older analysis easier, not to demonstrate knowledge of smoothing 101. And not to satisfy people who have been snubbed before. You are not the first, nor shall remain the last, who has gotten on their high horse to no avail.
Lief. Nir Shaviv says that when extremely intense cosmic ray bombardment of the earth occurs as the solar system passes through a spiral arm of the Milky Way, geologic data confirms that major global cooling occurs at the time of this extreme cosmic bombardment. From this observation, he argues cosmic radiation is the cause of the global cooling. Is he wrong?
Link: http://www.sciencebits.com/CosmicRaysClimate
What he finds is speculative. Both the cosmic ray intensity and the temperatures on time scales of tens of millions of years are highly uncertain. Data from the Moon indicate that the cosmic ray intensity has varied but little over billions of years.
why we bother with tree rings then, moon’s C14 records should be the ideal proxy for solar activity holocene, ice ages etc etc, let’s have some data.
As there are no trees on the Moon, there is no 14C data to be had. But isotopes from cosmic rays can be collected from the Moon’s surface and show no large variation of the cosmic ray intensity over millions of years.
I don’t think there is much organic matter on the Moon.
I din’t think /sarc was necessary.
” there are no trees on the Moon”, thanks for the clarification, wasn’t aware of that.
With your stuff, it is hard to separate truth from fiction… or real information from \sarc …
Now, there is lots of CO2 on Mars, so there will be 14C data in the ice caps…
NASA has reported more single event satellite upsets caused by cosmic rays, rather than from solar activity these last years.Must tell them about the Moon data. 🙂
NASA has reported more single event satellite upsets caused by cosmic rays, rather than from solar activity these last years.
Consider that perhaps there are also more satellites…
Must tell them about the Moon data.
I strongly encourage you to make your voice heard so go tell them. However, they, of course, know this already.
Please explain how C14 comes from plants. According to this, C14 is made when cosmic rays hit nitrogen in the atmosphere. Where do the plants come into the equation?
http://articles.latimes.com/2012/jun/04/science/la-sci-sn-cosmic-ray-increase-20120604
And what about Be10 and Titanium 44? How do we know these concentrations on the moon? Even if it is from moon rock, how do we know we brought back the right rocks?
14C combine with Oxygen to form 14CO2 with like ordicanry CO2 is plant food.
And what about Be10 and Titanium 44? How do we know these concentrations on the moon? Even if it is from moon rock, how do we know we brought back the right rocks?
10Be over the long run is consistent with the 14C data, although on short time scales the different residence time in the atmosphere make comparisons difficult in the short time.
44Ti data is highly variable and uncertain, so the jury is still out on that.
The Moon: what is the evidence that we picked the wrong rocks?
More precisely. It seems to me that plants only uptake the C14 from the atmosphere. They do not make it.
What is the evidence we picked the right rocks since cosmic rays fluctuate all over the earth?
We picked the rocks on the Moon in several places. If you have reason to believe the data is from the ‘wrong rocks’, show that evidence.
“One more time: the numbers are actual observations [~1100 of them during 1750-1799]”
n = 1100 /50 = 22/year”
That makes it less than 2 sunspot counts/month.
So, let’s have this clear, on bases of less than 2 observations / month (where all sorts of telescope optical problems could occur, grains of dust etc), your solar workshop decided to abolish the late 20th century well established and properly observed Grand Maximum, and past the honour of holding that record to the measly 2 observations/month in the late 1700s.
I could never sell such statistics to my employer, ‘he’ would never buy it, and if I attempted to do so, my job would end-up instantly in not much of a grand occasion.
Well, I don’t buy it either, but that doesn’t matter, does it..
decided to abolish the late 20th century well established and properly observed Grand Maximum
More nonsense. The modern data stays where it is [properly corrected for spurious weighting of spots]. It is just that the 18th century maximum is higher. Hoyt and Schatten showed that, even if you have observations on only 5% of days spread over a year, the average [true] sunspot number is well-determined from them [you can do that experiment your self: take the modern daily sunspot data, pick at random 20 days from each year, compute their average and compare with the yearly averages of the full series]. The geomagnetic and cosmic ray data confirm the 18th century high solar activity, so there is really no way we honestly can get around that. This is not to say that there will not be ‘rear-guard’ activists trying to old series because of their belief that it gives a convenient explanation for Global Warming or because it plays better with their own speculations.
Interesting, except the CO2 warming signal is not as clear from all of this murky data as stated at the end. This is one model projection I would like to see over SC 25 with backing of cycle strength predictions coming up soon.
Dr. Svalgaard
“‘rear-guard’ activists trying to old series because of their belief that it gives a convenient explanation for Global Warming or because it plays better with their own speculations.”
Yes, agree about that.
a) my speculation is irrelevant, despite the fact that may by chance, coincidence or possibly crudely reflecting natural events, got SC24 and development of polar fields to date ‘correct’ or not, anyone with any sense should not take it for granted. I do not have power, and if I did I would not suggest that anyone should modify their way of life based on it, right or wrong.
b) You and your colleagues are on the opposite end of the scale of influence, your (the workshop’s) views on these matters are now accepted as the world standard.
Powerful governments around world, including your own, listen to you on the solar matters, and if you are saying that old data
“ it gives a convenient explanation for Global Warming and to the contrary the new data takes away a convenient explanation for Global Warming you (the workshop) are taking HUGE responsibility on your shoulders, since millions if not billions of people around the world are and will be affected.
You (the workshop) may be right or god forbid, may be wrong, either way I wouldn’t swap the places.
All the best to you and your team.
if you are saying that old data
“ it gives a convenient explanation for Global Warming
Read what I said: it is the people who claims that the late 18th century has small solar activity who gives ammo to the view that it is an ‘explanation’ for global warming.
Data on this graph, now the solar activity ‘the world standard” is yours not mine, it is of profound importance for many decisions to be made in the near future regardless what others may claim about late 1700s.
I am only pointing out the obvious implication of the recalibration of the data,
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/NGM.gif
I am only pointing out the obvious implication of the recalibration of the data
Guess what. others have discovered that too.
http://www.iau.org/news/pressreleases/detail/iau1508/
Another obvious implication is the failure of your formula:
http://www.leif.org/research/Vuk-Failure-34.png
And those maxima [one in each of the 17th, 18th- 19th- and 20th century] are not all that grand.
http://www.leif.org/EOS/2009GL03804-Berggren.pdf
“A comparison with sunspot and neutron records confirms that ice core 10Be reflects solar Schwabe cycle variations, and continued 10Be variability suggests cyclic solar activity throughout the Maunder and Spoerer grand solar activity minima. Recent 10Be values are low; however, they do not indicate unusually high recent solar activity compared to the last 600 years.”
10Be ? that is amusing. Once upon time Dr. Svalgaard said “10Be is only good proxy for 10Be”.
I hope you are not trying to equate what I calculated with your SSN recalibration?
However it would be nice if my simple equation fitted whatever sun has done before 1800, but since I don’t know, I normally don’t show it. Maybe sun has done what you say, may be my equation needs 3rd component, who knows.
No evaluation of acuracy can be made one way or the other on just ’22 observations/annum’ but those who are responsible for making the life changing decisions, will use the highly speculative ’22 observations/annum’ to fortify their case.
You got my sympathy.
However it would be nice if my simple equation fitted whatever sun has done before 1800, but since I don’t know, I normally don’t show it.
You don’t show it because it doesn’t fit. I would wager that if it fitted, then you would proudly show it.
highly speculative ’22 observations/annum
That 22 is enough and is not speculative. Try it yourself, if you dare. If you don’t …
Leif: Never give up the hope!
Einstein once said: “there are two things that are infinite: the Universe and Human Stupidity. And I’m not so sure about the Universe…”
Greg: How do you know that the 20nHz filter distorts the raw-data? You have two options: 1st: You can write a response and romance about filters. 2nd: You can download the data ( link in the post) and compare and yoiu can decide if this filter is ok or not. I did it for you, it took 5 minutes:
http://www.directupload.net/file/d/4301/gwchqaof_png.htm
Greg: how can you know that the 20nhz-Filter distorts the raw-data? You have two options: 1st.: You can write a response and romance about the possibilities of filters to distort data. 2nd: You can download the data ( link is in the post) and take a look. I did it for you, it took 5 minutes.
http://www.directupload.net/file/d/4301/gwchqaof_png.htm
http://fs5.directupload.net/images/160322/6el2nexp.png
used to be
No such phrase as “use to be” in normal speech.
It’s a pitty that EVERY post here about the actual development of the sun’s activity, the polar fields… and so on ends in an endless discussion of the SSN-record. It’s so unsuccessful because the record stands as one downloads it from here: http://www.sidc.be/silso/datafiles . It was done a great job by Leif and others and the result is accepted. This must not be the very last word because the science developes, anyway: at this point it’s useless to discuss a given record. Or discussions about a given low-pass filter. In the original post arose some other question: What do we know about the asymmetry of the polar fields, were there big differences during MM as we observe it during SC24? We don’t know I’m afraid because the (annual) proxy-data only go back to 1900. There were only a few thoughts about the really interesting questions, thanks to Leif. And: the original post never linked the sun’s activity to the global temperatures. I think that was not the intention… anyway: the echo in the discussions was decoupled from the content in broad scale IMO. All the best!
It always ends like that because of our resident pseudo-scientists and trolls trying to peddle their nonsense stuff and never being willing to learn anything.
I agree. That was one of the things that caught my eye. However, if you are going to start looking at the difference between the hemispheres, you want to be doing just that, not looking at the difference in the way a broken, crappy filter is distorting each hemisphere’s data.
This is not pedantry, it is basic data processing. You don’t mange and invert you data before analysing it to try get insight into the processing driving what is observed.
If you want to study rise times of each cycle, cycle length and it’s relationship to cycle strength you’d best make sure that you are not shifting the data of the peak by 3 months and inverting a peak into a trough by bad d.p.
https://climategrog.wordpress.com/2013/05/19/triple-running-mean-filters/
However, if you are going to start looking at the difference between the hemispheres
That is not the purpose as the hemispheres varies rather independently from each other.
Note how the running mean ‘fitler’ is almost in anti-phase with variations in the data ( and the well behaved filters ).
The object is to get rid off the smaller bumps, not to have them match the large fluctuations.
Don’t think Einstein would have been very sure about you either, Leif.
Don’t think Einstein would have been very sure about you either, Leif.
You are right, I don’t fit in the category he was sure about [hint: it was not the Universe]. Perhaps you are a better fit…
Well that is a total failure then, one of the first ways you can spot that a running mean filter have been used is looking h.f. variations that it is supposed to removed. The other give away is troughs where peaks should be.
Most 11y running averages will have year to year jitter such as can be seen your graph around 1730 end elsewhere. You may have removed any 11y sinusoidal variations but you’ve got a load of short term noise in the result. Most of which is totally spurious junk and not even a residual of the true signal.
I’m amazed that people in serious science subjects like solar physics are still using such poorly performing, distorting filters. Let alone coming back persistently to try and justify sloppy practices.
Filtering is often used for specific purposes. For example, Hathaway design his filter such that it makes each cycle have only one local maximum and one local minimum such that the size if a cycle is uniquely determined. Other people use different filters of their own design to suppress different variations, e.g. our use of a 20 nHz filter to remove the annual variation. Janssens use a filter designed by Meeus [ http://users.telenet.be/j.janssens/Engzonnecyclus.html ]. The traditional smoothing is retained for historical reasons. There is nothing sloppy about any of this. But I guess that once you have gone down your road of petty pedantry you have painted yourself into a corner you cannot get out of.
Leif: This could be a felicitous last word… I’m afraid it’s not. 😉
best
Frank
” but that’s what happened.”
Agreed.
Plus everywhere the nightly surface temps get near dew point, water is removed from the air. Much evaporates the next morning, but not all.
Climbing TSI from 2009-2016 drove recent temperatures higher. We are riding the energetic crest of this solar cycle, and the ride is downhill now for a number of years ahead.
The SC24 TSI peak in early 2015 energized the 2015 El Nino, which kicked off in earnest last March.
Year 1au TSI
2015 1361.4321
2014 1361.3966
2013 1361.3587
2016 1361.3045
2012 1361.2413
2011 1361.0752
2003 1361.0292
2004 1360.9192
2010 1360.8027
2005 1360.7518
2006 1360.6735
2007 1360.5710
2009 1360.5565
2008 1360.5382
http://lasp.colorado.edu/data/sorce/tsi_data/daily/sorce_tsi_L3_c24h_latest.txt
Heat accumulated in the ocean as TSI climbed higher. Smoothed TSI last year dropped until mid Sept, as did the equatorial OHC, until TSI bumped up again, driving OHC higher for a few months. That’s history.
Equatorial ocean heat content is back to pre 2015 ENSO levels:
2014 12 0.50 0.48 0.54
2015 1 0.28 0.22 0.15
2015 2 0.54 0.65 0.83
2015 3 0.85 1.17 1.52
2015 4 1.05 1.42 1.74
2015 5 1.03 1.42 1.53
2015 6 0.87 1.27 1.51
2015 7 0.92 1.36 1.69
2015 8 0.99 1.43 1.97
2015 9 1.04 1.48 1.80
2015 10 1.04 1.51 1.91
2015 11 0.92 1.41 1.78
2015 12 0.58 1.04 1.20
2016 1 0.44 0.88 1.25
2016 2 -0.03 0.32 0.58
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/ocean/index/heat_content_index.txt
Global SSTs were down in February:
2015/12 0.717
2016/01 0.732
2016/02 0.604
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/hadobs/hadsst3/data/HadSST.3.1.1.0/diagnostics/HadSST.3.1.1.0_monthly_globe_ts.txt
The solar and SST record is replete with such examples of SST sensitivity to TSI, where heat accumulates when TSI is high enough, driving temps higher, only to fall again under lower TSI periods when OHC drops.
The solar data record can be interpreted from this viewpoint to explain climate ‘changes’ since the 1700’s.
Leif: As I said 🙂
In this graph Dr. Svalgaard compares his newly created Sunspot Group data to the tree rings extracted C14 data (C14 should be delayed by 1 year + time to the next growing season)
http://www.leif.org/research/Comparison-GSN-14C-Modulation.png
In this graph M. Vukcevic compares the CET’s temperature record to the above C14 data
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/C14b.png
It can be seen that on number of occasions the CET leads C14 data by far more than two years maximum (1 year + time to next next growing season).
What does this mean?
The author M. Vukcevic declined to comment.