Solar Cycle 25 Has Started

Guest post by David Archibald

The heliospheric current sheet has flattened meaning that Solar Cycle 24 is over and we are now in Solar Cycle 25.

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Figure 1: Heliospheric current sheet tilt angle 1976 -2020

The solar cycle isn’t over until the heliospheric current sheet has flattened. The data is provided by the Wilcox Solar Observatory at Stanford University. There were no observations from about 19 December to 5 February; so the values in between have been interpolated from the rotations before and after.

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Figure 2: Heliospheric current sheet tilt angle aligned on solar cycle minimum

As measured in Carrington rotations, averaging 27.23 days, Solar Cycle 24 was of average length.

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Figure 3: F10.7 flux aligned on solar minimum

On the basis of the F10.7 flux, Solar Cycle 24 was 11.1 years long – which is the average solar cycle length.

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Figure 4: Ap Index 1932 – 2020

What this figure shows is that there has been a permanent shift down in the Sun’s magnetic flux into the New Cold Period. The breakover was most probably in 2005 when the Ap Index suddenly dropped to solar-minimum type levels just above the Modern Warm Period activity floor. Then there was another sudden break down in 2008 with the absolute low in 2009.

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Figure 5: F10.7 Flux and Ap Index 1964 – 2020

More than anything else, it is the variation in the Sun’s magnetic flux that changes the Earth’s climate on decadal time scales. Higher magnetic flux pushes cosmic rays away from the inner planets of the solar system. The Ap Index averaged 13.6 from 1964 to the end of Solar Cycle 24. It averaged 8.1 over Solar Cycle 24. If the 11 year lag in terrestrial response to solar input holds, then the much-anticipated solar-driven cooling should start now.

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Figure 6: Hemispheric aunspot area and F10.7 flux 1985 – 2020

As Figure 6 show, the F10.7 flux equates to the sunspot area of the Sun.

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Figure 7: Sunspot Area 1874 – 2020

The change in character from the Little Ice Age to the Modern Warm Period is quite evident in the hemispheric sunspot area data. Apart from the much lower amplitude, there was far more asymmetry between the northern and southern solar hemispheres in the Little Ice Age than in the Modern Warm Period. Solar Cycle 24 returned to the sunspot area amplitudes of the late Little Ice Age and has north-south asymmetry similar to that of Solar Cycle 12 from 1878 to 1890.

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Figure 8: Oulu Neutron Count 1964 – 2020

Now that the solar minimum is in, the peak in neutron count should be one year from now. The amplitude of the peak is likely to be close to the amplitude of the 23/24 minimum.

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Figure 9: F10.7 flux and Oulu neutron count

As with Figure 5, this figure shows the result of the sudden step down of the Sun’s magnetic activity in 2005. The Sun has entered a new regime of activity with the New Cold Period.

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Figure 10: Solar polar field strength 1975 – 2020

This figure is from the Wilcox Solar Observatory. The solar polar field strength at solar minimum is the most accurate predictor of the amplitude of the following solar cycle. Figure 10 indicates that the amplitude of Solar Cycle 25 will be close to that of Solar Cycle 24. The New Cold Period continues.

David Archibald is the author of The Anticancer Garden in Australia

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mario lento
April 22, 2020 2:11 pm

Nice David!

Pillage Idiot
Reply to  mario lento
April 22, 2020 2:27 pm

That is exactly what the people of Florence said after Michelangelo completed his statue!

mario lento
Reply to  Pillage Idiot
April 22, 2020 2:32 pm

It’s also in Nice…

Greg
Reply to  mario lento
April 22, 2020 3:09 pm

Nice over view of all the data. However, linking to Tallbloke blog about David Evan’s half baked “notch filter” silliness is not very inspiring. I think even David Evans has gone quiet on that one now.

the New Cold Period? I wouldn’t say there’s much data backing such a claim.

Jarrad
Reply to  Greg
April 30, 2020 10:40 pm

Greg.

A Grand solar minima occur when several solar cycles exhibit lesser than average activity for decades or centuries. My question to you is ” How many solar cycles have had lesser than average activity? 2,3,4 ? What is mean by “several”? And what is predicted to occur for the next three years? You appear to be in denial? Why is that?
https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/products/predicted-sunspot-number-and-radio-flux

Coeur de Lion
Reply to  Pillage Idiot
April 23, 2020 1:05 am

Tho’ a little underendowed

Ed Zuiderwijk
Reply to  Coeur de Lion
April 23, 2020 1:22 am

It was cold outside.

April 22, 2020 2:16 pm

If TSI varies by ~2 W/m^2 and only 48% makes it to the surface, we are talking about a 0.96 W/m^2 difference, which at surface level is about a ~0.1 C difference. Of course there are a lot of other effects, but thermally, it’s very weak.

Am I right?

Chris Cordle
Reply to  Zoe Phin
April 22, 2020 5:26 pm

I don’t think we see a huge difference in TSI from min to max but the cosmic ray flux does increase cloud nucleation and cloud cover albedo as noted by Svensmark. More or less clouds has dramatic influence on climate. As I’m sure geothermal does as well. I wonder if geomagnetic pole shift is indicative of underlying changes in geothermal activity.

lt
Reply to  Zoe Phin
April 22, 2020 8:11 pm

UV emissions are not part of the TSI metric and I think they can vary as much as 10% between Solar Min and Max. The energy associated with UV is weaker but it can also effect the chemical composition of the Stratosphere which effects the transparency of the upper atmosphere, so yes there are a lot of other effects that we do not have accurate multidecadal trend information on.

Tom in Florida
Reply to  lt
April 23, 2020 2:37 pm

Since when is UV not part of TSI?

mario lento
Reply to  Tom in Florida
April 23, 2020 2:41 pm

I think it could have been worded differently. The TSI does not considered spectrum of wavelengths, but instead the totality of the energy. The factual point that was being made is that the amount of energy from different frequencies is not considered in TSI measurements.

Tom in Florida
Reply to  mario lento
April 23, 2020 4:50 pm

Then “It” should have referenced SSI. However, if I gave you $100 in the form of 4 $20s, 2 $5s, 9 $1s, 3 quarters , 1 dime, 2 nickels and 5 pennies you would still have $100.

mario lento
Reply to  mario lento
April 23, 2020 5:07 pm

Tom: You are trying hard, really hard, to not understand the meaning of what I wrote. I think other people here understand and you could to, if you tried.

The subject discussed was not the value of power per unit area = to “Total Solar Irradience”. Instead someone was making the point that it is made up of different frequencies, which changed in orders of magnitude greater than the TSI.

So in your simplistic misunderstanding of the subject matter, 100 dollars worth of pennies is the same as a 100 dollar bill, even though, one would fit in your pocket and the other would not.

Are you following yet?

Tom in Florida
Reply to  mario lento
April 23, 2020 7:31 pm

No Mario, I understand. Since the TSI changes only about 0.1 % over the 11 year solar cycle, and because UV is only a small part of that change, the “10% variation of UV in the TSI” is of little influence on climate. This has been discussed here several times in previous solar articles. Yet it still comes up occasionally as if a 10% change in this very small portion of the TSI was some kind of show stopping discovery. Now there are those, I believe you are one, who maintain that the UV variations have important effects on the upper atmosphere and that may have some truth, but it still does not affect the climate in any real measurable way.

mario lento
Reply to  Tom in Florida
April 23, 2020 9:17 pm

Tom in Florida: You’re obfuscation and lack of precision are in fact a complete distraction. Thus far, your posts have done nothing but dilute the concentration of otherwise good discourse here.

If your intention was to demean someone with your simplistic drivel, which you now just admitted, then you should expect others to assume you just do not understand.

Thank you for wasting everyone’s time, and I am sorry I gave you the benefit of the doubt.

Tom in Florida
Reply to  mario lento
April 24, 2020 5:17 am

I am not sure what burr is under your saddle. Who did I demean? The phrase “I believe you are one”? That was just identifying your position on the matter based on your own comment on WUWT here:
Mario Lento October 26, 2014 at 1:44 am

mario lento
Reply to  Tom in Florida
April 24, 2020 9:51 am

Tom: Come on Tom. Your simplistic mis-understanding of complex subjects and your non-value-added comments show you do not understand the subject matter at a basic level of physics. Your first comment was demeaning to the post from It. Your following money analogy to me was not demeaning, it showed however you did not understand what I had written, at all.

I invite you to re-read my comments to you from my first one. Perhaps you will learn something.

I always say, I learn nothing when I am right, but when I am wrong I have an opportunity to learn something. That said, there is nothing anyone has seen from you can is a learning opportunity.

Tom in Florida
Reply to  mario lento
April 24, 2020 7:10 pm

Mario,
Your opening comment started with “I think it could have been worded differently.”
I agree with that because I did hastily conclude that “It” was going in the direction that the 10% UV variation was the reason for most of the recent warming of the climate. If you read my response at 7:31 you will see that was my point. So my apologies to “It” for that hastiness. And my money example was not well written, I am no MofB.
However, my point stands that the up to 10% variation in UV has a negligible effect on temperatures at the surface. My understanding that it is about a 1-2 K variation. I am also aware of the investigations into the upper atmospheric changes caused by the interaction of UV and O3 and what effect that would have on the surface climate, although there is nothing conclusive to that end at this time.
And just to keep the record straight, I am not in the “CO2 is the cause of climate change” school of thought.

mario lento
Reply to  Tom in Florida
April 24, 2020 10:16 pm

Tom in FLA: We are both pretty much on the same side of the basic argument of CO2 and climate change CAGW and all that nonsense political science… I try, really hard, to be accountable with the words I use. So thank you for the olive branch. Much appreciated.

The conversation could have gone much better, on my side too. Anyway. What often happens in discussion is that arguments get re-framed. When that happens, strawmen arguments come up. And all of a sudden we are not even sure what we are arguing about.

All of that said. Conclusions devoid of a proper set of facts that we can probably both agree upon need to be laid out.

So in the end, I saw that “It” said something, and you may have properly or may not, read more into it. So I was clarifying what his statement meant. I think I got it right.

I am in the camp where what I wrote (in this post) is regarding UV spectrum varying and we probably both agree. TSI varies little, and UV varies more. That is all! We apparently also agree that TSI means what it means.

The rest, could be another off topic discussion which I am willing to have when appropriate about potential effects which are hypothetical and anecdotal about UV and the cascading effects which may or may not be measurable and may or may not have effects in climate. I recall talking about how temperature changes the color of lizards so that their albedo changes in response to temperature. I postulated that we do not know what effect in total the earth has to spectral changes from the sun over long time scales.

That is where I think you believe that they cannot have any effect and I might argue they might have an effect. I played this out once with Leif and it was a pretty respectful discussion related to Platinum Temperature sensors called RTDs which I have done a lot of work with. 2 wire, 3 wire and 4 wire temperature sensors.

Leif does not, if I recall correctly, subscribe to the notion that it can be deduced what effects in Ozone, and changes in flora or other areas of earth that could have an effect on albedo or state changes in water etc etc. But now I am going down a path of off topic discussion here except to acknowledge that I did go down that path before. I say I don’t know, and I am also convinced Leif does not think it’s worth finding out. I am curious and like to hear dissenting and agreeing views.

If I incorrectly recalled Leif’s position, I apologize right away.

But in the end, I understand where you were coming from and apologize for being snippy. Thank you!

Michael Keal
Reply to  mario lento
April 26, 2020 2:43 am

Correct me if I am wrong but is the variation in Solar TSI not accompanied by a variation in the magnitude and frequency composition of its UV component which varies upper atmospheric heating which affects the jet streams which affects the kind of weather we get? (I think the change in the split between what gets blocked up there and what gets through might play a role in this.)

Put another way the force one’s foot applies to the accelerator pedal is much smaller than the force the drive-wheels of a Ferrari applies to the road! (Do I own one? I wish!)

Crispin in Waterloo
Reply to  Zoe Phin
April 22, 2020 8:20 pm

Zoe

TSI varies by ~4 W/m^2. This was shown graphically in a post here a couple of days ago.

Reply to  Crispin in Waterloo
April 22, 2020 8:56 pm

I forgot to divide by 4.
So my 2 is really 0.5
And your 4 is really 1

So the thermal effect is 0.48 W/m^2

Master of the Obvious
Reply to  Zoe Phin
April 22, 2020 8:21 pm

Consider that it’s not just the thermal budget but also the sun’s affect on the solar wind.

At the reduced output, more cosmic rays reach the earth’s atmosphere to interact energetically. One hypothesis is that the cosmic rays help nucleate cloud droplets and an increase in cloud cover will result. More cloud cover reflects more sunshine back to space and reduces the energy reaching the lower atmosphere and ground level.

And, we not even stirring-in the ocean currents, wind currents and their cycles. The earth is a massive heat engine which has to react to events that try to push is out of the temperature range conducive to life (solar cycles, volcanic eruptions, etc.). In all, it does a really good job. One (of the many) reason that the climate models are spectacularly unable to predict temperatures even a year or two away is that this complexity is not well understood let alone numerically modeled.

Reply to  Master of the Obvious
April 22, 2020 9:02 pm

I don’t see a strong connection

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Chris Cordle
Reply to  Zoe Phin
April 23, 2020 9:03 am

I’d like to see that chart extended beyond the bottom (2009) as there could be a delayed feedback loop, but I think there have been noted challenges with modeling multi-decadal changes in cloud cover albedo. Svensmark et al. have done a lot of great research in this area, including utilizing cloud chamber experiments to prove the efficacy of cosmic ray cloud nucleation: https://www.thegwpf.org/content/uploads/2019/03/SvensmarkSolar2019-1.pdf

Reply to  Chris Cordle
April 23, 2020 12:46 pm

From the paper:

“Inserting these values into Eqn (6) gives an amplitude of
ΔTω ≈ 0.01 K (9)
The phase shift between the solar signal and the temperature response is ≈30°.
However, observations show that the amplitude of the temperature change during a
solar cycle is in the range 0.05–0.08 K (see Figure 16).
So the solar signal found is ≈5–7 times larger than the change in solar irradiance alone.”

From my original comment:
“which at surface level is about a ~0.1 C difference”

So essentially I got the right answer, though I did it wrong.

<0.1C is not big enough.

Reply to  Zoe Phin
April 22, 2020 9:17 pm

The likely linkage is a non-linear response of ozone production and stratospheric heating in the as the EUV/UV flux varies much more during the solar cycle than the TSI.

Robert of Ottawa
Reply to  Zoe Phin
April 23, 2020 2:49 am

Order of magnitude the same as the proposed CO2 induced variations – without the mystical feedbacks

Reply to  Zoe Phin
April 23, 2020 8:08 am

Am I right?

Yup.

Hubert
Reply to  Zoe Phin
April 23, 2020 9:00 am

anthropogenic CO2 effect also estimated at 2 watts/m2 by IPCC , so which one has the most impact on earth ?

Cath Miller
Reply to  Zoe Phin
April 23, 2020 8:54 pm

Well it seems to have an obvious impact on measured solar energy. See the data from my local station where solar energy is down by 22% and the temperatures have dropped accordingly…

In the Southwest of Western Australia, we are not affected by La Nina/El Nino and have seen temps drop consistently since 2012…

http://www.bom.gov.au/jsp/ncc/cdio/weatherData/av?p_display_type=dataGraph&p_stn_num=009574&p_nccObsCode=203&p_month=03&fbclid=IwAR1JzQPoYt61H21taO72xWpInZ-NyIvvPzAASnG5FtTQwdA1BVdqTZhwFgg

April 22, 2020 2:23 pm

comment image

Reply to  Jon P Peterson
April 22, 2020 3:37 pm

Oops, from spaceweatherDOTcom

Bob Hunter
April 22, 2020 2:28 pm

I suspect that means we can expect more adjustments to the weather stations’ temperature results.

Loydo
April 22, 2020 2:53 pm

“The New Cold Period continues.”

What a weird conclusion. So many pretty graphs, but not the one that shows this to be baloney.

Reply to  Loydo
April 22, 2020 3:29 pm

Lloydo

Post it then.

Reply to  HotScot
April 22, 2020 10:08 pm

It has been 7 hours, Loydo still hasn’t posted a graph.

Loydo
Reply to  Sunsettommy
April 22, 2020 11:30 pm

There aren’t any graphs that show were in a “new cold period”, I guess thats why David didn’t post one and just gave his opinion instead.

Matthew Schilling
Reply to  Loydo
April 23, 2020 10:55 am

Perhaps he thinks there might be a lag? Of course, I don’t why he would think that, since the mass of our atmosphere is only 5 x 10^18 kg and the mass of our oceans is only a little more than 200 times greater than that…
Oh wait.

MarkW
Reply to  Loydo
April 22, 2020 4:52 pm

Post it, but make sure it’s the entire record, not just the cherry picked portion that supports your religious convictions.

Loydo
Reply to  MarkW
April 22, 2020 11:27 pm

Define the “entire” record.

Reply to  Loydo
April 22, 2020 10:07 pm

Loydo,

Without those pesky El-Nino events since 2015, there would be NO warming at all for at least 5 years now.

WXcycles
Reply to  Loydo
April 22, 2020 10:40 pm

“The New Cold Period continues.”

Yeah, that looked dodgy to me too, Maybe the 1960s and 1970s mins were cooler to cold, but the summers were not.

http://elonionbloggle.blogspot.com/

4caster
April 22, 2020 2:55 pm

I will continue to say that the 60-70 year global temperature cycle is affiliated with, or possibly controlled by, the about-11 year solar / sunspot cycle. It is the combination of 3 cycles that seems to have an impact on global temperatures, perhaps with the odd-even-odd (odd-dominated) sunspot polarity followed by even-odd-even (even-dominated) polarity. This shorter-period cycle seems to be nested within a longer about-200 year cycle (3 groups of 3 sunspot cycles, times 2), and both are nested within the much longer-period and more pronounced about-800 (or 900) year cycle. The 60-70 year cycle is noticeable from 1905-1940 (warmer), 1940-1976 (cooler), and 1976-2010 (warmer). It does seem that global temperatures have plateaued over the past decade (2010-2020), so perhaps the first sunspot cycle of this new 3-group hasn’t kicked in yet, and that we’ll be in for a cooler 20 year period coming up from 2020-2040 (or 2045). Or, maybe the 800 year cycle is more dominant at its peak, which is this century into early next, which is why the (slight and benign) warming we’ve seen over the past century, especially in the 1980s and 1990s, hasn’t been dented by the other two shorter cycles recently.

I know those who pooh-pooh the sunspot effect on global temperatures say there is no evidence for it, but I think the fact that there is correlation ought to at least behoove us to investigate this further. One might say (and many do say) the same for CO2, that temperature increase correlates with CO2 increase since the start of the Industrial Revolution, or the middle of the 19th century, or whatever “anthropocene” starting point is wished, but that correlation has been shown by many to not have much validity to any great degree, and certainly not to a catastrophic extent such that we need to upend energy sources, and monetary and fiscal policies and norms, both of which have yet carried us to the greatest heights of civilization.

Just because no one has found why sunspots are directly affective of terrestrial weather and temperatures doesn’t mean that there is no, or even an important, effect.

Mark Green
Reply to  4caster
April 22, 2020 10:39 pm

You are correct to recall the ‘global cooling’ era that been noted by climatologists from approx. 1945 to 1980. Incredibly, this period of declining temperatures (during an era where global CO2 was rising) been largely ‘memory holed’.

Robert of Ottawa
Reply to  Mark Green
April 23, 2020 2:52 am

Adjusted out, you mean

Red94ViperRT10
Reply to  4caster
April 23, 2020 2:16 pm

I know those who pooh-pooh the sunspot effect on global temperatures say there is no evidence for it…”

…which does NOT prove it doesn’t exist, only that those particular investigators lack imagination. In other words, it may only be that they have not figured out where to look for the cause.

April 22, 2020 2:57 pm

on Figure 10: “As with Figure 5, this figure shows the result of the sudden step down of the Sun’s magnetic activity in 2005. The Sun has entered a new regime of activity with the New Cold Period.”
The sudden change happened in 2006 and was due to the replacement of a band-pass filter [which was failing and reducing the amount of light entering the instrument, thereby increasing the noise. Nothing to do with the sun. And the temperatures since then have been the highest on record: no New Cold Period.

Curious George
Reply to  Leif Svalgaard
April 22, 2020 3:19 pm

Thanks, Leif. That’s the difference between knowing and noticing.

Thomas
Reply to  Curious George
April 22, 2020 5:07 pm

Anytime I see a post about the sun on WUWT, I scan it quickly then go looking for Leif’s comment. Thanks for taking the time to post here Leif.

Doug Huffman
Reply to  Thomas
April 23, 2020 8:12 am

There has been recent elucidation of Epistemological Trespass. The field is largely Leif’s.

Editor
Reply to  Leif Svalgaard
April 22, 2020 5:45 pm

Thanks for the insight, Leif.

I hope you and yours are well.

Stay safe and healthy, all.
Bob

David Archibald
Reply to  Leif Svalgaard
April 22, 2020 6:28 pm

I think you mean Figure 9 and are you saying the Oulu neutron counter has light entering it? I remember in 2005 on WUWT when Anthony said that the sudden big drop in the Ap Index meant that there had been a regime change. I thought at the time that that was a big call to make. Now, after another 15 years of data, it is evident that 2005 was the breakover between the Modern Warm Period and the New Cold Period. I credit Anthony with being the first to call it. We are now back to the climate of the 19th century which will include frosts in July in the Corn Belt.

Reply to  Leif Svalgaard
April 22, 2020 7:32 pm

“The sudden change happened in 2006 and was due to the replacement of a band-pass filter [which was failing and reducing the amount of light entering the instrument, thereby increasing the noise.”

Query: The sudden change in what? F 10.7 Flux?

Do you have any comment on the minimum in AP index shown in figure 5 in 2009 and what might be expected in cycle 25?

Reply to  Leif Svalgaard
April 22, 2020 8:22 pm

I get the impression that the “New Cold Period” is based more on aspiration than observation. Agreed that the surface temperature record has been so mangled by adjustments that its relation to reality is somewhat tenuous. But the UAH mid-troposphere record doesn’t show any cooling yet, and that’s probably the one source that we can rely on for global temperature trends.

That said, I “usually” see a well developed spring between about April 20th and 25th, here in southern Ontario, but there’s not much sign of it yet. Snow flurries yesterday. But other than a very cold December, the past winter was extremely mild, so annualized temperature averages might end up showing 2020 to be a warm year, even without emergency adjustments. That’s the trouble with averages; they don’t always tell you what you need to know. And local climatic trends are not the same as global trends.

Peter K
Reply to  Leif Svalgaard
April 22, 2020 11:32 pm

“The temperatures since then have been the highest on record”..That is a very game statement, given the amount of temperature adjustments that we see, as far back as 1850..Old newspaper clippings are a great source of information, that usually debunk the claim of “hottest year ever”

davidgmillsatty
Reply to  Leif Svalgaard
April 23, 2020 2:04 pm

Highest on record? You are the sun guy not the temp guy.

April 22, 2020 3:01 pm

Well done Loydo, you twit, another inane comment in a long stream of inane comments. Where’s the graph you are referring to? If it exists at all.

Loydo
Reply to  Kevin McNeill
April 22, 2020 11:33 pm

See Leif’s comment above.

April 22, 2020 3:03 pm

Now that the solar minimum is in, the peak in neutron count should be one year from now. The amplitude of the peak is likely to be close to the amplitude of the 23/24 minimum.
It will not be. The flux is higher every other minimum [with a peaked curve] than the other minima [with a flatter curve]. The reason is well-understood and is due to the variation of the sign of the interplanetary magnetic field giving rise to a 22-year variation of the intensity [nothing as such to do with solar activity]. So 24/25 flux will be lower than the 23/24 flux even for the same amount of activity.

April 22, 2020 3:10 pm

The solar magnetic field strengtbs are dropping meaning more of the most energetic particles can escape.
That means more O3,NxOx and HxOx formed TOA.
That means less UV into the oceans.
The Cold Period is coming.

commieBob
Reply to  Henry Pool
April 22, 2020 3:53 pm

Eventually the cool period will come. Those who correctly predict its timing will claim that they know what’s going on. It’s kinda like James Hansen correctly predicting a warm period.

mario lento
Reply to  commieBob
April 22, 2020 4:03 pm

Yes, but can we make it cool by changing the numbers?

John F. Hultquist
Reply to  Henry Pool
April 23, 2020 8:35 am

Henry says “The Cold Period is coming.”

David A’s Figure 7 indicates the Cold Period began around 2005-’06.

Others say there is no “Cold Period” recently, now, or in the immediate future.

To clear things up: The weather is weird, and that is the only thing normal about it.

April 22, 2020 3:54 pm

” then the much-anticipated solar-driven cooling should start now”
Much said.

MarkW
Reply to  Nick Stokes
April 22, 2020 4:58 pm

Irony is lost on this one.

astonerii
April 22, 2020 4:01 pm

Shouldn’t we wait for an actual observation from the next solar cycle to see if it really changed direction or if it is still dropping slowly since there is not enough chaos going on to make it fully flip?

April 22, 2020 4:25 pm

“the New Cold Period”

You pushed the wrong button BACON BRAIN!

Foley Hund
Reply to  pigs_in_space
April 22, 2020 5:39 pm

…really? Is that the norm for some? Just cast aspersions?

Reply to  pigs_in_space
April 23, 2020 8:15 am

Ummmm, bacon……

April 22, 2020 4:54 pm

Now be prepared this idea may be thought of as out there by some, but Dr. Wickramsinghe (not sure I spelled his name correctly), but he along with another great astronomer Dr. Fred Hoyle, identified that in the solar minimum portion of the cycles, as this one and the one near 1918 were very extreme lows. It just so happens (perhaps no surprise to the good doctor) that in this low minima and the one near 1918, virus forms have caused serious influenza outbreaks. The theory both he and Dr. Hoyle have contended that viruses are able and do arrive in comets and fireballs from cometary sources. It is worth thinking about. Thank-you, Rod Chilton.

MarkW
Reply to  Rod Chilton
April 22, 2020 5:01 pm

I’ve read some dumb things in my years, but this one has got to be near the top.

The mere fact that the virus is virtually identical to viruses found in bats for decades just doesn’t make it past that data filter of yours, does it.

MarkW
Reply to  MarkW
April 22, 2020 6:56 pm

Add to that the fact that nothing more complex than simple proteins has ever been found on comets and meteorites.

DCE
Reply to  MarkW
April 23, 2020 11:01 am

I have to wonder which part of the solar cycles has effects on E. D. If we can figure that out then I wouldn’t have to waste money on any of those little blue pills.

noaaprogrammer
Reply to  DCE
April 23, 2020 9:53 pm

…c’mon, it’s the lunar cycle — not solar!

Reply to  Rod Chilton
April 23, 2020 4:17 am

not sure I buy into the comet theory, but UV from the sun is lethal to virus’ roaming free in the environment and I read some papers a while back showing the causal relationship between flu/winter/lower UV. UV is also a driver of Vitamin D levels which are also critical to immune function so it is not a stretch to see how variations in the suns output can influence the seasonal viral impacts, though there are lots of others factors tobe sure

Eben
April 22, 2020 4:57 pm

You forgot to include the “expert predictions” for the next cycle

Phil
April 22, 2020 5:06 pm

No Spots
comment image

John F. Hultquist
April 22, 2020 5:55 pm

The Little Ice Age, Fig. 7, lasts to 1932-33.
My mother would point to her waist and say
“the snow came up to here when I was your age.”
Of course we believed her.

mcswell
Reply to  John F. Hultquist
April 22, 2020 6:10 pm

Was your mother shorter when she was that age?

Alan Bryant
April 22, 2020 6:15 pm

When did 10.7 flux supplant the Wolfe sunspot counting method?

edward mcnally
April 22, 2020 7:40 pm

I GATHER IT IS NOT CONSIDERED BY THOSE ONLY INVOLVED WITH TEMPERATURE.

Reply to  edward mcnally
April 23, 2020 10:57 am

WHAT?

April 22, 2020 9:11 pm

I would have put it differently.

SC 24 has now ended. SC 25 started over a year ago.

Brandon
April 22, 2020 10:19 pm

Neat. Where is the cooling?

Loydo
Reply to  Brandon
April 22, 2020 11:44 pm

There is cooling, but not where the author wants it to be. https://tambonthongchai.com/2018/08/22/stratospheric-cooling/

dh-mtl
Reply to  Brandon
April 23, 2020 7:43 am

According to NOAA, a very strong La Nina is setting up for this fall (see https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/lanina/enso_evolution-status-fcsts-web.pdf, slide 25).

This will ensure cooling for a couple of years. We’ll need to see if the subsequent El Nino is strong or week, to see if the cooling progresses or stalls after that.

By the way, where I am, April has been unusually cold.

Ethan Brand
Reply to  dh-mtl
April 23, 2020 10:20 am

dh-mtl:
“According to NOAA, a very strong La Nina is setting up for this fall (see https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/lanina/enso_evolution-status-fcsts-web.pdf, slide 25).”
This analysis is dated April 20, 2020.

From the referenced slide 25:
“The CFS.v2 ensemble mean (black dashed line) predicts ENSO-neutral to continue into summer 2020, with chances favoring La Niña thereafter.”

How useful are NASA ENSO Forecasts?:
https://www.climate.gov/news-features/blogs/enso/how-good-have-enso-forecasts-been-lately

From this document:
“As one would expect, forecasts made from farther in the past (longer lead times) are less skillful than more recent (short-lead) forecasts, and the 7- month lead forecasts were of little use over this particular period. The dynamical models showed somewhat higher (i.e., better) correlations than the statistical models. The mean absolute error is generally larger for the dynamical models, partly because they averaged too warm during the period, especially when they predicted the warmest SST levels (7). The better correlations of dynamical models were also found in the 11-year period of 2002-2012 (Barnston et al. 2012). Based on the objective performance measures, it is clear that while our ENSO forecasts can be helpful for the coming few months, we have a long way to go in improving their performance and utility beyond that. It is especially hard to predict the timing of ENSO transitions and the correct strength. ”

Bottom line: ENSO forecasts more than a few months into the future have no useful skill. The above mention La Nina forecast (“CPC considers El Niño or La Niña conditions to occur when the monthly Niño3.4 OISST departures meet or exceed +/-0.5ºC along with consistent atmospheric features. These anomalies must also be forecasted to persist for 3 consecutive months.”) is 6-9 months in the future so has no usable skill level. Once the NASA ENSO forecasts (which are updated monthly) predict an La Nina within a few months, then we can start having at least a modicum of confidence in the forecast.

Ethan Brand

Patrick Geryl
April 22, 2020 10:22 pm

I worked with Jan Alvestad on my new paper concerning the start of Solar Cycle 25.
We included the high resolution sunspot numbers. Lots of people will be interested to compare the smoothed sunspot numbers from the ISN and the 1K and 2K high resolution sunspot numbers:
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/340477337_A_Formula_for_the_Start_of_a_New_Sunspot_Cycle

Reply to  Patrick Geryl
April 23, 2020 2:44 pm

Patrick,
A few month’s ago you were trying to correct me on my 1 January 2020 solar minimum claim, saying I didn’t understand a smoothed running average.
Are still insisting the minimum was June 2019?

Yet Jan’s Monthly solar cycle data is now calling either October or November 2019 as candidates.
http://www.solen.info/solar/

And February 2020 was an extremely low SSN month. A result which will drag the final smoothed SSN for a solar cycle minimum even more towards December-January.

Patric Geryl
Reply to  Joel O'Bryan
April 23, 2020 6:54 pm

We said currently June for the 2K. This could change to October – December… We have to wait. But the low will be no later than December.

April 22, 2020 10:40 pm

According to Ice core records the last three millennia, since 1000BC,Mail have been cooling much faster that the earlier 8 millennia of the Holocene, where each high point has been colder that the previous.

In the light of this, which would any sensible person bet on,
massive sudden warming or
continued long-term cooling.

https://edmhdotme.wordpress.com/holocene-context-for-catastrophic-anthropogenic-global-warming/

Loydo
Reply to  edmh
April 22, 2020 11:49 pm

Then when you add the temps since 1950 to that graph you see that “sudden massive warming” has already occurred – so a pretty good bet.

Phil R
Reply to  Loydo
April 23, 2020 7:44 am

Of all the dumb things you’ve posted, that has to be one of the dumbest.

I doubt you’ll take it into consideration or even understand it, but there’s a huge issue with temporal resolution associated with pasting a modern, high resolution temp. record onto a longer term, historical proxy temp. record with much lower (10’s to 100’s of years) resolution.

Loydo
Reply to  Phil R
April 23, 2020 2:41 pm

What’s the “huuuge” issue Phil? (btw, I’m already taking your hockeystickphobia into account).
Are you disputing there has been a modern warming?

Reply to  Loydo
April 23, 2020 8:20 am

“sudden massive warming” has already occurred

Don’t know where you’re at, Loydo, but been hammered by snow-showers & late frosts here in the last week.

Krishna Gans
Reply to  Loydo
April 23, 2020 1:34 pm

That was than, asa lot of scientists wrote about the coming ice age ???
Yeah, you are so right.
Not.
As ever. 😀

Red94ViperRT10
Reply to  Loydo
April 23, 2020 2:29 pm

Congratulations. You just repeated “…Mike’s Nature trick…” which was shown to be statistically invalid (that’s big-words for wrong). Are you really Michael Mann posting under an assumed name?

ren
April 23, 2020 12:03 am

It is the circulation in the stratosphere that governs the weather from autumn to spring in medium latitudes. The stratosphere is governed by solar activity (UV radiation, GCR, power of solar wind ).
https://earth.nullschool.net/#current/wind/isobaric/70hPa/orthographic=-17.89,89.09,296
comment image

ren
April 23, 2020 12:10 am

The equatorial Pacific subsurface temperature drops. This indicates the rapid cooling of the Southern Ocean. La Niña is waiting for stronger solar wind, which will bring winds of latitudinal.
http://www.bom.gov.au/cgi-bin/oceanography/wrap_ocean_analysis.pl?id=IDYOC007&year=2020&month=04

ren
April 23, 2020 12:20 am

There is a large asymmetry of activity in both solar hemispheres. This asymmetry will significantly reduce the total solar activity.
The northern polar field changed polarity first in June 2012, then weakened and was near neutral in April 2014. The southern polar field reversed in July 2013. During the previous similar polarity reversal in 1989-1991 the northern polar field reversed 14 months prior to the southern polar field reversal.

As of March 2020 the strength of the polar fields hints at a cycle 25 with a magnitude somewhere between those of cycles 23 and 24. The northern polar field may have peaked in late 2019 while the southern polar field reached its peak in November 2015.
https://solen.info/solar/polarfields/polar.html
http://wso.stanford.edu/gifs/north.gif
http://wso.stanford.edu/gifs/south.gif

ren
Reply to  ren
April 23, 2020 12:29 am

Reaching maximum by solar polar fields means the beginning of a new solar cycle.
comment image

David Archibald
Reply to  ren
April 23, 2020 3:11 am

Thanks Ren.

ren
April 23, 2020 12:55 am

The monthly average of 6808 neutron counts in Oulu means the same level of galactic radiation as in 2009.
https://cosmicrays.oulu.fi/

ren
Reply to  ren
April 23, 2020 1:19 am

The highest level of GCR was recorded at the turn of 2009 and 2010.
comment image

April 23, 2020 4:13 am

let us go back to some basic thinking about the 0.6K that was added (by the sun) to the oceans over the past 60 years.

http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadsst3gl/from:1960/plot/hadsst3nh/from:1960/plot/hadsst3sh/from:1960/plot/hadsst3gl/from:1960/trend

I want to establish if you agree with me on this:

Assume we have a 1000m column of water exactly 1 m2
That is 10^6 kg/m2
To heat one gram by 1 degree K you need 4.18 J
so for 0.6K we need 2.51 10^9 J/m2 (for the whole column)
This energy arrived over 60 years. That is 1.89 x 10^9 seconds. Assuming linearity, that gives us 1.32 W/m2.
Note that the surface of earth is 70% water.
So the answer to our problem about the amount of heat which we know is specifically not coming from ‘GH gases”: about 1 W/m2 of warming. This is natural warming, I would say. Unless, it is because we destroyed some of our ozone layer, which could have been the cause of some more UV (heat) coming through our atmosphere, landing in the ocean and subsequently causing more warming.
Agree?

ren
Reply to  Henry Pool
April 23, 2020 6:33 am

Note the growing differences in sea surface temperature anomalies in the Northern and Southern Hemispheres since around 2003.
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadsst3nh/from:2000/plot/hadsst3sh/from:2000

ren
Reply to  ren
April 23, 2020 6:47 am

I think the SSTA differences in the southern and northern hemispheres are the result of a much stronger winter southern polar vortex than the northern polar vortex.

ren
Reply to  ren
April 23, 2020 7:06 am

Between 1970 and 2000, SST anomalies in the southern hemisphere increased, indicating a strong polar vortex in the northern hemisphere. The cyclical change in the strength of the northern polar vortex can be seen.
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadsst3nh/from:1960/to:2000/plot/hadsst3sh/from:1960/to:2000

Reply to  ren
April 23, 2020 12:29 pm

Suface temperatures between the Arctic and Antarctic diverge during warm periods such as the MWP and Present and converge during cold periods such as the LIA.
https://imgur.com/8JdJArr

Reply to  ren
April 23, 2020 3:37 pm

Ren, I have a paper for you. I need your email address. erlathapps.com.au

You are right to focus on the ocean in the southern hemisphere and the stratosphere when looking for the solar connection.

Reply to  Henry Pool
April 23, 2020 8:37 am

are you suggesting that the water continually warms?
If so this is obviously incorrect since temperatures have not continually increased since the last ice age. The oceans loose heat at roughly the same rate as they gain heat for stable temperature. If the oceans are warming then the heat input has increased (not so) or the rate of loss has decreased.

Reply to  ghalfrunt
April 23, 2020 9:02 am

ghalfrunt

Exactly. But now, which is it? Did we get more energy from the sun [mostly UV, I would think] or was it, somehow, the extra CO2 in the atmosphere causing a decrease in the loss of energy?
Can you tell me?

Reply to  Henry Pool
April 23, 2020 7:52 pm

Any idea what % of the tsi is created by UV?
from this doc fig 1
https://www.hindawi.com/journals/jas/2013/368380/
TSI is 1361 w/sqm
UV is 0.022 w/sqm

Is uv likely to cause a difference in warming? I do not think so!

Julian Flood
Reply to  ghalfrunt
April 23, 2020 11:43 pm

Fish farmers in Israel decades ago were increasing the spring warming rate of their ponds by adding a very very thin layer of oil* — see Benjamin Franklin Mont Pond for the mechanism, or if you have a literary bent Kipling’s Knights of the Joyous Adventure. Warming results from reduced mixing as wave action is reduced, reduced albedo, reduced evaporation. The layers are molecules thick.

I have seen oil/surfactant smooths in the Med, the North and South Atlantic and countless rivers and streams. I have a few very poor images of a fractured smooth from abeam Porto to Madeira which covered literally thousands of square miles. Lakes are warming at anomalous rates but no-one seems to be looking at the mechanism. Oil/surfactant pollution from towns growing on their shores seems likely to me.

Feynman says ‘first you guess.’ So that’s my guess.

I just wish someone would look.

JF
*Less than the wavelength of light so no rainbow. Just in case anyone makes that objection – again.

Reply to  Julian Flood
April 24, 2020 2:12 am

That is a good point. I wd add salts and acids as a possible source.

April 23, 2020 7:13 am

ren
ja. I noticed that as well.
Remember it happened before?
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadsst3gl/from:1850/plot/hadsst3nh/from:1850/plot/hadsst3sh/from:1850/plot/hadsst3gl/from:1850/trend

it seems cyclic.

solar? volcanic?

ren
Reply to  Henry Pool
April 23, 2020 7:52 am

Henry Pool
I think that natural cycles can be weakened or strengthened by changes in solar activity, especially when this concerns the stratospheric polar vortex.

April 23, 2020 8:32 am

See these quotes from my updated blogpost from 2018 “The Millennial Turning Point – Solar Activity and the Coming Cooling ”
“The empirical temperature data is clear. The previous millennial cycle temperature peak was at about 990. ( see Fig 3 in the link below) The recent temperature Millennial Turning Point was about 2003/4 ( Fig 4 in link below ) which correlates with the solar millennial activity peak at 1991+/. The cycle is asymmetric with a 650 year +/- down-leg and a 350 +/- year up-leg. The suns magnetic field strength as reflected in its TSI will generally decline (modulated by other shorter term super-imposed solar activity cycles) until about 2650.
The temperature increase since about 1650 is clearly chiefly due to the up- leg in the natural solar activity millennial cycle as shown by Lean 2018 “Estimating Solar Irradiance Since 850 AD” Fig 5
comment image
…………………….Because of the thermal inertia of the oceans there is a varying lag between the solar activity MTP and the varying climate metrics. The temperature peak is about 2003/4 – lag is about 12 years. The arctic sea ice volume minimum was in 2012 +/- lag = 21 years. . For the details see data, discussion, and forecasts in Figs 3,4,5,10,11,and 12 in the links below.

See the Energy and Environment paper
The coming cooling: usefully accurate climate forecasting for policy makers.
http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0958305X16686488
and an earlier accessible blog version at
http://climatesense-norpag.blogspot.com/2017/02/the-coming-cooling-usefully-accurate_17.html See also the discussion with Professor William Happer at
http://climatesense-norpag.blogspot.com/2018/02/exchange-with-professor-happer-princeton.html
The establishment’s dangerous global warming meme, the associated IPCC series of reports ,the entire UNFCCC circus, the recent hysterical IPCC SR1.5 proposals and Nordhaus’ recent Nobel prize are founded on two basic errors in scientific judgement. First – the sample size is too small. Most IPCC model studies retrofit from the present back for only 100 – 150 years when the currently most important climate controlling, largest amplitude, solar activity cycle is millennial. This means that all climate model temperature outcomes are too hot and likely fall outside of the real future world. (See Kahneman -. Thinking Fast and Slow p 118) Second – the models make the fundamental scientific error of forecasting straight ahead beyond the Millennial Turning Point (MTP) and peak in solar activity which was reached in 1991.These errors are compounded by confirmation bias and academic consensus group think.

April 23, 2020 9:04 am

ghalfrunt

Exactly. But now, which is it? Did we get more energy from the sun [mostly UV, I would think] or was it, somehow, the extra CO2 in the atmosphere causing a decrease in the loss of energy?
Can you tell me?

Matthew Epp
Reply to  Henry Pool
April 23, 2020 9:41 am

It may not be a one or the other answer. Are you certain only CO2 in the atmosphere is the only possible source of increasing atmospheric enthalpy?
As I understand it, water vapor is the dominant”green house” gas and that CO2 is only effective if it adds to a feedback loop that increases water vapor.
If indeed additional solar energy is reaching the oceans, the increase in water vapor is expected with or without CO2.

Thoughts anyone?

Matt

Reply to  Matthew Epp
April 23, 2020 10:02 am

it is a catch 21 ?
more UV in the oceans means more H2O (g) in the air.

dh-mtl
Reply to  Matthew Epp
April 23, 2020 10:27 am

More water vapor in the air means more cooling. Water vapor for the earth, acts just like sweating for people.

– Evaporating water (primarily in the tropics) cools the ocean.
– Because of density differences (water vapor is 1/3 lighter than air), it increases atmospheric convection, and thus transport throughout the atmosphere.
– Water vapor, evaporated the tropics, is then transported throughout the atmosphere, and to the top of the atmosphere where it condenses, and radiates the energy of condensation to space, unimpeded by green-house gases in the lower atmosphere.
-Because the partial pressure of water vapor increases exponentially with temperature (roughly doubles for every 10C), water vapor increasingly acts as a negative feedback loop for CO2 at temperatures much above 10 – 15 C.

April 23, 2020 10:42 am

Hi Mark W. Point taken in regard to bats. However, If you were to read Dr. Wickramsinghe’s post at the Cosmic Tusk From April 5th of this year), when he was interviewed by a well known biologist in England, the Dr. stressed that the source for the Corona Virus was not bats! I do think that Dr. W. knows a thing or two about viruses, as he has been studying this topic for over thirty years. Did you know also, that viruses have been found on the outside of one of the Russian Space stations? This form of virus became established in outer space in the absence of air. Also, comets do contain a huge concoction of the basic building blocks of life. Dr. W. contends that viruses are particularly prevalent at times when the solar cycle is at minima, like now, and was also the case in 19i8/19 another time of a very serious influenza outbreak occurred. Thank-you, Rod. C.

April 24, 2020 6:31 pm

Huh. So what does this mean with respect to the expected effect on global climate? In terms a layman might comprehend.

Brett Keane
April 24, 2020 11:22 pm

Leif: What do you make then of Martin Mlynczak’s work at Nasa re the effects of Planetary Mechanics on Solar Plasma Fluxes. As they may govern the Planetary net Effective Energy influx? Brett Keane, NZ

Rudolf Huber
April 25, 2020 11:18 am

Yes – and the Sun is – drumrolls – spotless. Not the slightest pimple disturbs the immaculate disc the sun now really is. That might be nice to look at but it also means that the Sun is snoozing away. Less solar activity also means less sunlight, less energy, less warmth – we are now going into a new minimum and this means less warmth and more cold. Expect really, really cold winters. Breaking all the BS models the climate-mongers have thrown on us. It’s game over folks.

DEEBEE
April 26, 2020 3:50 am

Fresh out of cov-19 and a rising solar cycle will be prime opportunity to do something about the burning earth.

Cycle25
April 28, 2020 11:30 am

http://milesmathis.com/apollo.pdf

Solar Cycle 25 started in 2018?