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Whether it’s weather or climate – it’s all in the accuracy of the models and the accuracy model assumptions and data that the models are fed.
If the assumptions and/or data are off, what can be said about the results?
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By most indicators, the Sun is not behaving as expected at this point in the solar cycle – and it hasn’t been for quite a while. The most visible indicator of solar activity – the number of sunspots – is far lower than normal. Over the last few days, the Sun’s surface facing Earth has been spotless.
We are currently in Solar Cycle 24.
The figure on the right, above, is a composite of historical monthly sunspot numbers as of early December from NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center superimposed over the same figure from March 2007. The red lines represent the 2007 predicted maximum and minimum monthly sunspot counts. The current average monthly count, which should be ramping up to the cycle’s maximum, is far below what was anticipated.
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In a paper published March 2006, David Archibald predicted that Solar Cycles 24 and 25 would be very much like Solar Cycle 5 and 6 – the Dalton Minimum. Nearly two years into Cycle 24, the pattern he predicted appears to be developing.
So what was the Dalton Minimum and what might a similar period mean for the modern world?
Bottom line – it’s going to get colder.
The Dalton Minimum was a period of low solar activity that lasted from about 1790 to 1830 in which global temperatures were also lower than average. If we are entering into a similar “modern” minimum and the correlation of colder global temperatures hold true, global “warming” may stop and global temperatures may drop through the end of the minimum.
By many indicators, global temperatures appear to have been relatively stable for nearly a decade – or more – already, except for perturbations caused by climate features such as the Arctic Oscillation, El Nino, and La Nina.
Some scientists believe that the recent warming that has been seen is simply a natural recovery from the cold period of the Little Ice Age, which may have resulted from several low solar activity periods. If that is the case, even if temperature were to drop over the next couple of decades, the overall trend, since the end of the Little Ice Age, may be maintained, temperatures may drop for the next 20 to 30 years.
Previous related posts:
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In Australia, climate change initiatives have been delayed until at least 2013. Despite that, the Federal Climate Change Department is not considering any cutbacks or layoffs.
TAXPAYERS will fork out $90 million a year to keep more than 400 public servants employed within the Federal Climate Change Department – despite most of them now having nothing to do until 2013.
More than 60 of them are classified as senior executive staff on salaries between $168,000 and $298,000 a year. Their salary bill alone will cost an estimated $12 million every year.
A further $8 million will also be paid in rent for plush offices at Canberra’s Constitution Place until 2012, where it is believed 500 new computers will be delivered this week.
It can be revealed that despite Prime Minister Kevin Rudd’s decision on Tuesday to suspend the failed Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme until at least 2013, the department has ruled out plans to cut back staff.
Read the full Herald Sun article – Kevin Rudd’s Department of Hot Air costing taxpayers $90m
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From Fox News:
Al Gore won a Nobel Prize and an Oscar for his film, An Inconvenient Truth. But in the last three months, as global warming has gone from a scientific near-certitude to the subject of satire, Gore — the public face of global warming — has been mum on the topic.
The former vice president apparently finds it inconvenient even to answer calls to testify before the U.S. Senate. You can call him Al . . . but he won’t call back.
On Tuesday, Oklahoma Sen. James Inhofe — a prominent skeptic of global warming theory and the Republican leader of the Senate’s Environment and Public Works Committee — issued a request for Gore to come testify on global warming. In an interview with FoxNews.com, Inhofe said he wants Gore to appear because "it will be interesting to ask him on what science he based his movie," a film the senator considers "science fiction."
Gore has yet to respond, but that didn’t prevent him from causing a stir at Apple’s shareholder meeting Thursday. According to CNET, Gore was seated in the first row while several stockholders bashed his high-profile views on climate change. One reportedly said Gore "has become a laughingstock. The glaciers have not melted."
Read the Fox News article: You Can Call Him Al … But Al Won’t Call You Back
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Meeting in closed sessions in Bali, Environment and Climate ministers from several countries are insisting on a review of the performance of the IPCC and it’s head, Dr. Rajendra Pachauri. According to a UK Telegraph article, the minister’s main concern is over Dr. Pachauri’s response to errors discovered in the 2007 IPCC assessment report on climate.
Environment and Climate ministers meeting in closed session in Bali last night insisted that an independent review should be carried out following the publicising of mistakes in its last report, and a row surrounding Dr Pachauri’s robust response to his critics. If his management is found to be at fault his position could become untenable.
Participants in the unprecedented meeting – held at the annual assembly of the Governing Council of the United Nations Environment Programme’s (UNEP) Governing Council in Bali – were sworn to secrecy over the decision and it is only expected to be announced after its detailed scope and composition have been worked out by UNEP and the World Meteorological Organisation, the two UN agencies that oversee the IPCC’s work.
The ministers – led by Hillary Benn, the Environment Secretary,and his counterparts from Germany,. Norway, Algeria and Antigua and Barbuda – refused to allow Dr Pachauri to decide who would carry out the review, insisting it must be completely and demonstrably independent of the IPCC.
Read the full Telegraph article: IPCC chief Rajendra Pachauri to face independent inquiry.
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The Sun has lost its spots – part 4.
September 17, 2010
I check the status of solar activity and sunspots regularly – usually once a day, just a quick check, along with several other things I’m interested in.
I’ve also had a few related blog posts:
The sun isn’t as completely spotless as it was a year ago, but spotless days are still occurring – and, according to a new study discussed in Science, sunspots may soon disappear for decades.
The study is also discussed in a Financial Post article by Lawrence Solomon:
If this study proves out – and it is consistent with other studies and indicators – we are likely faced with declining global temperatures rather than global warming.
And that would not be good – far more people suffer and die as a result of cold than of heat. Extended periods of cold would have an adverse affect on crops. Frigid winters and cold summers during the Dalton Minimum, which lasted from about 1790 to 1830, resulted in massive crop failures, famine and death. The Maunder Minimum, also known as the Little Ice Age, lasted for about 70 years, from about 1645 to 1715, and “was marked by bitter cold, widespread crop failures, and severe human privation.”¹ The Dalton and Maunder Minimum were periods of low solar activity and low sunspot count.
The sun has not fully escaped the solar minimum between solar cycles 23 and 24. A typical solar minimum will see 486 days without sunspots. Since 2004, there has been 809 blank days, 41 so far in 2010, and the most recent just in the past week. If scientists were to use the telescopes of the Dalton or Maunder Minimum, the number of blank days would likely be quite a bit higher and many of the recent sunspots would not have been counted.
What do you think about the possibility of a colder future?
Of course, some may say that for long term forecasting, one would have just as much fortune depending upon the Old Farmer’s Almanac. Ironically, though, sunspots are taken into consideration in the Old Farmer’s Almanac forecasts.
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