Climate and the Spotless Sun

By Andrew C. Revkin
quiet SunQuiet Sun. (Space Weather Prediction Center)

[UPDATE, 7/20/09: Ken Chang has written a fascinating update on the unusual state of the Sun. Have a look and weigh in here.]

My colleague Ken Chang has written about the sun’s unusual stretch with 205 days this year without sunspots and a sleepy solar wind. Here are a couple of highlights:

The sun has been strangely unblemished this year. On more than 200 days so far this year, no sunspots were spotted. That makes the sun blanker this year than in any year since 1954, when it was spotless for 241 days. . . .

In another sign of solar quiescence, scientists reported last month that the solar wind, a rush of charged particles continually spewed from the sun at a million miles an hour, had diminished to its lowest level in 50 years. . . .

Scientists are not sure why this minimum has been especially minimal, and the episode is even playing into the global warming debate. Some wonder if this could be the start of an extended period of solar indolence that would more than offset the warming effect of human-made carbon dioxide emissions. From the middle of the 17th century to the early 18th, a period known as the Maunder Minimum, sunspots were extremely rare, and the reduced activity coincided with lower temperatures in what is known as the Little Ice Age.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (big pdf file) and other climate-research groups have largely rejected the hypothesis that variations in the sun’s behavior could have played a big role in warming since 1950 (the period in which the panel and the vast majority of climate specialists see abundant evidence that a human-caused buildup of greenhouse gases is the main influence).

But the sun has been the focus of a persistent chorus including some scientists and groups and individuals opposed to restrictions on greenhouse-gas emissions (and including a highly visible cluster of comment contributors here). We’ll keep tracking trends, both here and 93 million miles away, and see how this cycle plays out.

Comments are no longer being accepted.

Jude October 3, 2008 · 10:57 am

Ah, at long last!

So, thank you Andy for raising the topic.

Now, tell us what you think. Should the US move ahead with regulation and legislation to compel lower CO2 levels, even though it is likely to be costly and even though we have no way of compelling, for example, India and China to do likewise?

Or do the US first count a beat or two, watch the sun, watch the continuing temperature indices, and attempt some rigorous testing of the various hypotheses?

(and, in the meantime, again, thanks for paying some attention to that big star in our neighborhood, and raising the question whether its variations might have something to do with our own)

eppure, si rinfresca

John McCormick October 3, 2008 · 10:58 am

Andy, your piece includes the following:

[Some wonder if this could be the start of an extended period of solar indolence that would more than offset the warming effect of human-made carbon dioxide emissions]

What if it does (could???) offset the warming?

Would those who believe that possibility be willing to venture into a discussion about the increasing uptake in the oceans and their worsening acidity?

Impact of atmospheric CO2 increasehas many dynamics and ocean acidity is only one of them. Impact on vegetative growth from increased uptake of CO2 is another.

So the sun has gone quiet. The industrial world has not!

John McCormick

Jeff Huggins October 3, 2008 · 11:30 am

I see: Let’s blame the sun, even though the vast majority of scientists don’t, and even though we know CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere have gone way up, and even though we know that CO2 traps heat. But let’s consider blaming the sun anyway. It feels better. And, it’s what our ancestors did 10,000 years ago: They blamed everything on their gods, rather than on their own actions.

And, while we are at it, let’s just rely on the sun to pull us out of this, and pray a little bit, so we can continue pouring CO2 into the atmosphere and using what is an unsustainable resource anyhow.

I, for one, am fed up with this sort of thinking, and I’m fed up with the enablement of this sort of thinking without corresponding critical commentary and analysis.

New York Times, when will the front-page article appear, that’s well-written, that avoids the journalistic pitfalls that so many people have acknowledged, that lists all the bona fide major national and international scientific organizations and societies that all say that global warming is real, that it’s largely caused by human activity, and that we need to address it? Where is THAT article? Will you run it well before the election? If so, you MAY still have me as a customer after November. If not, I can promise that you won’t. I probably spend about $500 a year on the Times. That will go away if you don’t get your act together. Are you listening.

Thank you.

Mike Roddy October 3, 2008 · 11:31 am

I read the link from “Newsbusters”, and it was not persuasive. It repeatedly called IPCC and climate scientists “alarmists”, and the article smelled like just more far right claptrap.

The relative contribution of solar activity to climate patterns has been calculated with considerable precision by IPCC contributors. A few scientists from South Africa are disputing that data. Even if adjustments are required (not likely), this would have no real impact on the well quantified relationship between radiative forcing from greenhouse gases and increasing global temperatures.

I’m expecting a chorus of aha’s from the Dot Earth deniers on this latest slew of sunspot opinions. For those who are unfamiliar with their qualifications or the quality of their arguments, I counsel newer Dot Earth readers to disregard them. Most of us here have learned to do so. The deniers on this blog have been repeatedly shown to produce bad data, and scientists here tire of pointing it out. The facts do not change their opinions- clearly, other forces are in play.

S.t October 3, 2008 · 11:44 am

‘…the reduced (sunspot) activity coincided with lower temperatures in what is known as the Little Ice Age.’

Can we blame President Bush for the upcoming cooling period too?

Steven Earl Salmony October 3, 2008 · 11:52 am

………3 days………..three days……………..THREE DAYS

*******OCTOBER 6, 2008 at 2:00 PM, NYT Bldg********

A Meeting of the Dot Earth Community

Bob NYC October 3, 2008 · 12:05 pm

Andy, you just made Kim’s day. A few days ago a small sunspot cluster appeared in the north eastern region only to fall apart within a couple of days. The same with a few previous insignificant spots. The sun is playing dead and it is possible that we are entering a Maunder Minimum or hopefully just a short period of very low solar activity. I say hopefully, because past history ties lack of sunspot activity to low temps, something that appears to happen often according to tree ring studies. If this turns out to be true I will be too cold to find any pleasure in saying “I told you so” which I probably will :-)
This is one reason why I believe we should avoid panic and rash decisions that can finish off our economy and destroy untold lives.

S.t October 3, 2008 · 12:19 pm

Coming soon – the Obama bin Biden proposed Sunshine Tax

Jepe October 3, 2008 · 12:44 pm

Thanks for this fair article mr. Revkin.

If the sun stays in this “quiet” mode, we may be witnessing an enormous natural experiment. If the world warms despite this “sleeping” sun, I will have to revise my hypothesis, if the world cools, the “warmers” will have to revise their hypothesis.

thingsbreak October 3, 2008 · 12:52 pm

It might be helpful to note that if the sun were the main driver of current climate change, such a minimum on the heels of a La Nina would have us in record cold rather than the still above average temperatures observed so far this year.

//data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/tabledata/GLB.Ts+dSST.txt
ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/anomalies/monthly.land_and_ocean.90S.90N.df_1901-2000mean.dat
//vortex.nsstc.uah.edu/public/msu/t2lt/tltglhmam_5.2
//www.remss.com/pub/msu/monthly_time_series/RSS_Monthly_MSU_AMSU_Channel_TLT_Anomalies_Land_and_Ocean_v03_1.txt

Ike Solem October 3, 2008 · 1:02 pm

Here’s a press release worth covering, that shows how the Arctic is continuing to warm, as predicted by greenhouse-gas forced climate models:

Arctic Sea Ice Hits Second-lowest Recorded Extent, Likely Lowest Volume

ScienceDaily (Oct. 3, 2008) — Arctic sea ice extent during the 2008 melt season dropped to the second-lowest level since satellite measurements began in 1979, reaching the lowest point in its annual cycle of melt and growth on Sept. 14, according to researchers at the University of Colorado at Boulder’s National Snow and Ice Data Center.”

“Preliminary data also indicate 2008 may represent the lowest volume of Arctic sea ice on record, according to the researchers. The declining Arctic sea ice is due to rising concentrations of greenhouse gases that have elevated temperatures across the Arctic and strong natural variability in Arctic sea ice, according to scientists.”

That alters & updates the image presented by a previous Dot Earth blog:

//dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/09/17/ice-retreat-in-arctic-misses-last-years-mark/

It’s also worth noting that the area of sea ice coverage is influenced by the wind, and the rapid area loss of last summer was mainly wind-driven – but thin sea ice is more sensitive to wind forcing than thick sea ice is.

That’s why the actual volume of sea ice is more indicative of the real temperature trend – meaning that the decline is continuing, and there is no recovery. Arctic subsurface waters are also warmer than normal, meaning that ice formation over the winter will be lower than usual.

A3k October 3, 2008 · 1:12 pm

So when sunspot activity picks up, warming will too?

The discussion is unchanged.

A3k October 3, 2008 · 1:14 pm

Jepe,

Please go read a book on multi-variate analysis. And don’t come back until you understand it.

Patrick Henry October 3, 2008 · 1:25 pm

One of the greatest deficiencies of the IPCC approach, is that the only solar variable they are willing to consider is TSI (total solar insolation.) The sun has many other variable properties which have been known for hundreds of years.

British astronomer William Herschel observed in 1801, a direct correlation between the historical record of sunspots and grain prices – indicating that the solar cycles do have a strong impact on climate variability.

“”There are some empirical bits of evidence that show interesting relationships we don’t fully understand,” says Drew Shindell, a researcher at NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York. ”
//www.csmonitor.com/2007/0927/p13s03-sten.html

Spencer October 3, 2008 · 2:23 pm

The Sun is unpredictable… that’s one of the reasons I quit solar physics (after publishing articles on solar activity in Solar Physics and Astrophysical Journal) and moved to history of science.

Remember when the Marshall Institute and others published “reports” insisting that the warming since the 1890s was entirely due to the rise of solar activity during the same period? So folks predicted that when solar activity diminished, the climate would cool down. Oh yeah, that was around 1980. The temperature has gone up a lot since then, as solar activity levelled off. Why do we keep listening to people who were wrong?

Well, to be fair, it is scientifically respectable to argue that solar activity does influence climate. Funny thing is, the energy involved in these solar changes is a really, really small fraction of the total solar output. Oh, but wait, very small changes in sunlight (Milankovitch cycles) can trigger entire ice ages. So gee, I guess the climate can be pushed around by really small changes in solar radiation. Now let’s see, what kind of influence on radiation does doubling the CO2 in the atmosphere exert? Ooops, a good bit more than these little solar radiation changes. So if the solar changes do influence climate, as many think they do (including me), greenhouse gases must influence it even more.

This can be calculated. The take-away is that if the Sun were now to stop all activity, as during the 16th-century Maunder Minimum, it would produce an effect on climate no greater than the next twenty years’ worth of greenhouse gas emissions–some say, ten years. (On all this, see the history site at //www.aip.org/history/climate/solar.)

Ike Solem October 3, 2008 · 2:28 pm

Patrick Henry, the sunspot issue is a non-issue – and the other variables do not significantly impact climate, although they do heavily impact satellite telecommunications.

The only people who have tried to claim a link are Wille Soon and Sallie Baliunas, who claimed in 2003 that “When there are more sunspots, the total solar output increases, and when there are fewer sunspots, it decreases.”

That’s been proven to be false, but neither one has retracted their claims. Both are associates of the George C. Marshall Institute, which has taken some $750,000 from Exxon over the past ten years.

The Soon-Baliunas-Marshall-Exxon team have quite a record on this:
//www.reason.com/news/show/30760.html

October 1998: Baliunas on the failure of the computer climate models: “It should be right where the warming is felt first– for example, the polar regions, the Arctic. In the last 50 years, the Arctic has cooled. And the models say it should be warming profoundly.”

Should we expect any of these tobacco science experts to come out and admit they were wrong? Or will they continue to act as background “expert” support for the likes of Sarah Palin, British Petroleum, Exxon and Conoco?

Definitely the latter:
//www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/oct/01/sarahpalin.climatechange

“The Republican Sarah Palin and her officials in the Alaskan state government drew on the work of at least six scientists known to be sceptical about the dangers and causes of global warming…”

“One co-author of the paper, Willie Soon, completed the study with funding from ExxonMobil – which has oil operations in Alaska’s North Slope – as well as from the American Petroleum Institute….”

“Another co-author of the document was Sallie Baliunas. In 2003 she and Soon were criticised when it was revealed that a joint paper had been partially funded by the American Petroleum Institute.”

The cottage industry of tobacco-science experts has gone on long enough. No one goes around interviewing scientists who claim AIDS is not related to HIV any more (except Mbeki) – so how is it that politicians get away with citing the likes of Soon & Baliunas as the basis for government policy?

Mike Roddy October 3, 2008 · 2:56 pm

Thank you, Spencer, Jeff, and Ike. You have once again effectively debunked Patrick, Bob, and Jude. It’s hard work, but somebody’s got to do it.

Patrick Henry October 3, 2008 · 3:14 pm

Nice try Ike –

In 2007, Svensmark and Nigel Calder published a book The Chilling Stars: A New Theory of Climate Change which described the theory that cosmic rays “have more effect on the climate than manmade CO2″:
//www.spacecenter.dk/~hsv/

Now, since you are so knowledgeable, please tell us what caused the Little Ice Age?

Patrick Henry October 3, 2008 · 3:17 pm

Ike,

Was William Herschel also funded by “tobacco and oil?”

JR October 3, 2008 · 4:31 pm

To Sun Spot Believers And Other Fossil Fools:

Since mainstream climate science is beyond your capacity,
maybe reading the homespun wisdom of modern classics will help:

“It ain’t what we don’t know that gets us into trouble. It’s
what we know for sure that just ain’t so.” — Mark Twain

“Let us be thankful for the fools. But for them the rest of us
could not succeed.” — Mark Twain

“It is difficult for a man to understand something when
his salary depends upon not understanding it.”
— Upton Sinclair

jorge acker October 3, 2008 · 7:41 pm

I don’t think that sun spot activity is solely reasonable for climate change, just as most scientist do agree that humans are not the only or even the main cause. Both left & right of this issue jump on any stats or subject that tells what they want to be known while leaving out info that hurts their theories. So often the whole story is edited to be bias, anyone who has time( that means most of the population can’t) to read and process all the info realizes that this is not the first time that the planet has gone through historic changes and that not one thing,,,but many things have contributed . One thing is clear, things are changing, but to dispell any viable info is what breeds the worst form of ignorance. I’m worn out from talking to people that have read a few articles and believe they know whats going ,,, that it is mankind ! or it is sunspots ! the truth is that there are many factors, some we may be able to control or alter and some we have no control over. A solution would be to take all possiable causes address any that man kind can affect, change, or adjust and hope for the best.

Dano October 3, 2008 · 8:30 pm

Thapa (st) in 5 stated:

‘…Can we blame President Bush for the upcoming cooling period too?

Thapa can see into the future! What amazing powers!

Say, Sanjong, can you see what next week’s winning lottery numbers are, buddy, pal of mine? Thank you ever so much!

Best,

D

Dano October 3, 2008 · 8:36 pm

Does everyone notice how the denialists (viz #18) can’t point to peer-reviewed empirical literature to make their point?

Books, op-ed pieces, cherry-picked and selectively quoted (viz 14) articles, argument from ignorance are the tools of the denialist trade.

This lack of evidence is the reason why so many local climate initiatives are being launched against the denialist’s entreaties. Awwww.

Best,

D

Brian M. October 3, 2008 · 9:00 pm

#3 Jeff Huggins:

Let me get this straight. You’re going to take away your funding from The Times if it doesn’t report scientific results the way you want them printed?!?

The irony there is so rich I”m not even going to touch it.

But I will comment on your statement that “…it’s what our ancestors did 10,000 years ago: They blamed everything on their gods, rather than on their own actions. “.

Actually, they did just the opposite. They thought their actions (in failing to appease said gods) controlled things like volcanoes erupting, locusts swarming, and…gosh…the climate changing.

Is this National Ironic Statements Day? If not, I’d better start worshiping…

Sanjong Thapa October 3, 2008 · 9:41 pm

Dano

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