A typical sunspot compared to the size of the earth. Sunspots have all but vanished in recent years.
Henrik Svensmark explains the SKY experiment
Posted on 02/09/2008 12:25:57 PM PST by neverdem
Global Cooling comes back in a big way
Dr. Kenneth Tapping is worried about the sun. Solar activity comes in regular cycles, but the latest one is refusing to start. Sunspots have all but vanished, and activity is suspiciously quiet. The last time this happened was 400 years ago -- and it signaled a solar event known as a "Maunder Minimum," along with the start of what we now call the "Little Ice Age."
Tapping, a solar researcher and project director for Canada's National Research Council, says it may be happening again. Overseeing a giant radio telescope he calls a "stethoscope for the sun," Tapping says, if the pattern doesn't change quickly, the earth is in for some very chilly weather.
During the Little Ice Age, global temperatures dropped sharply. New York Harbor froze hard enough to allow people to walk from Manhattan to Staten Island, and in Britain, people reported sighting eskimos paddling canoes off the coast. Glaciers in Norway grew up to 100 meters a year, destroying farms and villages.
But will it happen again?
In 2005, Russian astronomer Khabibullo Abdusamatov predicted the sun would soon peak, triggering a rapid decline in world temperatures. Only last month, the view was echoed by Dr. Oleg Sorokhtin, a fellow of the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences. who advised the world to "stock up on fur coats." Sorokhtin, who calls man's contribution to climate change "a drop in the bucket," predicts the solar minimum to occur by the year 2040, with icy weather lasting till 2100 or beyond.
Observational data seems to support the claims -- or doesn't contradict it, at least. According to data from Britain's Met Office, the earth has cooled very slightly since 1998. The Met Office says global warming "will pick up again shortly." Others aren't so sure.
Researcher Dr. Timothy Patterson, director of the Geoscience Center at Carleton University, shares the concern. Patterson is finding "excellent correlations" between solar fluctuations, a relationship that historically, he says doesn't exist between CO2 and past climate changes. According to Patterson. we shouldn't be surprised by a solar link. "The sun [is] the ultimate source of energy on this planet," he says.
Such research dates back to 1991, when the Danish Meteorological Institute released a study showing that world temperatures over the past several centuries correlated very closely with solar cycles. A 2004 study by the Max Planck Institute found a similar correlation, but concluded the timing was only coincidental, as the solar variance seemed too small to explain temperature changes.
However, researchers at DMI continued to work, eventually discovering what they believe to be the link. The key factor isn't changes in solar output, but rather changes in the sun's magnetosphere A stronger field shields the earth more from cosmic rays, which act as "seeds" for cloud formation. The result is less cloud cover, and a warming planet. When the field weakens, clouds increases, reflecting more light back to space, and the earth cools off.
Recently, lead researcher Henrik Svensmark was able to experimentally verify the link between cosmic rays and cloud formation, in a cloud chamber experiment called "SKY" at the Danish National Space Center. CERN plans a similar experiment this year.
A few years ago, Stanford University's Hoover Institution also reported finding a correlation between the sun and climate. Hoover
Even NASA's Goddard Institute of Space Studies -- long the nation's most ardent champion of anthropogenic global warming -- is getting in on the act. Drew Shindell, a researcher at GISS, says there are some "interesting relationships we don't fully understand" between solar activity and climate.
It’s obvious the CO2 is escaping through the ozone hole and extinguishing the solar flairs.
I wish I had your flare for science.
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The Little Ice Age never happened. It did not fit the global warming model, so our written history is incorrect. Earth's temperature has been constant for billions of years before the invention of the combustion engine.
I thought we were at the end of an 11 year cycle.
As to the picture comparing a sunspot with the Earth... wow.
Interesting theory. You have the makings of a great climate change expert.
The ozone layer is below the fart layer, which is why we need to protect the ozone layer. (I was just watching some old Steve Martin on Youtube.)
darn...I was looking forward to global warming and lower heating bills.
I hate being cold.
Global cooling scare in the 70’s to early 80’s, global warming scare in the late 90’s to 2007, now were back to global cooling. I think I see a pattern here.
Click on POGW graphic for full GW rundown
New!!: Dr. John Ray's
GREENIE WATCH
Ping me if you find one I've missed.
Click on POGW graphic for full GW rundown
New!!: Dr. John Ray's
GREENIE WATCH
Ping me if you find one I've missed.
If you are interested in Astronomy, this data has been out there and available for a long time. If not, you probably haven’t seen it.
The data is real, the correlation with low temperatures is quite real. These are not whispy computer models that don’t work in the real world.
GE was set to make a mint on the CO2 goods. Al Gore made a mint on those bogus movies. etc.
Here is a flaming something that like to tell the world he has "flair" also....
Yes, I was waiting for the ice caps to melt and create a great inland sea. I live on a hill overlooking a creek. The water would backup leaving me with beachfront property.
With this bad news, I’ll just be stuck on a hill in the cold.
I just can’t catch a break.
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