Five Decades Of Cooling Ahead

Investors.com ^ | December 24, 2009 | INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY staff

[mrreaganaut]

Now that sounds like science that might actually be believable.
____________________________________________________________

Sorry no link, but a friend tells me that NASA data show global warming and cooling on Mars and Venus at the same time as Earth’s; that is to say, change consistent with Earth’s on planets with no CFC emissions at all. The sunspot cycle has the most influence on planetary warming and cooling.

Yes, science has finally proved that the Sun warms the Earth. BTW, we are under a severe storm watch, and no Christmas Eve services in town because of it (Christmas Canceled Due To Global Warming). Happy Kwanzaa!

[muawiyah]

Yup, Y2K was definitely a real phenomenon. Took more than programming to overcome it. I still run into the occasional old file dated 2027. Thankfully I know what that means!

[Nuc1]

Well said.

[visualops]

Y2K was definitely a big issue.
Acid rain (more correctly acid precipitation) also is an issue of concern. However, the media love drama, and the enviros take advantage of that, so something like acid precipitation becomes high drama.
If you want an interesting and impartial discussion of acid precipitation (and other causes of building deterioration) I suggest you read this-
http://pubs.usgs.gov/gip/acidrain/index.html

click on Contents then each page on the bottom click next.

[Para-Ord.45]

bm

[troy McClure]

Maybe some Rat senator will slip and fall,and be in a coma.

[ICCtheWay]

The world has had several major ice ages followed by melting of those ice ages as done by global warming...

Seems we have a natural cycle going on here... especially since all those ice ages and following warming periods came about before civilization existed...

But these obvious truths are totally ignored...

The most likely cause of any global cooling or warming period is planetary and solar movements - in conjunction with each other...

The earth’s orbit around the Sun is not perfect - there can be slight orbital perturbations (irregularities) which can change the amount of sunlight directed to and/or absorbed by the Earth. Orbital perturbations can and do occur in cycles - periodic and non periodic.

Likewise - the angle of the Earth’s axis is not perfect and can change - ever so slightly - a fraction of a fraction of a degree. A slight alteration in the angle of the Earth’s axis could easily produce changes in the amount of sunlight absorbed or not absorbed by the Earth in a given time frame...

Also the diameter of the Sun can change by internal expansion / contractions cycles — then there are the well known Sun spot cycles - some quite predictable...

Periods of global cooling, global warming and global nothing could easily be explained by any of the above factors...

I believe global cooling and warming cycles could well be a chance confluence of two or three of the above mentioned phenomena... throw in some human activity and you have what we know as climate change - for better or worse...

Bottom line - humans have little to no significant contribution to any sort of climatic change in temperature or weather patterns...

On a much smaller scale urban centers do have an effect on localized weather patterns.

The claims of global warming - climate change are just a global excuse for political movements not achievable by other means...

In the U.S.A. this is also exemplified by a manufactured ‘health care crisis’ ... there is no health care crisis - but it does make a good excuse (fabricated as it is) for a political movement ...

Footnote — but of course none of the global events over hundreds and thousands of years similar to the one described below have had any climatic effect (according to LEFTIST around the world) ... /SARC off ...

RE: the 2004 earthquake and tsunami near Indonesia, Thailand and the Indian Ocean area ... The gigantic quake rattled the Earth’s orbit, changed the map of Asia:

An earthquake that unleashed deadly tidal waves on Asia was so powerful it made the Earth wobble on its axis and permanently altered the regional map, US geophysicists said.

The 9.0-magnitude temblor that struck 250 kilometers (155 miles) southeast of Sumatra island Sunday may have moved small islands as much as 20 meters (66 feet), according to one expert.

“That earthquake has changed the map,” US Geological Survey expert Ken Hudnut told AFP. “Based on seismic modeling, some of the smaller islands off the southwest coast of Sumatra may have moved to the southwest by about 20 meters. That is a lot of slip.”

The northwestern tip of the Indonesian territory of Sumatra may also have shifted to the southwest by around 36 meters (120 feet), Hudnut said.

In addition, the energy released as the two sides of the undersea fault slipped against each other made the Earth wobble on its axis, Hudnut said.

“We can detect very slight motions of the Earth and I would expect that the Earth wobbled in its orbit when the earthquake occurred due the massive amount of energy exerted and the sudden shift in mass,” Hudnut said.

Another USGS research geophysicist agreed that the Earth would have got a “little jog,” and that the islands off Sumatra would have been moved by the quake.

However, Stuart Sipkin, of the USGS National Earthquake Information Center in Golden Colorado, said it was more likely that the islands off Sumatra had risen higher out of the sea than they had moved laterally. “In in this case, the Indian plate dived below the Burma plate, causing
uplift, so most of the motion to the islands would have been vertical, not horizontal.”

---

The Sumatran earthquake will not alter the Earth’s tilt ), but will probably alter the Earth’s wobble on that axis. The Earth’s north pole gradually spirals around, anti-clockwise, on the Earth’s surface (in a diameter of about 2-12 metres); generally the tighter, the
faster the rotation.

[Star Traveler]

It's always been "climate change" as the weather has been warmer and it has been colder -- as it changes all the time... LOL... Climate change is a good explanation for what's going on... the climate is changing all the time... :-)

---

Meteorological events that happened on December 24th:

1796
A famous cold day was felt at Cairo, IL where the temperature fell to -8 and in Kentucky where the mercury fell to -13.  The Ohio and Mississippi Rivers were frozen.

1836
An intense cold wave drove the temperature down nearly 40 degrees in 10 hours at Fort Snelling, MN to -28° by Christmas morning, one degree shy of 1822's record.

1868
A severe freeze occurred at Jacksonville, FL when the temperature dropped to 20.

1872
Extreme cold gripped the Upper Midwest.  Downtown Chicago, IL reported an all-time record low of -23°, which stood until 12/24/1983 and Minneapolis, MN plunged to -38°.  The afternoon high at Minneapolis struggled to make it to -17°.

1879
It was a frigid Christmas Eve at Winnipeg, Manitoba Canada as the temperature fell to -54°.

1924
At Fairfield, MT, it was 63° at noon; by midnight the temperature had plunged an incredible 84 degrees to -21°.

1927
A Christmas Eve Blizzard buried Findon, West Sussex, United Kingdom driven by gale force winds.  The deep and drifting snow cut off the town.  100 men were employed to remove the great snowfall from roads.

1955
For the month of December: Waco, TX: 91°, Abilene, TX: 89°,  Dallas (Love Field), TX: 89° (broke previous daily record by 13 degrees), Dodge City, KS: 86° (broke previous daily record by 20 degrees),  Oklahoma City, OK: 86° (broke previous daily record by 17 degrees), Wichita, KS: 83° (broke previous record by 20 degrees), Tulsa, OK: 80°-Tied (broke previous record by 13 degrees), Little Rock, AR: 80°-Tied,

Del Rio, TX: 89°, Dallas (DFW), TX: 88°, San Angelo, TX: 87°, Wichita Falls, TX: 87°, Austin, TX: 82°, Midland-Odessa, TX: 82°, Houston, TX: 82°-Tied, Amarillo, TX: 81° (broke previous record by 12 degrees), Lubbock, TX: 80°, Jackson, MS: 80°, Fort Smith, AR: 80°, Austin (Bergstrom), TX: 80°-Tied, New Orleans, LA: 79°, Roswell, NM: 78°, Meridian, MS: 78°, Tupelo, MS: 78°, Montgomery, AL: 78°, Clayton, NM: 77°, Goodland, KS: 77° (broke previous record by 10 degrees), Pueblo, CO: 76°, Memphis, TN: 76°, Birmingham, AL: 74°, Springfield, MO: 74°, Huntsville, AL: 73°, El Paso, TX: 72°, Chattanooga, TN: 72°, Atlanta, GA: 71°-Tied, Colorado Springs, CO: 70°, Denver, CO: 70°, Oak Ridge, TN: 70°, Huntington, WV: 70°-Tied, Bristol, TN: 69°, Columbia, MO: 69°, Beckley, WV: 67°, Kansas City, MO: 66°, Scottsbluff, NE: 65°, Grand Junction, CO: 64° (broke previous record by 10 degrees), Cheyenne, WY: 60°, Alamosa, CO: 58° and Casper, WY: 52°.

***See Slideshow***

1962
A band of precipitation over northern Scotland turned to snow, giving Glasgow, Scotland its first white Christmas in 24 years.

1963
The temperature fell to -13° at Memphis, TN, setting the all-time record low temperature for the city.  This came only two days after Memphis had received its third heaviest snowfall on record with 14.3 inches.

1972
Queensland in Australia recorded one of its hottest days on record when the high temperature at Birdsville reached 118.4°.

1982
The "Blizzard of '82" blasted eastern Colorado with 18 to 34 inches of snow.  Akron was buried under 28 inches of snow.  Denver recorded 23.6 inches of snow in 24 hours to set a new all-time 24 hour snowfall record.  Winds gusting to 60 mph whipped the snow into 4 to 8 foot drifts.  All highways leading out of Denver were closed and Stapleton International Airport was closed for 33 consecutive hours as visibilities fell to a quarter of a mile or less for 17 consecutive hours.  Laramie, WY picked up 18.2 inches of snow.

During an unseasonal period of severe weather, thunderstorms over Oregon County, Missouri produced an F4 tornado. The tornado kept up F4 intensity for 43 miles before dropping to F2 intensity and continuing its progress for an additional 33 miles. During its 35 minute life span the twister killed one person, injured 8 others and did over $10 million dollars in damage.

An F2 tornado touched down in Christian County, Missouri and cut a 300 yard wide 16 mile long path of damage. One person was injured and $5 million dollars of damage was reported.

1983
It was the coldest Christmas Eve on modern record in the United States.  Arctic air covered almost 90 percent of the country with temperatures well below freezing and, in many areas of the north, well below zero. On Christmas day 125 record lows were set in 24 different states..  Chicago, IL recorded its' coldest temperature ever with a reading of -25°.  Miles City, MT established a new U.S. record high barometric pressure of 31.42 inHg or 1063.9 millibars.  Sioux Falls, SD led the nation with record cold as the city stayed below zero for 8 consecutive days.  Oklahoma City, OK set their highest barometric pressure reading with 31.14 inHg.

Miles City, MT set their all-time record low and coldest high temperature with -38° and -25° respectively.  Sheridan, WY also recorded their all-time coldest temperature of -37°. 

Locations reporting their lowest December temperature: Alma, WI: -32°, Billings, MT: -32° (broke previous record by 18 degrees), Waukon, IA: -27°, Dubuque, IA: -25°, Chicago, IL: -25°, Rockford, IL: -24° and Youngstown, OH: -12°-Tied (broke previous daily record by 12 degrees).

Locations reporting daily record low temperatures for the date included: Chester, MT: -52°, Wisdom, MT: -52°, Havre, MT: -50°, West Yellowstone, MT: -48°, Bozeman, MT: -46°, Chinook, MT: -46°, Conrad, MT: -46°, White Sulphur Springs, MT: -46°, Fort Assinniboine, MT: -44°, Lincoln Ranger Station, MT: -44°, Shelby, MT: -43°, Great Falls, MT: -42° (broke previous record by 18 degrees), Lewistown, MT: -42°, Livingston, MT: -41°, Cut Bank, MT: -40°, Butte, MT: -40°, Boulder, MT: -40°, Grass Range, MT: -39°, Del Bonita, MT: -38°, Virginia City, MT: -38°, Glasgow, MT: -37°, Helena, MT: -37°, Townsend, MT: -37°, Choteau, MT: -35°, Valier, MT: -35°, Casper, WY: -33° (broke previous record by 20 degrees), Kalispell, MT: -30° (broke previous record by 13 degrees), Ennis, MT: -30°, Timber Lake, SD: -28°, Watertown, SD: -28°, St. Cloud, MN: -28°, Mobridge, SD: -26°, Wheaton, SD: -26°, Waterloo, IA: -26°, Rochester, MN: -26°, Rapid City, SD: -26°, Sisseton, SD: -25°, Valentine, NE: -25°, Cheyenne, WY: -25°, Aberdeen, SD: -23°, Sioux Falls, SD: -23°, Green Bay, WI: -21°, Scottsbluff, NE: -21°, Des Moines, IA: -19°, Moline, IL: -19° (broke previous record by 10 degrees), Grand Island, NE: -19°, Omaha, NE: -19°, Sioux City, IA: -18°, Peoria, IL: -18°, Lincoln, NE: -18°, Indianapolis, IN: -17°, Kansas City, MO: -17° (broke previous record by 14 degrees), Springfield, IL: -16°, Fort Wayne, IN: -16°, Columbia, MO: -16° (broke previous record by 14 degrees), South Bend, IN: -15° (broke previous record by 11 degrees), Akron, OH: -15°, Dayton, OH: -15°, Toledo, OH: -15°, Topeka, KS: -14°, Mansfield, OH: -14°, Lewiston, ID: -13°, Concordia, KS: -13°, St. Louis, MO: -12°, Cincinnati, OH: -12°, Columbus, OH: -12°, Marquette, MI: -11°, Pittsburgh, PA: -11°, Beckley, WV: -11°, Lexington, KY: -10°, Jackson, KY: -10°, Wichita, KS: -10°, Springfield, MO: -10°, Cleveland, OH: -10°, Elkins, WV: -10°, Detroit, MI: -9°, Pocatello, ID: -8°, Louisville, KY: -8°, Huntington, WV: -7° (broke previous record by 11 degrees), Paducah, KY: -6°, Charleston, WV: -6°, Wilmington, DE: -5°, Asheville, NC: -5°, Nashville, TN: -4°, Erie, PA: -3°, Bristol, TN: -3°, Amarillo, TX: -3°, Tulsa, OK: -2°, Knoxville, TN: -2°, Oak Ridge, TN: -2°, Atlantic City, NJ: -1°, Allentown, PA: -1°, Harrisburg, PA: -1°, Trenton, NJ: -1°, Fort Smith, AR: 0°, Oklahoma City, OK: 0°, Lubbock, TX: 0°, Roanoke, VA: 0°, Yakima, WA: 0°, Lynchburg, VA: 1°, Sterling (Dulles Airport), VA: 1°, Huntsville, AL: 2°, Chattanooga, TN: 2° (Broke previous record by 10 degrees), Atlanta, GA: 3°, Newark, NJ: 3°, Philadelphia, PA: 3°, Birmingham, AL: 4°, Baltimore, MD: 4°, Tupelo, MS: 4°, Greensboro, NC: 4°, New York (LaGuardia Airport), NY: 4°, Abilene, TX: 4°, Washington, D.C.: 5°, New York (Kennedy Airport), NY: 5° (broke previous record by 10 degrees), Dallas, TX: 5°, Charlotte, NC: 6° (broke previous record by 11 degrees), Raleigh, NC: 6°, New York (Central Park, NY), NY: 6°, Midland-Odessa, TX: 6°, San Angelo, TX: 6°, Wichita Falls, TX: 6°, Richmond, VA: 6°, Athens, GA: 7°, Dallas (DFW), TX: 7°, Bridgeport, CT: 8°, Shreveport, LA: 8°, Greenville-Spartanburg, SC: 8°, Jackson, MS: 9°, Wallops Island, VA: 9°, Montgomery, AL: 10°, Macon, GA: 10°, Meridian, MS: 10°, Norfolk, VA: 10°, Augusta, GA: 11°, Columbus, GA: 11°, Wilmington, NC: 11° (broke previous record by 10 degrees), Columbia, SC: 12°, Austin, TX: 12°, Waco, TX: 12°, Mobile, AL: 13°, Baton Rouge, LA: 13°, Cape Hatteras, NC: 13° (broke previous record by 10 degrees), Houston, TX: 14°, Olympia, WA: 14°, Pensacola, FL: 15°, Portland, OR: 15°, Del Rio, TX: 15°, San Antonio, TX: 15°, Savannah, GA: 16°, Austin (Bergstrom), TX: 16°, Lake Charles, LA: 17°, New Orleans, LA: 17°, Galveston, TX: 17°, Victoria, TX: 17°, Astoria, OR: 18°, Jacksonville, FL: 18°, Charleston, SC: 18°, Quillayute, WA: 18°, Beaumont-Port Arthur, TX: 19°, Tallahassee, FL: 20°, Corpus Christi, TX: 20°, Brownsville, TX: 24°, Daytona, Beach, FL: 30°-Tied and Orlando, FL: 35°.

If the brutal dangerous cold wasn’t enough, 1983 the Northern Plains was in the grip of a ferocious ground blizzard. Over the stretch beginning on the 18th through the 25th temperatures were rarely above zero across the area and strong winds made conditions especially dangerous. The worst conditions occurred from the 23rd through the 25th as light snow and loose surface snow combined with strong northwesterly winds to produce whiteout conditions for extended periods of time.

The ground blizzard paralyzed most areas, completely blocking most roads with drifts 4 to 5 feet high. One drift in southwest Minnesota climbed to 15 feet deep and took five hours to clear with a large snowplow. With sub-zero temperatures and winds gusting up to 60 mph, at times, wind chills were from -60° to -100°. The intense and long- lived cold spell burst gas lines, caused propane gas to solidify, and froze water pipes and tanks.

The last of five consecutive days that the temperature remained below zero occurred on this day for Chadron, Alliance and Scottsbluff, NE.  Cheyenne, WY warmed above zero in the late evening on this day due to Chinook winds, and ended their longest recorded streak of below zero temperatures at 120 hours.

1986
A severe ice storm hit the Ottawa Valley in Ontario and southwestern Quebec Canada on Christmas Eve, forcing many residents to barbecue their holiday turkey as power was lost for 25% of the residents. 1.18 inches of freezing rain accumulated in about 14 hours.

1987
A 4-day siege of heavy rain began in the south central U.S.  Flooding claimed 4 lives and caused millions of dollars property damage.  Western Tennessee was drenched with up to 14 inches of rain in two days.  Total rainfall exceeded 12 inches around Memphis TN, and the heavy rain and subsequent flooding added insult to injury to victims of the West Memphis tornado on the 14th of the month.  Little Rock, AR experienced their wettest December day on record with 5.01 inches of rain.  West Little Rock, AR reported 10.20 inches of rain in 24 hours.

1988
Early morning thunderstorms developing along a cold front spawned a powerful F4 tornado at Franklin, TN which killed one person, injured 7 others, and caused $8 million dollars damage. 

Another in a series of winter storms in the western U.S. produced 20 inches of snow at Blue Canyon, CA in 24 hours.  Bishop, CA received 14 inches of snow in just 6 hours, and Redding, CA, which averages 3 inches of snow per year, was blanketed with 10 inches.

1989
Many cities in the south central and eastern U.S. reported record low temperatures for the date.  Key West, FL equaled their record for December with a morning low of 44°.  The high of just 45° at Miami, FL was an all-time record for that location.  This smashed their previous record for the date by 20 degrees.

Vero Beach, FL set their all-time record December low with 23° while Key West, FL tied their December record low with 44°.

Locations reporting daily record lows included: Elkins, WV: -22° (broke previous record by 12 degrees), Concord, NH: -20°, Mt. Pocono, PA: -20°, Burlington, VT: -18°, Caribou, ME: -18°-Tied, Albany, NY: -15°, Syracuse, NY: -14°, Portland, ME: -13°, Binghamton, NY: -11°, Lexington, KY: -10°-Tied, Evansville, IN: -9°, Hartford, CT: -9°, Avoca, PA: -9°, Huntington, WV: -9°, Williamsport, PA: -9°-Tied, Allentown, PA: -5°, Bristol, TN: -3°-Tied, Reading, PA: -1°, Roanoke, VA: 0°-Tied, Huntsville, AL: 1°, Tupelo, MS: 3°, Birmingham, AL: 4°-Tied, Bridgeport, CT: 6°, Jackson, MS: 6°, Meridian, MS: 6°, Montgomery, AL: 7°, Shreveport, LA: 8°-Tied, Mobile, AL: 9°, Columbus, GA: 9, Georgetown, DE: 9, Baton Rouge, LA: 10, Macon, GA: 10-Tied, Pensacola, FL: 11°, Houston, TX: 11°, Lake Charles, LA: 12°, Islip, NY: 12°, Tallahassee, FL: 13°, Beaumont-Port Arthur, TX: 13°, Austin (Bergstrom), TX: 14°, New Orleans, LA: 15°, Corpus Christi, TX: 15°, Gainesville, FL: 16°, Charleston, SC: 16°, Victoria, TX: 16°, Savannah, GA: 16°-Tied, Brownsville, TX: 18°, Daytona, Beach, FL: 20° (broke previous record by 10 degrees), Orlando, FL: 22° (broke previous record by 13 degrees), Tampa, FL: 24°, Ft. Myers, FL: 27°, West Palm Beach, FL: 28° and Miami, FL: 31°.

Record low temperatures in the southeast were the result of a heavy Christmas Eve to Christmas day snowstorm that dumped up to 20 inches of snow in Eastern North Carolina giving many locations their first white Christmas ever.  Cape Hatteras, NC was in the second day of their greatest snowstorm on record with 13.3 inches.  This storm was one of those coastal lows that actually had an "eye" show in IR satellite imagery like tropical hurricanes.  Temperatures were in the teens on the coast but just 50 miles off shore were they in the middle 50's.

***See Slideshow***

1990
A deep upper level trough continued to bring dangerous record lows from the Rockies to the West Coast.  Many locations reported record low temperatures for the date including: 

Cache Valley, UT: -44°, Roosevelt, UT: -34°, Alamosa, CO: -33°, Milford, UT: -33°, Winnemucca, NV: -27°-Tied, Ely, NV: -22°, Pocatello, ID: -21° (broke previous record by 13 degrees), Boise, ID: -20° (broke previous record by 11 degrees), Pueblo, CO: -17°, Burns, OR: -17°, Reno, NV: -11° (broke previous record by 11 degrees), Albuquerque, NM: -2°, Yakima, WA: -1°, Bishop, CA: 3°, Medford, OR: 10°, Salem, OR: 10°, Olympia, WA: 11°, Las Vegas, NV: 14°, Portland, OR: 15°-Tied, Sacramento, CA: 19°, Stockton, CA: 19°, Fresno, CA: 20°, Santa Maria, CA: 23°-Tied, Eureka, CA: 27°, Redding, CA: 27°, San Francisco Airport, CA: 29° and Downtown Los Angeles, CA: 35°-Tied.

1993
Light snow at Sioux Falls, SD pushed the melted precipitation for the year for the city to 36.03 inches.  This set a new all-time record for yearly precipitation for the location.

1996
Southerly flow out ahead of a cold front brought a few record high temperatures to parts of the Northeast.  Central Park in New York City soared to 63°, tying the record high temperature for the date.  Other record highs included: Boston, MA: 61°, Hartford, CT: 59°-Tied, Milton, MA: 58° and Worcester, MA: 57°-Tied.

2001
Buffalo, NY had gone through the entire month of November without any snow, the very first time in history that had occurred.  But the city would make up for it on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day as 25.2 inches of snow fell in just 24 hours, the 3rd highest 24 hour snowfall for the city.  The new record would fall just two days later when 29.6 inches of snow fell between 7pm on the 26th and 7pm on the 27th.  82.3 inches of snow fell during a 5-day period, almost as much as the city normally receives in an entire winter season.

2004
The residents of Victoria, TX awoke to their first white Christmas in 86 years when south Texas received a rare blanket of snow that reached 13 inches.

Several locations from the upper Midwest to the Ohio Valley reported record low temperatures for the date including: International Falls, MN: -35°, Valentine, MT: -25°, Marquette, MI: -18°, Alpena, MI: -12°-Tied, Evansville, IN: -10° and Paducah, KY: -6°-Tied.

[Star Traveler]

It’s one thing to gripe and complain about these things and disagree with it, but it’s quite another to convince your friends and neighbors and relatives and coworkers...

THEREFORE..., it’s also absolutely necessary for people to know the information in the following documentary. If there were simply one video that you could see and/or show people you know... this would be the one...

---

The following is an excellent video documentary on the so-called “Global Warming” I would recommend it to all FReepers. It’s a very well-made documentary.

“The Great Global Warming Swindle”

If you want to download it, via a BitTorrent site (using a BitTorrent client), you can get it at the following link. Information about BitTorrent protocol and BitTorrent clients and their comparison at these three links (in this sentence). Some additional BitTorrent information here and here.

Download it here...
http://thepiratebay.org/torrent/3635222/The_Great_Global_Warming_Swindle
[This is a high-quality copy, of about a gigabyte in size. This link is the information about it, and you have to click the download link to get it on your BitTorrent client software. You'll also find users' comments here, too.]

It’s worth seeing and having for relatives, friends, neighbors and coworkers to see.

Also, see it online here...
http://www.moviesfoundonline.com/great_global_warming_swindle.php
[this one is considerably lower quality, is a flash video and viewable online, of course..., and also, you can download flash video on a website either yourself or some software doing it.]

Buy it on DVD here...
[this would be the very highest quality version, on a DVD disk, of several gigabytes in size...] At Amazon, it seems to be high-priced now and have only a few copies right now.
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B000WLUXZE

At WAGtv (a UK shop), but don't know about shipping. The price is reasonable, though.
https://www.wagtv.com/product/The-Great-Global-Warming-Swindle-322.html
[And..., some information from WAGtv about this item.]

---

Also, in split parts on YouTube...

The Great Global Warming Swindle (Part 1 of 9)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6TqqWJugXzs

The Great Global Warming Swindle (Part 2 of 9)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L5rGpDMN8lw

The Great Global Warming Swindle (Part 3 of 9)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GzFL6Ixe_bo

The Great Global Warming Swindle (Part 4 of 9)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mNQy2rT_dvU

The Great Global Warming Swindle (Part 5 of 9)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5dzIMXGI6k8

The Great Global Warming Swindle (Part 6 of 9)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6GjOgQN1Jco

The Great Global Warming Swindle (Part 7 of 9)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VHI2GfbfrYw

The Great Global Warming Swindle (Part 8 of 9)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7N9benJh3Lw

The Great Global Warming Swindle - Credits (Part 9 of 9)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S_1ifP-ri58

[Star Traveler]

Sunspot Activity at 8,000-Year High

By Robert Roy Britt
Senior Science Writer
posted: 27 October 2004
12:58 pm ET

Sunspots have been more common in the past seven decades than at any time in the last 8,000 years, according to a new historic reconstruction of solar activity.

Many researchers have tried to link sunspot activity to climate change, but the new results cannot be used to explain global warming, according to the scientists who did the study.

Sunspots are areas of intense magnetic energy. They act like temporary caps on upwelling matter, and they are the sites of occasional ferocious eruptions of light and electrified gas. More sunspots generally means increased solar activity.

Sunspots have been studied directly for about four centuries, and these direct observations provide the most reliable historic record of solar activity. Previous studies have suggested cooler periods on Earth were related to long stretches with low sunspot counts. From the 1400s to the 1700s, for example, Europe and North America experienced a "Little Ice Age." For a period of about 50 years during that time, there were almost no sunspots.

But a firm connection between sunspot numbers and climate remains elusive, many scientists say.

Better record

The new study, led by Sami Solanki of the Max Planck Institute in Germany, employed a novel approach to pinning down sunspot activity going back 11,400 years:

Cosmic rays constantly bombard Earth's atmosphere. Chemical interactions create a fairly constant source of stuff called carbon-14, which falls to Earth and is absorbed and retained by trees. But charged particles hurled at Earth by active sunspots deflect cosmic rays. So when the Sun gets wild, trees record less carbon-14.

While trees don't typically live more than a few hundred years or perhaps a couple thousand, dead and buried trees, if preserved, carry a longer record, "as long as tree rings can be identified," said Manfred Schuessler, another Max Planck Institute researcher who worked on the study.

The study's finding: Sunspot activity has been more intense and lasted longer during the past 60 to 70 years than at anytime in more than eight millennia.

Sunspot activity is known to ebb and flow in two cycles lasting 11 and 88 years (activity is currently headed toward a short-term minimum). Astronomers think that longer cycles -- or at least long-term variations -- also occur. Scientists in other fields have shown that during the past 11,000 years, Earth's climate has had many dramatic shifts.

"Whether solar activity is a dominant influence in these [climate] changes is a subject of intense debate," says Paula Reimer, a researcher at Queen's University Belfast who wrote an analysis of the new study for Nature. Why? Because "the exact relationship of solar irradiance to sunspot number is still uncertain."

In general, studies indicate changes in solar output affect climate during periods lasting decades or centuries, "but this interpretation is controversial because it is not based on any understanding of the relevant physical processes," study member Schuessler told SPACE.com. Translation: Scientists have a lot to learn about the Sun-Earth connection.

Better understanding

The study's methods appear solid: "The models reproduce the observed record of sunspots extremely well, from almost no sunspots during the seventeenth century to the current high levels," Reimer said.

The research could eventually help scientists understand why the climate has changed in the past and allow for better predictions of future change.

"The reconstructed sunspot number will nonetheless provide a much-needed record of solar activity," Reimer said. "This can then be compared with palaeoclimate data sets to test theories of possible solar-climate connections, as well as enabling physicists to model long-term solar variability."

Whatever the result, change is likely to continue.

Solanki's team calculates that, based on history, the chances of sunspot activity remaining at the currently high levels for another 50 years is 8 percent. Odds are just 1 percent the solar exuberance will last through the end of this century.

[Star Traveler]

I'm looking forward to the coming decade of colder winters... :-)

---

Dalton Minimum Returns

 21 Apr 09 - Paul Stanko of NOAA writes meteorologist Anthony Watts to tell him of an interesting development in his tracking of the International Sunspot Number (ISN).

Paul writes:

My running mean of the International Sunspot Number for 2009 just dipped below 1.00. For anything comparable you now need to go back before 1913 (which scored a 1.43) which could mean we're now competing directly with the Dalton Minimum. Just in case you'd like another tidbit, here is something that puts our 20 to 30 day spotless runs in perspective… the mother of all spotless runs (in the heart of the Maunder Minimum, of course!) was from October 15, 1661 to August 2, 1671. It totaled 3579 consecutive spotless days, all of which had obs. To say that that we in interesting times is a huge understatement. We are about to enter a Grand Minimum, which in the past have produced a cooler planet, while our government is preparing for run-away global warming. Who could have predicted this stupidity?

---

Is a new Dalton Minimum approaching?

Russ Steele

Well 2008 arrived last night and Sunspot Cycle 24 was absent. While we had a flurry of excitement a few week ago when a patch of reverse polarity showed on the Suns surface it soon faded. The Sun reverses polarity with each cycle change. As we have discussed in the past the length of the roughly 11-year sunspot cycle is correlated with temperature and a late arriving cycle can have some long term climate implications for us folks here on Earth. The Cycle 23 solar minimum was at 1996.5, so with an average 11 year cycle we should have seen the new minimum in mid-2007. Here we are in 2008 and the next cycle is already six months late, and the defining minimum generally occurs 12-20 months after the first spot of the new cycle. This would indicate the ending minimum of Cycle 23 and the start of Cycle 24 will come in mid  2009, resulting in a 13 year cycle, the longest since 1784-1797. Interesting to note that this cycle started a long series - 13.6, 12.3, 12.7 years, which coincided with the cold period known as the Dalton Minimum. Stay tuned, these are going to be interesting times. Sun cycles indicate cooling and the politicians are trying stop global warming. We may need a little extra warming over the next thirty years.

Thanks to David Archibald for this graphic showing the relationship of cycle length to temperature in New Hampshire.

---

Dalton Minimum

The Dalton minimum in the 400 year history of sunspot numbers The Dalton Minimum was a period of low solar activity, named for the English meteorologist John Dalton, lasting from about 1790 to 1830. Like the Maunder Minimum and Spörer Minimum, the Dalton Minimum coincided with a period of lower-than-average global temperatures. The Oberlach Station in Germany, for example, experienced a 2.0° C decline over 20 years. The Year Without a Summer, in 1816, also occurred during the Dalton Minimum.

[Star Traveler]

How sunspots were observed “back then”?

From NASA...

---

The Sunspot Cycle
(Updated 2009/12/08)

Sunspot Numbers

In 1610, shortly after viewing the sun with his new telescope, Galileo Galilei (or was it Thomas Harriot?) made the first European observations of Sunspots. Continuous daily observations were started at the Zurich Observatory in 1849 and earlier observations have been used to extend the records back to 1610. The sunspot number is calculated by first counting the number of sunspot groups and then the number of individual sunspots.

[Star Traveler]

Melting ice opens Northwest Passage; Shrinking levels suggest route could become open shipping lane.

Article from: Albany Times Union (Albany, NY) Article date:September 16, 2007 Copyright

Byline: JAMEY KEATEN - Associated Press

PARIS - Arctic ice has shrunk to the lowest level on record, new satellite images show, raising the possibility that the Northwest Passage that eluded famous explorers will become an open shipping lane.

The European Space Agency said nearly 200 satellite photos this month taken together showed an ice-free passage along northern Canada, Alaska and Greenland, and ice retreating to its lowest level since such images were first taken in 1978.

The waters are exposing unexplored resources, and vessels could trim thousands of miles from Europe to Asia by bypassing the Panama Canal. The seasonal ebb and flow of ...

[kempo]

The earth has been in a warming trend for the past 10,000 years and and this is a good thing because it has allowed mankind to populate the planet. When the climate turns and goes into a long term cooling trend billions of people will die. I think something like 60 million people died in Europe alone during the mini ice age in the 1700’s.

[DoughtyOne]

She sure well. I agree with you.

[Stosh]

“...CFC’s form free radicals in the upper atmosphere that act as chemical catalysts...”

You are exactly correct - the action of CFC’s is qualitatively different from that of CO2 precisely because it’s catalytic.

As centurion318 pointed out in post 6, one real shortcoming of this report is that it provides no mechanism by which CFC’s bring about warming (don’t know if that’s the case in the original work), just a correlation.

But assume, just hypothetically, that it is true - that atmospheric CFC’s *can* significantly warm the atmosphere. Global cooling - and in the extreme, ice ages - are much more hostile to human survival than modest global warming. And although I’ll concede that large-scale screwing around with natural phenomena is fraught with danger, imagine that we actually *could* modulate global temperature simply by controlled release of CFC’s.

In principle, a real global catastrophe - the next ice age - might be something that we’d at least have a shot at modifying, if the postulated effect of CFC’s is correct.

[dalereed]

i want global warming!!!

I’m tired of it getting colder every year for more than 10 years!

I used to only wear long pants for 3 or 4 weeks a year and now I have to wear long pants for 5 or 5 months!

[dalereed]

Tell me how CFCs that are heavier than air can reach the upper atmosphere?

[votemout]

CFC atoms affix themsleves to the heated air coming out of the capitol building and rise to the top with the hot air.

[tips up]

That’s why climate change is the perfect problem. As it is always changing, no one can disprove it.