Could this be attributed to shutting down the solar spot activity?
I don’t think this could be attributed to shutting down the solar spot activity. First of all the sun is in our solar system not billions of light years away. Secondly, the sun spot numbers were down before this happened.
However, SunkenCiv sent us a post about cosmic rays affecting the temperature of the stratosphere, and I wonder what affect gamma rays might have. Could this be part of the reason for our colder winter this year?