Click the pick for evilconservatives.com
Posted on 09/21/2005 1:11:52 PM PDT by MNJohnnie
what could be the simplest explanation for one component of global warming, a new study shows the Sun's radiation has increased by .05 percent per decade since the late 1970s.
The increase would only be significant to Earth's climate if it has been going on for a century or more, said study leader Richard Willson, a Columbia University researcher also affiliated with NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies.
The Sun's increasing output has only been monitored with precision since satellite technology allowed necessary observations. Willson is not sure if the trend extends further back in time, but other studies suggest it does.
"This trend is important because, if sustained over many decades, it could cause significant climate change," Willson said.
In a NASA-funded study recently published in Geophysical Research Letters, Willson and his colleagues speculate on the possible history of the trend based on data collected in the pre-satellite era.
"Solar activity has apparently been going upward for a century or more," Willson told SPACE.com today.
Significant component
Further satellite observations may eventually show the trend to be short-term. But if the change has indeed persisted at the present rate through the 20th Century, "it would have provided a significant component of the global warming the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reports to have occurred over the past 100 years," he said.
That does not mean industrial pollution has not been a significant factor, Willson cautioned.
Scientists, industry leaders and environmentalists have argued for years whether humans have contributed to global warming, and to what extent. The average surface temperature around the globe has risen by about 1 degree Fahrenheit since 1880. Some scientists say the increase could be part of natural climate cycles. Others argue that greenhouse gases produced by automobiles and industry are largely to blame.
Willson said the Sun's possible influence has been largely ignored because it is so difficult to quantify over long periods.
Confounding efforts to determine the Sun's role is the fact that its energy output waxes and wanes every 11 years. This solar cycle, as it is called, reached maximum in the middle of 2000 and achieved a second peak in 2002. It is now ramping down toward a solar minimum that will arrive in about three years.
Connections
Changes in the solar cycle -- and solar output -- are known to cause short-term climate change on Earth. At solar max, Earth's thin upper atmosphere can see a doubling of temperature. It swells, and denser air can puff up to the region of space where the International Space Station orbits, causing increased drag on the ship and forcing more frequent boosts from space shuttles.
Who is the Sun's representative so that we can get it to comply with the Kyoto treaty??? We can't have this "rogue" outfit messing up Al Gore's idea of Utopia...
Because I didn't read the article properly????
Here is some new math.
Average global temp of 58.28 Degrees Fahrenheit in 2004
Times .0005 increase per decade,
equals .29 degrees per century
Not as dramatic as my earlier post, but significant nonetheless.
By the way, I noticed you didn't challenge my Bush theory... :-)
As for the Bush theory...I'll have to do more research on that one.
Except you would have had to look long and hard back then for a hippy wacked-out enough to insist that same-sex "marriage" is a constitutional right.
Sorry to go off the subject a little, but I couldn't resist pointing that out.
Blame Bush!
Some things are truly Sad.
Haight-Ashbury, San Fran., 1969, I was there.
You can't explain to somebody who doesn't know, how the movement grew, became infected, and died.
Everybody dwells on the infection like that was the movement.
Let's just say the way Hippies wanted to raise kids isn't the way kids need to be raised.
I was at the Hippy-fest in the High Uintas last summer, six-seven thousand strong, lasted about two weeks.
About the only thing worth doing there was handing out cigarettes and handing out money.
Let me rephrase the comment then: Today's Good Democrats are really about where the 60's hippies were back them.
Dems say Haliburton was given clear title to the Sun by Bush and Rove.
I bow to the oracle of the Cups.
Spot on with his/her analysis of the current political scene.
Click the pick for evilconservatives.com
The average temperature on the surface of the earth in 2004 was 58.58 degrees Fahrenheit.
This converts to 287.76 degrees Kelvin
287.76 degrees Kelvin, times the .05% per decade increase in the Sun's output equals .14388 degrees Kelvin of increase per decade, or 1.4388 degrees Kelvin per century.
This would take our average temperature to 289.1988 degrees Kelvin.
This converts to 60.86984 degrees Fahrenheit, an increase of 2.28984 degrees Fahrenheit per century.
This also points to it being Bush's fault:
2.2894 degrees Fahrenheit
Fahrenheit 9/11
Coincidence? I don't think so
I concur.
Next, forget NASA's great plans to go to Mars.
We need a permenant manned space station on Mercury where we can keep an eye on the Sun.
From there we ought to be launching regular probes into the sun to determine its true composition and establish a baseline of reliable data for solar warming.
Then we need technology to control Sunspots and solar flares which damage earth's critical power grids and essential satellite services.
Can you imagine how much energy we could generate if we had a huge array of solar panels facing the sun on Mercury?
Oh nevermind, I have to get back to work.
This solar cycle, as it is called, reached maximum in the middle of 2000 and achieved a second peak in 2002. It is now ramping down toward a solar minimum that will arrive in about three years.
The latter point means a "cooling off" period.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.