“What could be the implications of a solar minimum and are they temporary or more lasting?”
“Could be” a lot of things, and also depends on a lot of other things. Short version: Less sunspots = indication of weaker magnetic field from sun = more cosmic rays reach earth = more clouds = more sunlight deflected away from earth = cooling. That’s the theory at least, with some good science (NOT modeling) to back it. How much cooling? A little? Maybe. A lot? Maybe. If you get a BIG volcano or a lot of volcanic activity (which drarfs what man makes), the SO2 (I think) ejected into the atmosphere can increase clouds’ reflectivity, and you can get a “year without a summer” as in 1816. It’s a one-two punch that we’ve seen before. That would be very bad, obivously.
My bet is that if the sun’s activity doesn’t increase in the next few months, we’re going to get our collective rears kicked by this winter. Think “long, cold, lotsa snow.” After that, who knows?
Then again, I could be wrong. The climate is a VERY complex system.
Your take on the importance of solar activity is fine, but I caution you that the lag in its influence is probably on the order of five years... probably a “five year moving average” would suffice. So far, I’m not sure we’ll be there by the end of this year. Next year, or the year later, if solar activity has not really blasted off to offset some of the current lack of activity, I would expect your cooling scenerio to be accurate.
As I write here, the current solar cycle has lasted 146 months. The previous fifty years, the cycle lengths averaged 125 months - at least 21months longer. Empirically, the last 200 years, the temperature sensitivity to solar cycle length has been approximately -0.28C/yr=-0.5F/yr=-0.1C/4months. So far, then, this cycle length suggests that the temperature during this coming decade will be about 0.5C cooler than the average of the previous 50 years. That will pretty much bring back to zero the “temperature anomaly” that has been seen in the US temperatures during the last century.
Time will tell... but if it tells the story I suggest here, the CO2/ AGW hypothesis will be pretty much shattered beyond reconciliation.