Posted on 04/23/2008 8:44:43 AM PDT by neverdem
There is some serious evidence accumulating that we may be on the brink of not just global cooling, but an ice age. Sunspots are historically correlated with temperature on earth. During the Dalton Minimum, beginning in 1790, the number of sunspots was low, as the earth's climate turned cold for a few decades. At http://www.spaceweather.com/ you can see live images of the sun taken from the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory in space. Right now there is but one tiny sunspot.
The sunspot number follows a cycle of somewhat variable length, averaging 11 years. The most recent minimum was in March last year. The new cycle, No.24, was supposed to start soon after that, with a gradual build-up in sunspot numbers.
It didn't happen. The first sunspot appeared in January this year and lasted only two days. A tiny spot appeared last Monday but vanished within 24 hours. Another little spot appeared this Monday. Pray that there will be many more, and soon. [....]
That the rapid temperature decline in 2007 coincided with the failure of cycle No.24 to begin on schedule is not proof of a causal connection but it is cause for concern.
It is time to put aside the global warming dogma, at least to begin contingency planning about what to do if we are moving into another little ice age, similar to the one that lasted from 1100 to 1850.
There is no doubt that the next little ice age would be much worse than the previous one and much more harmful than anything warming may do. There are many more people now and we have become dependent on a few temperate agricultural areas, especially in the US and Canada. Global warming would increase agricultural output, but global cooling will decrease it.
Millions will starve if we do nothing to prepare for it (such as planning changes in agriculture to compensate), and millions more will die from cold-related diseases.
The next sunspot cycle will be 30-50% stronger than the last one and begin as much as a year late, according to a breakthrough forecast using a computer model of solar dynamics developed by scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR). Predicting the Sun's cycles accurately, years in advance, will help societies plan for active bouts of solar storms, which can slow satellite orbits, disrupt communications, and bring down power systems.
The scientists have confidence in the forecast because, in a series of test runs, the newly developed model simulated the strength of the past eight solar cycles with more than 98% accuracy. The forecasts are generated, in part, by tracking the subsurface movements of the sunspot remnants of the previous two solar cycles. The team is publishing its forecast in the current issue of Geophysical Research Letters.
"Our model has demonstrated the necessary skill to be used as a forecasting tool," says NCAR scientist Mausumi Dikpati, the leader of the forecast team at NCAR's High Altitude Observatory that also includes Peter Gilman and Giuliana de Toma. [....]
The scientists expect the cycle to begin in late 2007 or early 2008, which is about 6 to 12 months later than a cycle would normally start. Cycle 24 is likely to reach its peak about 2012.
“I don’t know. It wasn’t that long ago Earth emerged from the Little Ice Age. It seems soon to go back into a cold cycle. But, the last decade has seen slight cooling and if the sunspot fits . . . .”
One theory is that we are still in the Little Ice Age, and this recent warming is just another of the intermittent warming periods, which the graph in #12 also seems to show.
The Little Ice Age is still with us:
http://www.nationalpost.com/news/story.html?id=94b7d021-c5da-4e82-b37f-53d338709fb1
But if you want to know why March is ranked the way it is, this is why:
Are the anomalies real? Ask the snow:
Take Your Pick with the March 2008 Temperatures
"March snow cover extent on the Eurasian Continent was the lowest on record."
Great blog discussion on that thread, too. IHIAB.
In fact the current sunspot, 23 Apr. 08, has the polarity of Cycle 23. We’re still waiting on Cycle 24.
Interesting.
Isn't it obvious? Sunspot scientists are in the back pocket of big oil, therefore, their findings are not worthy of mention. Besides, big media has already hitched itself to algore. /sarcasm
Besides, powerful corporations like GE stand to make billions convincing us that Global Warming is real so we will all go out and buy new fridges, AC's, and other "green" appliances we don't need.
..... stupid question. Obvious answer - at least to those of us who don’t depend upon the Main Stream Media for our news.
I also would like to add that my solution to this “Green” revolution is to shove it in their face by Starting a Company called “The Green Company”, Have the Building painted “Grass Green” and all of the office paper on ‘green paper’ and the CEO with the last name of “Green” - - - and sell wood stoves, SUV’s etc.
Shove their symbolism right back in their face and make lots of money from non eco sensitive people who would like to support a ANTI symbolism based company.
Form a blog, a brief explanation of what is wrong with the IPCC models that predict so much warming - they rely on feedback THAT ISN’T THERE:
http://wattsupwiththat.wordpress.com/2008/04/18/open-thread/#comments
Is the 10% from the math or computer models or observed data from the atmosphere? I understand that CO2’s sensitivity has yet to be measured in the atmosphere.”
This number is estimated using basic physics which even skeptical scientists agree with (e.g. Richard Linzden, Pat Micheals). The source of 10% figure is explained on the junkscience.com page I linked to. I believe junkscience.com coined the term ‘playstation science’ in first place.
The computer models only become an issue when alarmists argue that a small increases in CO2 will by amplified by water vapour feedback. Saying CO2 accounts for 10% of the greenhouse effect does not include any of these feedbacks.
GW science is complex and not everything claimed by the alarmists is wrong.
The CO2 effect, in a direct sense, is not even the issue. The IPCC could be 100% right about the warming effect of CO2 and STILL be 100% wrong.
What the IPCC models rely on are the positive feedback issues. If there is no positive feedback, if there is instead, negative feedback leading to homeostasis, then the entire AGW hypothesis is in the dumper.
That’s what’s the big news about the AquaSat. No positive feedback. The water vapor that is supposed to be increasing the GH effect is instead going into cloud cover and increasing albedo/precipitation, which leads to an increase increase ice cover, which in turn leads to even more albedo.
Even the Boston Globe (editorial) and the Washington Post (op ed piece) have actually pointed that out about ethanol recently! (Maybe there's a catch there, but I don't know where!)
“
But it doesn’t really matter, even during the Little Ice age there were still El Ninos & heatwaves, the AGW crowd will just highlight those and no matter how cold the actual temps get they will just continue to “Hansenize” the data to show it getting warmer & warmer.”
Every blip warmer is “global warming”,
every blip cooler is “just weather, it will change”.
You are correct. OTOH, they were using a convenient set of slides to show - “This is the amount of warming per decade” ...
1980 - 2000 was a nice warming trend, useful for AGW hyping:
http://atmoz.org/img/climate_metrics.png
http://atmoz.org/blog/2008/04/14/comparable-global-climate-metrics/
If 2000-2010 shows no net warming, then the 0.16/decade trend becomes more like 0.10/decade.
“March 2008 was globally the 2nd warmest month ever.” Not quite. They were comparing March land values only.
That works for me. Let me know when it goes public... i’ll buy some green stocks.
—The average global temperature (land/ocean surface combined) for the month of March was 0.71 degrees celsius (1.28 F) above normal (against the 20th century mean) making it the 2nd warmest on record for the month of March (using 129 years of record keeping).
If you don't like those numbers then take a look at a few of the other sources for March 2008 global temperature measurement..........
RSS/MSU data
Global +0.08 c (More detail right here, courtesy of Anthony Watts)
Northern Hemisphere +0.47 c
Southern Hemisphere -0.33 c
UAH/MSU data
Global +0.10 c
Northern Hemisphere +0.43 c
Southern Hemisphere -0.24 c
GISS data
Global +0.67 c
Back to the NCDC March highlights.......
—The global (land only) surface temperature was the warmest on record! The main reason for this
is the fact that much of the Asian Continent (we are talking a major chunk of land here) was well above normal for the month of March.
—March snow cover extent on the Eurasian Continent was the lowest on record.
—The global ocean surface was 13th warmest on record, again thanks tp the warmth around Eurasia (Sorry, nice try La Nina!)
U.S. Highlights from the NCDC.......
—The average temperature for the U.S. was 0.22 Celsius (0.4 degrees F) below normal for March.
—Western snow pack was among the healthiest in more than a decade, which is great news.
http://wattsupwiththat.wordpress.com
You’d think the answer would be obvious, but here we have a NOAA operated USHCN climate station of record providing a live experiment. It always helps to illustrate with photos. Today I surveyed a sewage treatment plant, one of 4 stations surveyed today (though I tried for 5) and found that for convenience, they had made a nice concrete walkway to allow servicing the Fisher-Porter rain gauge, which needs a paper punch tape replaced one a month.
Here is what you see in visible light:
Gee, I wonder why they show higher temperatures than RSS
http://wattsupwiththat.wordpress.com
You’d think the answer would be obvious, but here we have a NOAA operated USHCN climate station of record providing a live experiment. It always helps to illustrate with photos. Today I surveyed a sewage treatment plant, one of 4 stations surveyed today (though I tried for 5) and found that for convenience, they had made a nice concrete walkway to allow servicing the Fisher-Porter rain gauge, which needs a paper punch tape replaced one a month.
Here is what you see in visible light:
Gee, I wonder why they show higher temperatures than RSS
Gee, I wonder if you know that RSS temperatures are for the lower troposphere and NOAA weather station temperatures are for the Earth's SURFACE ??????????
Who made the plot?
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