Would now be a good time to talk about how the sun (giant fire-ball) affects the Earth’s temperature? Talk about an Inconvenient Truth.
‘Quiet’ sun could mean cooler days
STEPHEN CAUCHI
September 13, 2009
THE number of sunspots has declined dramatically in the past two years – but scientists say it is too early to tell if it is the start of a solar depression that could lead to cooler weather on Earth.
Over the past millennium, whenever the sun has had long periods of low sunspot numbers, Earth has weathered equally long cold snaps. The most famous of these was the Maunder Minimum of 1645 to 1715, when sunspots all but vanished for 70 years. It coincided with the coldest period of the Little Ice Age.
For the past two years, sunspots – dark and intensely magnetic blotches on the sun’s surface – have been at their fewest since 1913.
”This is the quietest sun we’ve seen in almost a century,” said NASA solar forecaster David Hathaway. ”Since the space age began in the 1950s, solar activity has been generally high … We’re just not used to this type of deep calm.”
Sunspots cause other solar activity such as solar flares and coronal mass ejections, radiation from which can interfere with Earth’s magnetic field, upper atmosphere and, many scientists believe, climate.
Scientists expect to record 290 spotless days this year. Last year, there were 266, the most spotless days since 1913, when there were 311 recorded.
”People are wondering about whether we’re going into another Maunder Minimum or not,” said Iver Cairns, of the University of Sydney’s School of Physics. ”The balance of opinion is that it’s too early to tell. But it could be very significant.”
Professor Cairns said it was uncertain how – or indeed if – changes in solar activity affected Earth’s climate, but it was possible energetic particles from the sun penetrated the ozone layer and altered its chemistry, leading to weather changes.
Monash University’s Paul Cally said that if a cooling period were to begin it would be interesting to see how it affected the global warming being caused by high greenhouse gas levels. ”We haven’t been in this situation in historical periods before.”
Original article
Even “quiet” sun can lash Earth: Scientists
Singapore, September 19 – U.S. scientists revealed that the sun can lash the Earth with powerful winds even when it is in the quiet stage of its 11-year solar cycle. These winds can lead to an interruption in the communication system and aviation and power lines. The sun can strike the earth with powerful winds even when it is in its dormant phase
The activity on the sun is measured by observing the number of sunspots on its surface. There is a point when the number of sunspots reaches at the highest and this is known as the “solar maximum”. It then declines to come back to a minimum number.
When the sunspots are at the peak, strong solar flares and geomagnetic storms expel huge amounts of energy into space. All these storms crash into the magnetic fields that shield the Earth. They can blow out satellites, disturb communications and cause colorful aurorae.
However, scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in the United States and the University of Michigan reported that the Earth was lashed by powerful solar winds last year despite the sun being in its quite phase.
Sarah Gibson of the center’s High Altitude Observatory and lead author of the study was quoted as saying, “The sun continues to surprise us.”
She further added, “The solar wind can hit Earth like a fire hose even when there are virtually no sunspots.”
Earlier, the scientists supposed that the streams of energy mainly vanished as the solar cycle moved towards the minimum.
Co-author Janet Kozyra of the University of Michigan, said, “The new observations from last year are changing our understanding of how solar quiet intervals affect the Earth and how and why this might change from cycle to cycle.”
Research study details and observations by scientists
The research team for the present study included scientists from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).
The researchers compared measurements gathered from the current solar minimum interval, taken in 2008, with the measurements of the last solar minimum in 1996.
They found out that although the present solar minimum has lesser sunspots than any minimum in 75 years, the sun’s effect on Earth’s outer radiation belt was above three times more last year than in 1996.
It was discovered that the occurrence of high-speed streams during the solar minimum in 2008 is associated with the structure of the sun.
The latest research study has been published in the current issue of the Journal of Geophysical Research.
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[...] Record Low Sunspots…Cooler Temps and Solar Winds? [...]
and how long have we been keeping records??? Seems like only a millisecond compared to the life span thus far to the sun!!
Just tell us the truth!!!! Stop lying to us to advance YOUR ADJENDA!!!