David Archibald on – The State of the Sun – 16th June, 2009 June 20, 2009
Posted by honestclimate in sunspots.Tags: climate change, david archibald, global warming, solar, sun, sunspots
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David Archibald on – The State of the Sun – 16th June, 2009
June 16th, 2009 by Warwick Hughes
The Ap Index is heading down sharply.
The F10.7 flux is flatlining. Note that the volatility has gone out of it
The rate of decline of the heliospheric current sheet suggests that the month of solar minimum may be still a year off.
Like the Ap Index, the Interplanetary Magnetic Field recently headed down sharply.
The Oulu neutron count is trending up steeply. If the month of solar minimum is still a year off, the neutron count can be expected to continue rising for another two years.
Solar wind flow pressure is going to new lows.
Summary
The Sun has gone very quiet and several indicators of activity are still heading down. Solar Cycle 23 may end up being 14 years long. Solar activity modelling that I have recently become aware of suggests that the Sun will have very low activity until 2016.
An Honest Climate Debate 
Very interesting. I hope “mother nature” within 6 months or so decides this 11 year minimum is enough. Otherwise I’ll become a very loud (annoyong/unpleasent?) cooling alarmist! I think we’re well into a Dalton Minimum and still hope two consecutive weak solar cyckes is al that we got.
I find the last monts declining solar wind velocity disturbing:
If we’re not yet in the bottom of this 11 year minimum I’m afraid SC24 will not start off before a bit into 2010. Then I think a low maximum of 40 spotless days a month for SC24 is something we should be quite happy with…
The cosmic ray umbrella will anyway be so weak I guess temperature equilibrium will be below current temperature during the SC24. Thus we’ll got slightly falling temperatures until the next “11-year cycle” minimum when the temperature may fall more and stay low during a weak SC25.
(Btw, I’m an amateur in this field, not a solar- or climate scientist.)
Btw Russ Steele mentioned this well written article in Sky & Telescope on this topic:
http://www.skyandtelescope.com/news/48607432.html
Correction or clearification: “11 year minimum”. I should instead have wrtitten: 11 year solar cycle minimum.