Solar max and climate

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Another answer to a question which has been asked here before.

SOLAR CYCLE CREATES CLIMATE CHANGE BUT NOT GLOBAL WARMING A new study confirms that changing levels of energy from the sun are not a major cause of global warming. But space researchers have found that variations in the energy given off by the Sun do affect the Earth's wind patterns and the climate of the planet.

According to Drew Shindell, a climate researcher from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA) Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York, New York, the study's lead author, previous studies neglected the effects of increased solar activity on the ozone layer. They also overlooked the complex chemistry of the upper atmosphere where most of the high-energy radiation, including ultra-violet radiation - the kind responsible for creating the ozone layer - gets absorbed. "When we added the upper atmosphere's chemistry into our climate model, we found that during a solar maximum major climate changes occur in North America." The changes are caused by stronger westerly winds.

Changes also occur in wind speeds and directions all over the Earth's surface. "Solar variability changes the distribution of energy," said Shindell. "Over an 11-year solar cycle, the total amount of energy has not changed very much. But where the energy goes changes as wind speeds and directions change." During the Sun's 11-year cycle, from a solar maximum to a solar minimum, the energy released by the Sun changes by only about a tenth of a percent. When the solar cycle is at a maximum, it puts out a larger percentage of high-energy radiation, which increases the amount of ozone in the upper atmosphere. The increased ozone warms the upper atmosphere and the warm air affects winds all the way from the stratosphere - six to 30 miles up - to the Earth's surface. "The change in wind strength and direction creates different climate patterns around the globe," said Shindell.

-- Hallyx (Hallyx@aol.com), April 14, 1999

Answers

The solar max we are entering will also affect our psyche's and conciousness. It's no coincidence that TPTB are hotting up (pun intended) global instability.

Later,

-- Andy (2000EOD@prodigy.net), April 14, 1999.


Antarctic Ice Shelves Breaking Up Fast

www.cnn.com 4-9-99 WASHINGTON (Reuters) -- Two Antarctic ice shelves have broken up more quickly than anyone predicted, indicating that the effects of global warming may be accelerating, scientists said on Wednesday. They published satellite images showing the Larsen B and Wilkins ice shelves in "full retreat," having lost nearly 1,100 square miles (3,000 square km) of their total area in the last year. Ted Scambos of the University of Colorado at Boulder said his team and colleagues at the British Antarctic Survey in Cambridge had predicted the break-up would happen, but not this quickly. "It happened much faster than we thought," Scambos said in a telephone interview. "Within this last calendar year we saw a retreat not only on Larsen but the Wilkins." The Larsen Ice Shelf is on the eastern half of the peninsula, which is the part of the Antarctic that sticks up toward Argentina. The Wilkins is on the southwest side. Alarmed by findings "It was nearly as much activity in a single year as we've seen in 10 or 15 years up to now on average," Scambos said. "To have retreats totaling 3,000 square kilometers in a single year is clearly an escalation," David Vaughan of the British Antarctic Survey said in a statement. "Within a few years, much of the Wilkins ice shelf will likely be gone." The researchers usually publish their findings in scientific journals and have submitted their findings to the Journal of Glaciology. But they were so alarmed by their findings that they decided to publicize them. The effects will not be immediate. Ice shelves are floating on the ocean, so they do not cause sea levels to rise when they break up and melt. But Scambos said the glaciers behind them could melt faster if the protective ice shelves disappear. "Other ice shelves have huge glaciers behind them and large areas of ice to drain that are continental," Scambos said. That means the water locked up as ice in those glaciers would add to the sea level. Sea level rising According to the U.S. Geological Survey, global sea level has risen about 4 inches (10 cm) during the past century. It says if all the Earth's glaciers melted, which is unlikely, sea levels would rise by 260 feet (80 meters). Antarctica, the fifth largest continent, contains about 90 percent of the world's glacial ice. Scambos thinks the satellite pictures have helped explain why the ice shelves are melting. "Ice shelves are so large -- they are a thousand feet (300 meters) thick and many square miles (km) -- that warming at the top won't actually cause the ice to melt," he said. "What we think instead is going on is that as these things crack naturally in the summer, the meltwater goes into the cracks." Because the melted water is denser, it forces the cracks to open even wider. "What we are seeing ... is an ice shelf that is essentially shattered, already being swept out. There are thousands of relatively small icebergs," he said. Scientists believe the Larsen B ice shelf has existed for at least 400 years. But the local climate is inching toward an average summertime temperature just above 32 degrees Fahrenheit (0 degrees Celsius) -- the melting point of water. The British Antarctic Survey reports an increase in mean annual temperature in the region of about 4.5 degrees Fahrenheit (2.5 degrees Celsius) since the 1940s.



-- a (a@a.a), April 14, 1999.


Link Established Between Solar Cycle And Earth Climate

NASA/Goddard Spaceflight Center www.gsfc.nasa.gov www.sciencedaily.com 4-12-99

Researchers have found that the variations in the energy given off from the sun effect the Earth's wind patterns and thus the climate of the planet, according to results of a new study published in the April 9 issue of Science.

For decades, scientists have tried to understand the link between winds and temperature and the sun and its cycles. There were tell- tale signs of a connection. For instance, the Little Ice Age recorded in Europe between 1550 and 1700 happened during a time of very low solar activity. But how the sun and climate were linked continued to elude researchers.

According to Drew Shindell, a climate researcher from NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York, NY, and lead author of the new study, a key piece of the puzzle was missing. Previous studies neglected to take into account the effects of increased solar activity on the ozone layer or the complex chemistry of the upper atmosphere where most of the high-energy radiation, including ultra- violet radiation (the kind responsible for creating the ozone layer) gets absorbed.

"When we added the upper atmosphere's chemistry into our climate model, we found that during a solar maximum major climate changes occur in North America." The changes, according to Shindell, are caused by stronger westerly winds. Changes also occur in wind speeds and directions all over the Earth's surface.

"Solar variability changes the distribution of energy," said Shindell. "Over an 11-year solar cycle, the total amount of energy has not changed very much. But where the energy goes changes as wind speeds and directions change." During the sun's 11-year cycle, from a solar maximum to a solar minimum, the energy released by the sun changes by only about a tenth of a percent.

When the solar cycle is at a maximum, it puts out a larger percentage of high-energy radiation, which increases the amount of ozone in the upper atmosphere. The increased ozone warms the upper atmosphere and the warm air affects winds all the way from the stratosphere (that region of the atmosphere that extends from about 6 to 30 miles high) to the Earth's surface. "The change in wind strength and direction creates different climate patterns around the globe," said Shindell.

According to Shindell, the new study also confirms that changing levels of energy from the sun are not a major cause of global warming.

Many scientists have argued that the radiation change in a solar cycle - an increase of two to three tenths of a percent over the 20th century - are not strong enough to account for the observed surface temperature increases. The GISS model agrees that the solar increases do not have the ability to cause large global temperature increases, leading Shindell to conclude that greenhouse gasses are indeed playing the dominant role.

The general circulation model used in the study included solar radiation data from NASA's Upper Atmospheric Research Satellite, launched in 1991. With data from UARS, which was used to calculate ozone changes, scientists have good measurements of how much radiation the sun puts out, increasing the accuracy of the new model.

___________

Note: This story has been adapted from a news release issued by NASA/Goddard Spaceflight Center for journalists and other members of the public. If you wish to quote from any part of this story, please credit NASA/Goddard Spaceflight Center as the original source.

-- Andy (2000EOD@prodigy.net), April 14, 1999.


Minor episode of hair pulling here - the ice shelves are already floating. They will not add to the water level even one inch. Only land locked glaciers can do that. I hate it when someone does not explain themselves fully.

-- Paul Davis (davisp1953@yahoo.com), April 16, 1999.

Whatever floats yer boat Paul :)

-- Andy (2000EOD@prodigy.net), April 16, 1999.


Paul,

By oversimplifying the issue, you miss some of the beauty and mystery, the complexity and interconnectedness of it all. Those articles posted above addressed only one aspect of the results of climate change. A simple explanation of all the facets would run to tens of thousands of words. It is quite more complicated than this simple Y2K thingy.

Freshwater is less dense than saltwater; every pound that melts takes up more room than the saltwater on which it's floating. Because the Larkin (and Ross) shelves are anchored to islands, more of it is above sea level than your average iceberg. Add to that the fact that water expands as it warms. A measurable increase is expected.

Freshwater dilution effects the thermohaline circulation and, therefore, ocean currents; and, therefore, planetary heat tranference.

More immediately important, those floating ice-shelves are helping to hold back the glaciers and snowpack which comprise the WAIS (Western Antarctic Ice Sheet)which is trying to slide down from the Trans-Antarctic ridge into the ocean. If (when?)that land-bound ice-sheet ever lets go....

Both poles are warming, on the average, three times faster than the temperate zones. The summertime average temperature is rapidly approaching zero degrees Celcius. Does that make you nervous? No? How about your grandkids?

Warming of the stratosphere, by solar flares as well as other influences, causes a temperature inversion which attenuates warmer air rising off the continent. That's one of the reasons the poles are warming faster than the average and, as described, is one factor thwarting natural repair of the ozone holes (plural).

What has this to do with Y2K? Besides the breathtaking interconnectness and complexity---chess to Y2K's checkers---the similarities and analogies are legion. But I'll leave that as an exercise for the student.

Hallyx

"When we tug at a single thing in nature, we find it attached to the rest of the world." --- John Muir

-- Hallyx (Hallyx@aol.com), April 16, 1999.


Thank you Hallyx--

Your explanation was well rounded enough for me to see from your perch for a moment, thankyou.

I believe this is the biggest hurdle for any DGI. They simply cannot grasp the beauty and complexity of systems. I don't claim to be able to see even a fraction of it from my perch, but perhaps my wanderings and dabblings in so many different genre have given me a better look at the interconnectiveness of it all, than someone whom has spent their whole life becomig an expert on a single plane of perspective.

-- Michael (mikeymac@uswest.net), June 28, 1999.


Michael,

Thank you for the kind words. I had forgotten that this discussion took place. Eleven weeks is a long time around here. Nowadays the solar max is a hot topic on this board. But even now the discussion is more about how the event effects us and our technological systems directly, with little regard as to its ultimate effects on us, our children and our planet.

I am gratified to meet here people who understand the complexity of the Y2K issue, but who also understand the involvement of our technology and civilization in the broader scheme of life. I would have thought that anyone who "gets" Y2K would be inclined to appreciate the wide and variegated panoply of existence, the complicated interplay of natural systems which dwarfs our simplistic technology.

Y2K has demonstrated that we don't even have a complete understanding of a technology which we created. Imagine how ignorant we must be of the systems within systems within systems that have been evolving for millions and billions of years. And now, just as we are beginning to hear the polyrhythms and sense the multiphonic melodies of the natural world (melodies and rhythms which our ancestors danced to for hundreds of millennia), just as we are about to be invited to rejoin the Earthdance, we turn up our hideous boom-boxes and electrical, mechanical metaphors and drown out the scintillation of surf, the hush of wind, the melodies of birdsong, the wonderful wild calls of wilderness trumpets, the rhythms of these magical cycles and interconnections, the songs of our ancestors and our children, and their children yet unborn down the ages.

I'm with you, Micheal. I too, "...don't claim to be able to see even a fraction of it from my perch, but perhaps my wanderings and dabblings in so many different genre have given me a better look at the interconnectiveness of it all..." I think that we generalists are blessed by being able to appreciate this more deeply than most.

Elisabet Sahtouris (biologist and eco-philosopher) says it much better than I ever could. Her book, "Earthdance," is online at http://www.ratical.com/lifeweb/ Knowing how you feel, I think you would enjoy it very much, as well as gain an appreciation for the view from the lofty eyrie of a devoted generalist and soulful observer of this masterwork of which our higly-vaunted system is but a small part.

Hallyx

"Everything is deeply intertwingled."--- Tom DeMarco

-- (Hallyx@aol.com), June 30, 1999.


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