Above: The sunspot cycle from 1995 to the present. The jagged curve traces actual sunspot counts. Smooth curves are fits to the data and one forecaster’s predictions of future activity. Credit: David Hathaway, NASA/MSFC. [more]From Watts Up With That?
The sunspot cycle is behaving a little like the stock market. Just when you think it has hit bottom, it goes even lower.
2008 was a bear. There were no sunspots observed on 266 of the year’s 366 days (73%). To find a year with more blank suns, you have to go all the way back to 1913, which had 311 spotless days: plot. Prompted by these numbers, some observers suggested that the solar cycle had hit bottom in 2008.
Maybe not. Sunspot counts for 2009 have dropped even lower. As of March 31st, there were no sunspots on 78 of the year’s 90 days (87%).
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1 comment:
NASA may be compring apples to oranges. the solar cycle had not hit botton in 2004. The sun still had many spots though it was on the downward leg of cycle 23. They have been slow to recognise the bimodal peaks the past 22 year cycle and have not mentioned the hypothesis and experimental support for the solar work of the Danish geophysicists and astrophysicists for 30 years at the Danish National Space center. Their work is not chopped liver. If we want to stop the carbon economy, the powers should at least tell the truth about global warming and cooling. Otherwise the entire issue is way too Orwellian. There may be some face saving going on.
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