Sunspot update: January activity returns to expected levels
Though I am a bit late this month, it is once again time provide my monthly update of the Sun’s on-going sunspot cycle. Below is NOAA’s February 1, 2021 monthly graph, showing the Sun’s monthly sunspot activity. I have, as I do each month, annotated it to show the previous solar cycle predictions.
After two months of relatively high activity, activity that was very high so early in the ramp up to solar maximum, the number of sunspots in January dropped down to closely match the predicted value. It was still higher, but not by much.
The graph above has been modified to show the predictions of the solar science community for the previous solar maximum. The green curves show the community’s two original predictions from April 2007 for the previous maximum, with half the scientists predicting a very strong maximum and half predicting a weak one. The blue curve is their revised May 2009 prediction. The red curve is the new prediction, first posted by NOAA in April 2020.
That activity remains above the prediction suggests that this prediction might be too low. I must emphasize however that it is too soon to tell. What we do know is that there is no consensus among solar scientists as to what will happen next. The solar scientists from NOAA, as indicated by the red curve above, expect a relatively weak solar maximum, comparable to the weak maximum seen in 2009. Others believe that the upcoming solar maximum will be very strong, as much as two times stronger than NOAA’s prediction. Others had predicted no solar maximum at all, a prediction which now appears to have been wrong.
I’ve said this many times before but it bears repeating. These predictions are not based on any real understanding of the underlying magnetic dynamo processes in the Sun that produce sunspots. They merely predict based on different patterns seen from past cycles.
We know the Sun’s magnetic field and dynamo produce the cycles. We really do not know why.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Though I am a bit late this month, it is once again time provide my monthly update of the Sun’s on-going sunspot cycle. Below is NOAA’s February 1, 2021 monthly graph, showing the Sun’s monthly sunspot activity. I have, as I do each month, annotated it to show the previous solar cycle predictions.
After two months of relatively high activity, activity that was very high so early in the ramp up to solar maximum, the number of sunspots in January dropped down to closely match the predicted value. It was still higher, but not by much.
The graph above has been modified to show the predictions of the solar science community for the previous solar maximum. The green curves show the community’s two original predictions from April 2007 for the previous maximum, with half the scientists predicting a very strong maximum and half predicting a weak one. The blue curve is their revised May 2009 prediction. The red curve is the new prediction, first posted by NOAA in April 2020.
That activity remains above the prediction suggests that this prediction might be too low. I must emphasize however that it is too soon to tell. What we do know is that there is no consensus among solar scientists as to what will happen next. The solar scientists from NOAA, as indicated by the red curve above, expect a relatively weak solar maximum, comparable to the weak maximum seen in 2009. Others believe that the upcoming solar maximum will be very strong, as much as two times stronger than NOAA’s prediction. Others had predicted no solar maximum at all, a prediction which now appears to have been wrong.
I’ve said this many times before but it bears repeating. These predictions are not based on any real understanding of the underlying magnetic dynamo processes in the Sun that produce sunspots. They merely predict based on different patterns seen from past cycles.
We know the Sun’s magnetic field and dynamo produce the cycles. We really do not know why.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Does anyone have the old link to the data from the very start of sun spot recording? Seems the internet searches (duckduckgo) have only hits where the Maunder minimum is missing. I have switched computers and lost the old link.
Sorry, finally found it. Was trying to see the uptick in sun spots at the start of a climb to maximum. It seems the sun spot group that lead to the uptick was, possibly, fairly common, but the rule.
There seems no doubt that our basic understanding of solar dynamics needs a lot of work. The grand maximum of the mid 1900s could very well be related to the rate of glacial recession. WHY is the real question.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunspot#/media/File:Sunspot_Numbers.png
Just looking at the curves with the naked eye (and heliophysicists don’t seem to base their practical predictions on much more than that, yet): If the broadening of the double tops at maximum continues from cycle to cycle, basically if there are two overlapping one-year out of phase sinus curves because of some convoluted inner workings of the Sun, then I visually predict a quick rise to a first big top (100-150 spots) during late 2022. Then three years of a big dent in the middle of this cycle, down to 50 spots. Followed by a second double top again 100-150 spots, finally ending the cycle to 0 spots 11 years after the last bottom just ended.
Then with the bottom between the double tops lasting half of the 26th cycle, there might be no discernible top at all, but the number of spots staying below 50 for all of the 2030th. Given this childishly simple assumption.