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Sun Spot News - September 2009
The Sun goes through a regular 11-year cycle of active periods and quiet periods. The active periods
are marked by an increase in sunspots—dark regions of intense magnetic activity on the surface of the Sun.
Sunspot activity rises and falls roughly every 11 years – the last maximum was in 2001, and activity slowly
fell off to zero by 2006 and since then…almost nothing. Scientists had expected sunspot activity to start
increasing by now, but it hasn’t. No one knows why, or when the cycle will pick up again.
Now, “active” and “quiet” are relative terms. The amount of energy released by the Sun in its “active”
phase is only 1/10th of 1% more than that released during its “quiet” phase. In other words, a quiet
Sun is still putting out 99.9% as much energy as an active Sun.
A new study by the National Center for Atmospheric Research and published in the journal Science argues
that the increased solar output warms ozone in the upper atmosphere. This extra energy creates more ozone,
which traps more heat, which creates more ozone, which… you get the idea. It’s a feedback loop.
The end result is stronger winds. These winds reduce clouds over the Pacific Ocean, allowing
it to warm up as well. So you’ve got heat coming down from the sky, and more heat coming up from the
ocean, the end result of which is that the Earth warms more than twice as much as you would expect
from the increased Sun activity alone.
The low number of sunspots over the last couple of years may at least partially explain our unusually cool summers of late.
Sunspots - latest MDI Continuum image
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Sun Spot Totals last 30 days
10-03-2010 - 12
09-03-2010 - 0
08-03-2010 - 0
07-03-2010 - 0
06-03-2010 - 0
05-03-2010 - 35
04-03-2010 - 40
03-03-2010 - 39
02-03-2010 - 39
01-03-2010 - 36
28-02-2010 - 13
27-02-2010 - 26
26-02-2010 - 26
25-02-2010 - 30
24-02-2010 - 40
23-02-2010 - 31
22-02-2010 - 14
21-02-2010 - 17
20-02-2010 - 19
19-02-2010 - 23
18-02-2010 - 17
17-02-2010 - 49
16-02-2010 - 28
15-02-2010 - 27
14-02-2010 - 28
13-02-2010 - 37
12-02-2010 - 38
11-02-2010 - 64
10-02-2010 - 55
