Monthly Archives: October 2008

News and Views, Solar

Hard lesson about solar realities for NOAA / NASA

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The real world sunspot data remaining quiet month after month are mocking the curved red predictions of NOAA and about to slide underneath. Time for a rethink I reckon NOAA !!
Here is my clearer chart showing the misfit between NOAA / NASA prediction and real-world data.
Misfit NOAA / NASA prediction
Regular readers might remember that we started posting articles drawing attention to contrasting predictions for Solar Cycle 24, way back on 16 December 2006. Scroll to the start of my solar threads.

Then in March 2007 I posted David Archibald’s pdf article, “The Past and Future of Climate”. Well worth another read now, I would like to see another version of David’s Fig 12 showing where we are now in the transition from Cycle 23 to Cycle 24.
Solar Cycle 24 Prediction Issued April 2007 from NOAA / NASA

Much data and commentary at solarcycle24.com

News and Views, Water

Long term rainfall trend updates Melbourne region, Canberra, Warragamba catchment (Sydney Australia)

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While digging around for rain data I thought I would update my “Melbourne water supply issues” page. Look for the Yan Yean monthly long term chart (below the red map) and below that my composite Melbourne region long term rainfall.
This lead on to charting the Queanbeyan Bowling Club trend complete from 1871.
Queanbeyan long term rain trend 1871-2008
Then Taralga from the Warragamba catchment.
Warragamba catchment (Sydney Australia) rain trend from 1885
Compare with my Uriarra district (Canberra, ACT) long term chart.
All of these long term data show that the recent decade is nothing exceptional, in every case the 5 year trend has been lower in earlier periods. Yet to listen to the media you would believe we are in a “long drought” caused by IPCC Greenhouse Global Warming. A bizarre national delusion. Who knows what the future brings, if rainfall long term trends do slide further into uncharted territory we can be sure that our policy response will be based on irrational notions and not on considered logic.

News and Views, Water

Deterioration in BoM rainfall data quality this decade

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While chasing updates for Perth Dam catchments rainfall data I have been hit by how common it is to find a marked fall of in data quality this decade. I want to emphasize I have not searched for these cases, they just jumped out in the normal course of checking data. Then I had a quick look at stations relevant to catchments east of Melbourne incl the Thomson, very poor data there.
I wonder why, considering Australia is widely believed to be in the grip of a national rain / water crisis. Our pioneers have little trouble collecting data reliably for the best part of a century and just when the nation is hit by a downturn in rainfall, the BoM appears to drop the ball on what must be one of its prime reasons for existence. I would suggest there needs to be a reallocation of resources in the BoM; more effort on archiving weather and water data history and presenting it free on the www in a usable form and less resources wasted on climate change fairy stories.
Here are the examples, I have taken a screen shot of the gap ridden recent years and you can click the station name links to see all the data for each station at the new and very useful BoM web page. The columns are monthly rain in mm, Jan to Dec left to right, with the annual total in far right column.
MUNDARING WEIR Site number: 9031 Commenced: 1900, full data to end 1996, missing Jul 1987, then OK till 2001, then just as national “water crisis” hits, missing data increases. First 4 from Perth hills Western Australia then a few from catchments east of Melbourne.
Mundaring Weir rain data gaps
Continue reading Deterioration in BoM rainfall data quality this decade →

News and Views, Solar

David Archibald’s elegant illustration of how late and weak solar cycle 24 is proving

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David Archibald illustration

There is another way of looking at solar cycles.

Solar cycles actually start with the magnetic reversal near the peak of the previous cycle. The sunspots take seven years to surface and become visible. Almost all sunspot cycles tend to be about 18.5 years long, measured from the peak of the previous cycle.

The above graph compares the average of three cycles, 21 to 23, from the late 20th century with three, 14 to 16, from the late 19th century (which had much colder weather). Also included is Solar Cycle 5, the first half of the Dalton Minimum.
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Given we are now 103 months from the peak of Solar Cycle 23, it is now too late to get a late 19th century-type outcome for Solar Cycle 24. Out of the 24 named solar cycles, Solar Cycle 24 is now the latest after Solar Cycle 5.

It is so late that it is now in no man’s land and its weakness is now more of a consideration than lateness in itself.

It is certain that we will be getting a Dalton Minimum-type experience.
David Archibald

Atmospheric science, IPCC, News and Views

Dr Ann Henderson-Sellers of Macquarie University tells us what IPCC Lead Authors Really Think

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Yearly NAO indexesNorth Atlantic Oscillation

From Climate Science: Roger Pielke Sr. Research Group News, very much worth your time to read. I think it is fair to say Dr Henderson-Sellers has been a long term supporter of the IPCC and it is stunning news that she is publishing her reservations.

Contrast this with the evangelical certainty of the Rudd Government (Australia) rushing policy to save the planet, at colossal cost to all Australians. For what benefit ? I would say zero measurable effect on global climate.

The source article on the Pielke site includes:

The rush to emphasize regional climate does not have a scientifically sound basis

Until and unless major oscillations in the Earth System (El Nino-Southern Oscillation (ENSO), Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO), North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) and Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO) etc.) can be predicted to the extent that they are predictable, regional climate is not a well defined problem. It may never be. If that is the case then we should say so. It is not just the forecast but the confidence and uncertainty that are just as much a key.

Climate models need to be exercised for weather prediction; there are necessary but not sufficient things that can best be tested in this framework, which is just beginning to be exploited.

Energy budget is really worrisome; we should have had 20 years of ERBE [Earth Radiation Budget Experiment] type data by now- this would have told us about cloud feedback and climate sensitivity. I’m worried that we’ll never have a reliable long-term measurement. This combined with accurate ocean heat uptake data would really help constrain the big-picture climate change outcome, and then we can work on the details.

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