“Solar Cycles” or Climate Denial?
Comments on my blog posts and social media bring up some very good questions, but also expose many “theories” and misinformation that defy basic scientific fact.
On LinkedIN there were a lot of positive comments to my last blog post, but also a few that actually disputed the established causes of global warming.
These particular commenters preferred to blame solar variations. Are natural solar variations really the cause of the warming?
Two of the phenomena most frequently pushed as minority theories to explain climate change, aka “global warming” are 11-year solar cycles and the Grand Solar Minimum, or GSM.
Both are real, but do not explain what is happening with climate. Pointing to them is a distraction from the critical problem the world now faces. Such sham science must be corrected and dismissed as it undermines the mainstream understanding of planetary warming and climate destabilization.
Climate deniers do not want to accept that the warming planet tracks with the long term increase in greenhouse gas levels. They grab onto obscure contrarian articles pushing theories such as solar cycles causing us to enter a new dramatic global cooling era, which will be catastrophic. [NOT TRUE.]
One of the best resources for climate change information and to separate fact from fiction is www.skepticalscience.com Their chart below clearly shows that global average temperature (red) is warming despite a normal but modest cooling phase of incoming solar energy (blue).
Global Temperature Compared to Solar Energy Variation (www.skepticalscience.com)
There are several variations in solar energy that do affect Earth’s weather and temperature. The best documented one is the 11-year solar cycle, first described by Galileo in 1609. (FYI, there are also other repeating orbital patterns that result in the Ice Age cycles, but the timing of these are in the tens of thousands of years)
The Grand Solar Minimum has been observed over the centuries but is not predictable and not well understood, fertile ground for conspiracy theories.
The facts are clear: Despite entering the lower temperature phase of the eleven year cycle and possibly entering a grand solar minimum, global average temperature keeps rising – and accelerating. As the 11 year-cycle turns to warming, as it will, temperature will increase even more.
As pointed out in another recent post here, even with the Covid-19 lockdowns and restricted travel, carbon dioxide levels are still increasing, just a little slower than pre-pandemic.
Skepticism is healthy. But just denying obvious scientific fact to distract people from deadly-serious threats needs to be called out. Global warming and climate destabilization demand that we tackle the problem with full commitment and clarity.
Make no mistake, we are in an existential challenge. This is no time to sow and share contrarian confusion.
Looking at the News This Week…the Paris Agreement
Last Friday, the headlines noted that the U.S. formally rejoined the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement, following one of President Biden’s very first acts after his inauguration. There has been some discussion about the significance and effect, that are worth a comment. China National Television even had me on for a live six minute interview, with that very question.
To share my perspective in a few bullet points:
- It is important and noteworthy that the U.S. participate in and be committed to this global agreement
by some 190 nations. - While this requires a total global effort, the two largest emitters of greenhouse gases, the U.S. and
China are critical to finding the solutions. - While unfortunate that the U.S. officially “sat on the sidelines” for the last four years, many states, large
cities, and corporations pursued the goal, so it’s not as if the four years were totally lost. - It is important to recognize that the Paris Accord only sets the goal to stop global warming at an additional degree Celsius (almost two
degrees Fahrenheit). - Experts generally agree that achieving that temperature goal requires stopping the rise of carbon dioxide by 2050.
- It leaves it to each country to resolve how to make its contribution to reducing greenhouse gas emissions, causing the warming.
- The specific means to achieve that are not yet understood by any major nation.
- Even if “we” find a way to achieve that goal of limiting warming to one more Celsius degree, the planet will be considerably warmer, and more CO2 will be in the atmosphere. Importantly, the effects of heat, unusual storms, wildfires, drought and deluge rain – will not abate but continue.
- Of all the challenging effects, the most certain is that the glaciers and ice caps will continue to melt, inexorably raising global sea level.
Being committed to the Paris Agreement is a meaningful and important rst step. Now we have to figure out how to solve the problem of a warming planet.