99 percent chance that extremely cold Central European winters and low solar activity are linked
Rhine River - Credit Wikipedia
Scientists have long suspected that the Sun’s 11-year cycle influences climate of certain regions on Earth. A new study conducted by researchers at Johannes Gutenberg and the Institute for Atmospheric and Climate Science in Zurich, Switzerland, provides evidence that their suspicions were well-founded.
By studying the freezing of the Rhine River, researchers have been able to link low solar activity – when sunspot numbers are minimal – to localized, temporary cooling in Central Europe.
“The advantage with studying the Rhine is because it’s a very simple measurement,” said Frank Sirocko, professor of Sedimentology and Paleoclimatology at Johannes Gutenberg University. “Freezing is special in that it’s like an on-off mode. Either there is ice or there is no ice.”
“From the early 19th through mid-20th centuries, riverboat men used the Rhine for cargo transport, so docks along the river have annual records of when ice clogged the waterway and stymied shipping,” explains this article on Physics.org.
Sirocko and his colleagues found that between 1780 and 1963, the Rhine froze in multiple places 14 different times. The sheer size of the river – the 12th longest river in Europe – means it takes extremely cold temperatures to freeze over making freezing episodes a good proxy for very cold winters in the region, said Sirocko, lead author of a paper on the study.
After determining that ten of the fourteen freezes occurred during years around when the Sun had minimal sunspots, Sirocko and his colleagues calculated that there is a 99 percent chance that extremely cold Central European winters and low solar activity are inherently linked.
The article goes on to pay homage to global warming by pointing out that the average temperature of Central European winters has been increasing for the past three decades, and that the Rhine River has not frozen over since 1963. Such warming results, in part, from climate change, said Sirocko.
The study is set to be published August 25 in Geophysical Research Letters.
See entire article:
http://phys.org/news/2012-08-link-cold-european-winters-solar.html
Thanks to David Bass for this link
20 Responses to Cold European winters linked to solar activity
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Well ‘scientists’ have awakened if they believe the obvious. Been ‘obvious’ for ages SUN = CLIMATE. No dont tell me!
I am sure it must have been frozen in the late 16h00′s towards early 17h00′s as well?
The river Thames was then?
The warming we had, that ended around year 2000 was caused by the sun, not C02. The cooling today is caused by the sun, not C02. It really is as simple as that! Volcanic ashclouds are nr.2 after the sun, they can block out the -> Sun! Talks about greenhouse gas emissions are ridiculous!
I wish articles like *We are in an Ice Age Now!* or *We are Going to burn up Now* would be banned.
We need balanced articles that are not slanted.
This website is fun to read once in a while learning new cold records but is pretty much beating a dead horse other then posting the links to records.
I DO like how this site posts temp records that is not talked about in other places but I guess that’s what I get living in a world covered in sin.
Like Jesus said about casting the first stones.
Interesting, and confirms Piers Corbyn’s work at WeatherAction.com I’d like to read the original paper and look at the actual data – too often summaries and abstracts reveal biased thought processes, and the original papers reveal faults in methodology and analysis. I cannot recall the exact details off the top of my head (?jet stream moving south?), but one of the major climate/solar linkages is much stronger in odd numbered 11 year solar cycles than even numbered cycles – in other words that particular factor follows a 22 year cycle. We have not had winter 2012 yet – though the summer here in West Wales has done a good impression of some of the milder winters we’ve had! LOL. The lack of freezing in the 1963 to 2011 period represents 2 of those 22 year cycles – in other words it didn’t get cold enough for significant freezing in the 2 most recent peak cold winters, presumably 1985 and 2007. Winters when the industrial activity, population density and urbanisation in the Rhine catchment area – resulting in warmer water being discharged into the Rhine – would have been higher than at any other time in history. Probably a much bigger effect on potential freezing than a microscopic (on a total atmosphere scale) increase in CO2. So I question the paper’s authors’ conclusions that anthropogenic CO2 has resulted in the lack of freezing. And even if the globe has been a bit warmer recently, and even if there is a correlation with increased CO2 (both highly questionable when sources of bias in data collection are taken into account) those do NOT show that human CO2 is a major climate driver – correlation does not of itself prove causality. As the Little Ice Age weather over the next 25 years will probably demonstrate! So an interesting paper, but like so much “science” nowadays, the analysis has not been rigorous enough where CO2 is concerned. But perhaps they had to add that bit to ensure they keep getting funding!
Why did the rhine not freeze any more after 1963 ?
Most likely and probable only cause is heat pollution of the rhine-water as caused by electrical power generating ie atomic reactors being cooled by rhine-water and other industrial use of the rhine-water .
To me it is no surprise that the Rhine has not frozen since 1963. Apart from the fact that there was high solar activity, there has also been much more “thermal pollution” in that period than in the years before. The quantity of warm waste water from households and industrial plants has increased a lot since 1963. That has nothing to do with global warming. The Rhine did not freeze in February this year, in spite of the fact that it was very cold at that time in Central Europe. In earlier years the Rhine did freeze, while it was less cold than in February 2012. So the last part of the study, where it pays homage to global warming, is bogus. Keep in mind that scientists must pay this homage, because otherwise they will not get the money they need to do their research. As long as their science articles confirm the new religion, the pseude science of man made global warming, scientists get money, but if they fail to comply, they will get no money and they will even be outcasted in their profession.
“By studying the freezing of the Rhine River, researchers have been able to link low solar activity – when sunspot numbers are minimal – to localized, temporary cooling in Central Europe.” So, they are saying that the sun affects Central Europe differently? Is is closer, or farther away from the sun than the rest of the planet? I might be a layman, but I think any effect on Central Europe should also be the same in other places.
It is a valid question. Why hasn’t the Rhine frozen over since 1963? Have physical conditions on the river changed signifigantly, making it harder for it to freeze? Still in all it is good news.
When I first read this, I personally thought it was a joke. Just another attempt to take the real data and twist it. In truth, there is no way they can make the data say what they want, but they can state the data and say what they want and somehow, that will actually make “believers” believe they have tied the two together. Charlatan science.
How about Eastern Europe? winters are colder in Eastern Europe, especially this year but summers are hooter in East then Central Europe.
But if the Rhine does freeze over in an upcoming winter, it will still have to be climate change (AGW), right, since it has not frozen since 1963?
Nice and cool low 80′s a few days last week here in Abq, more like mid-Sept. But low 90′s back. Probably called climate change, too.
For 50 some years, I had always heard the following was the major cause of Climate Change/Shifts.
11 year and 206 year cycles: Cycles of solar variability ( sunspot activity )
21,000 year cycle: Earth’s combined tilt and elliptical orbit around the Sun ( precession of the equinoxes )
41,000 year cycle: Cycle of the +/- 1.5° wobble in Earth’s orbit ( tilt )
100,000 year cycle: Variations in the shape of Earth’s elliptical orbit ( cycle of eccentricity )
The Green House Effect is what keep the heat from escaping, otherwise we would have the same climate as the moon. However, the heat trapping particles are generally constant in the amount of heat trapped and the variable is the amount of heat being directed at the earth. Generally, it takes 4 time the insulating power to double the heat retained, so a 3 or 4 percent increase in Green House Gases have a minimal effect on the heat trapped. Which puts us back to the more heat in, the warmer the earth will be. Much like the heater works in your house.
Is there any comparable data for the Mississippi?
I remember having this very argument with some pro-AGW (whom I call ‘Gorons’) folks. They continue to insist the Sun’s effects are negligable compared to man’s effect through CO2.
Unfortunately they will also be the first ones at my door in any disaster since I tend to look ahead and plan for these things.
A further factor reducing the chances of the Rhine freezing recently could be that it is running faster. The Thames in London runs much faster than it used to – it is only about half as wide as it used to be because the banks have been “reclaimed” and built on. It is dredged to a greater depth to compensate, but even so it still runs much faster. This faster flow has been stated as the reason that the Thames is unlikely to freeze over even if we have really cold winters like those when “Frost Fairs” (complete with ox roasts!) were held on its frozen surface. I am guessing the Rhine banks are more built up than they used to be, and it is probably dredged deeper to accommodate the bigger barges of modern times. Plus flood defenses and agricultural drainage would tend to dump rainwater (and meltwater) into the main river faster, increasing the flow. I’m a scientist, though not specialising in climate or drainage. If myself and the other correspondents on here can come up so quickly with so many alternative explanations to CO2 for the recent lack of Rhine freezing, then why can’t the specialists who are paid so much for this research? Because they’ve stopped being true scientists – they no longer have open, inquiring minds where CO2 is concerned, either because they are true believers in the CO2 myth, or because they cannot risk their grant funding. Such a shame. But at least they had the skill and the guts to research and publish work which so strongly points to the sun being the main climate driver, so we should all applaud them for that.
Here we go again – the sun is primary in causing cooling but Co2 is primary in causing warming – gotta love the guys protecting their paychecks. We watch a lot of the science channels on tv here at home and always laugh when scientists are challenging theories and beating each other up over what caused the big bang or whether Hawking or Einstein has the right idea – but for climate it must be consensus all the way – which is how you can tell it is a religion, not science.
Take the sun away and it means no life, and almost 0 Kelvin = Logical yes!!
I must admit some of the “scientists” do sound like total idiots to me…because it just seems that “they” cannot think logical anymore. Sometimes I peep on their forums and looks like the one wants to impress the other more with formulas and math equations and then saying actually nothing.
it’s getting Colderrrr.
I remember how hot was summer a few years ago. In Northern Europe temps over +30C, in Moscow temps over +35C forest was burning; in Siberia also temps over +30C. This summer temps in those places was with 10-15C colder.
Is this only central Europe though what about the rest of the world. Weren’t the winters in the past colder in the USA than now.