/sci/ - Science & Math

Weather isn't climate, but circumstantial evidence indicates our sun may be entering a grand minimum of sunspot activity, not unlike the Maunder Minimum that some climatologists think caused record low winter temperatures in Northern Europe during the latter half of the 17th century.

"My opinion is that we are heading into a Maunder Minimum," said Mark Giampapa, a solar physicist at the National Solar Observatory (NSO) in Tucson, Arizona. "I'm seeing a continuation in the decline of the sunspots' mean magnetic field strengths and a weakening of the polar magnetic fields and subsurface flows."

"If we're entering a Maunder Minimum, it could persist until the 2080s," said Giampapa, who points out that if such a minimum's primary effect is cooling, it could wreak havoc by curtailing agricultural growing seasons which, for instance, could lead to lower wheat production in breadbasket economies.

www.forbes.com/sites/brucedorminey/2014/01/20/sun-flatlining-into-grand-minimum-says-solar-physicist/