Solar storms ahead: Is Earth prepared?
Sunspot cycle beginning in 2012 may put satellites, power grids at risk.
By James Turner | Correspondent for The Christian Science Monitor/ May 5, 2009 edition
NEWSCOM
One of the most spectacular solar flares ever recorded spanned 367,000 miles in December 1973.
When we look at the sun (carefully), it appears to be a uniform, unchanging star. But scientists and engineers have a much different perspective. To them, the sun is a dynamic, chaotic, and poorly understood caldron of thermonuclear forces, one that can spit out fierce bursts of radiation at any time.
And when Earth lies in the path of that blast, the flare can play havoc with power grids, disrupt radio communications, and disturb or disable satellites. Fifty years into the Space Age, Earth has avoided the worst the sun can deliver – so far.
But with the sun entering a period of increased activity, more frequent solar flares could be headed our way. This has many astronomers and companies asking if satellites and power grids are ready.
Solar flares are a product of the sun’s complex chemistry, says Haimin Wang, director of the Space Weather Research Lab at the New Jersey Institute of Technology in Newark. The internal processes of the sun create whirlpools of magnetic force, which slightly lower the surface temperature of the sun, causing what we see as sunspots.
Every 11 years, the sun flips its magnetic north and south. This swap churns up an increased number of sunspots, with the next volatile peak due in 2012. Magnetic energy can build up on the solar surface and then suddenly be released in a massive burst.
This flare, a wave of particles moving at near the speed of light, arrives at Earth shortly after the light itself, which takes about eight minutes to cross the 93 million miles. In other words, sky-watchers won’t know there has been a solar flare until shortly before the radiation arrives.
The burst is largely cushioned by Earth’s atmosphere, according to Madhulika Guhathakurta, program director for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s STEREO mission, which studies solar forces from a pair of spacecraft orbiting the sun.
Because of atmospheric padding, the burst poses little risk to people on the ground. However, airplanes at cruising altitude and spacecraft are much more vulnerable. The flash also can zap electronics on satellites, which lie entirely outside the safety of Earth’s atmosphere.
While this initial burst can be dangerous, there’s a much slower wave of energy – a coronal mass ejection (CME) – that really can mess with electronics.
Not every flare produces a CME, and they often occur when no flare is present. When they do spew out, CMEs send strong waves of electromagnetic force our way. The most visible signs of this are the colorful northern and southern lights. But it also has more serious consequences.
For one, it can cause electrical transformers to trip or fail, which can lead to widespread power outages. A particularly powerful CME storm hit Earth in 1921, before electricity played as big a role in daily life. If a burst of similar magnitude hit today, it would interrupt power for as many as 130 million people, according to a recent report by the National Academy of Sciences. In 1989, a geomagnetic storm knocked out power to 6 million people in Quebec.
CMEs also can cause the Earth’s atmosphere to expand temporarily. This can cause low-orbit satellites, such as the constellation of Global Positioning System markers used for navigation, to drag in the denser air. Combined with changes in the transmission of radio waves caused by CMEs, this can lead to errors in positioning. The magnetic field also can induce glitches or even damage satellites.
Ron Mahmot, who manages the Satellite Operations Control Center for the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), isn’t particularly concerned about potential damage from solar activity. NOAA has had only one satellite damaged by a solar flare. The 1994 incident merely shortened the life of the orbital weather-watcher; it did not totally disable it. And for the most critical NOAA satellites, those that monitor the United States from geosynchronous orbit, there is an on-orbit spare in place, with another that was due to launch at the end of April, and yet another already in production.
For satellite TV provider DirecTV, “solar events are nonevents. In the more than 14 years that we’ve been operating satellites, we’ve never experienced a signal outage or interruption of any kind due to solar flares,” a spokesman writes in an e-mail. “The history of communications satellites is one of extraordinary reliability.” Each has shielding and a backup system.
Ms. Guhathakurta of NASA is less certain: “In the past, satellites were built with much greater integrity,” she says. “Now we’re putting up so many satellites, and the electronics are changing. I don’t believe the electronics are as well tested for radiation as in the past.”
Part of the problem, she says, is that we don’t know what the most powerful solar flare might look like. And even if 2012 brings a mild solar peak in terms of quantity, the power of the flares is not directly associated with their number.
“We cannot say anything about the kind of flares or coronal mass ejections we are going to see in a given cycle,” she says. The most powerful solar flare in modern times occurred during a solar lull in 2006.
This unpredictability makes protecting satellites tricky. Guhathakurta’s pair of STEREO spacecraft recently captured the first 3-D image of a CME burst, an important step toward understanding them.
As scientists gather more information, satellite companies have a few tricks to protect their space-bound electronics. It’s hard to determine the effectiveness of shielding – mostly because experts don’t fully know what the sun is capable of spewing out. Another satellite defense would be “safe modes,” where administrators turn off most of the on-board electronics to protect it from going haywire. This can save the satellite but would interrupt whatever services it offered. Safe modes also require some kind of early warning – technology that is nascent at best.
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Comments
2. Peter | 05.05.09
umm, has anyone noticed there arn’t any sun spots? How can you crystal ball types come up with this scenario of 2012. The sunspot cycle has been understood for sometime, but some unusual event is happening with the sun. Even if your prediction is correct we’ve been through this before and lived to tell about it.
3. Sean | 05.05.09
I have to agree with Peter above, the only thing exceptional (at least during the period of the space age) is the extended period of quiet in the sun. Models that predicted a strong cycle 24 have been scaled back and the peak has been delayed. And even these strong cycle models predict a weak cycle 25. The news from old Sol is LACK of solar activity so great news for all the satellite/rocket scientists but I’d keep a close eye on the weather closer to home. I would also like to know why someone is feeding solar storm warning stories when its inactivity is the real news.
4. Bay | 05.05.09
One possible benefit from a powerful CME is the creation of an expanded atmosphere and friction slowing space junk to drop out of orbit. The bright northern lights would be a wonderful sight, as well as space junk burning up in our atmosphere.
5. buckheaddad | 05.05.09
Isn’t 2012 also the date set by the ancient Mayans (or other S./Central American Cultures) as the end of time?
Interesting. . . .
7. Tree | 05.06.09
2012 was indeed the date… figures!!! End of the world (or its current cycle). The calendar is attributed to the Mayans however seems to be much older.
Good reading on the subject: Hancock, Fingerprints of the Gods
8. Steph | 05.06.09
They didn’t predict the end of the world. Their calender ended in 2012. Just like ours ends ever year. They had a few calenders. All with ending dates. We are still here. Just saying. People have been blowing all that Mayan stuff up for years. There was nothing that said the world is ending. They just kept track of everything. Some cycle is ending. It will start again like all the rest.
9. Homunculis | 05.06.09
buckheaddad | Wrote:
Isn’t 2012 also the date set by the ancient Mayans (or other S./Central American Cultures) as the end of time?
Interesting. . . .
—————
Yes. And very.
10. Larry | 05.06.09
Yep! … Dec. 21, 2012 - “DAS ENDE” … FINI! … according to the Mayans, the Egyptians, the Inca, the Aztec, the Hopi’s, the Navajo’s and a plethora of other sources - including Nostrodamus and a webbot project that confirms the date!
So, “2012. Figures” is correctomundo “spot on!”
11. Atoyota | 05.06.09
Funny this article did not mention the Carrington event of 1859. Also a very active Solar maximum was preceded by a minimum similar to what we are now experiencing, back in 1919.
The obvious point to this story is our dependence on a very vulnerable semi conductor technology of which Nearly every facet of our functioning infrastructure is dependent, from communications to transportation and power.
Not to mention the data or recordable experience we have with the Sun is limited, as radio has only been around 120 years (10 events), and direct observation much less… maybe 3 events. In short, Cycle prediction is not understood, it’s theory at best.
And yes… 2012 is a very interesting date.
12. George F. Kennan | 05.06.09
Your report is directly contradicted elsewhere, where lower solar activity is predicted:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/the-missing-sunspots-is-this-the-big-chill-1674630.html
13. Ron Scheurer | 05.06.09
The earth is known to shift it poles from time to time also. Will it not be interesting if both the sun and earth do so at the same time?
14. John V | 05.06.09
Who cares what some ancient people thought about the end of the world? How many predicted cataclysms have come and gone? Mysticism is not the point of the article, people. 2012 is not an important date because although solar activity will increase then, as it does every 11 years, the big flares that we have to worry about come randomly and essentially without warning, like earthquakes.
If a big one hits and we are unprepared, the satellites will be the least of our concerns, because we will fry our electrical transformers, so most areas will be out of power for MONTHS since there is only a small number of spares on hand. Of course, this will mean all modern services will STOP since you need electricity for gas pumps, lights, refrigeration, heating/cooling, sewage treatment, water pumps, natural gas pumps, phones, traffic lights, etc etc etc. Many areas will have serious anarchy on their hands, and our society/economy could take decades to recover.
15. Jenni | 05.06.09
Yes, everything I’ve read suggests that solar activity has been remarkably LOW the last year or so. As I work on a satellite mission, that’s very relevant to me and something my office keeps an eye on.
But the rest of the science in the article is just as bad. If the atmosphere expands due to a CME, the GPS satellites should be among the LEAST affected, since they are so high in altitude. It is the lowest-flying satellites that would be most affected by drag.
Secondly, take a quick study into the Van Allen belts and you’ll see that the atmosphere isn’t the only thing protecting Earth from harmful solar radiation. For both people and satellites within those bands, solar emissions are profoundly decreased.
Thirdly, any aerospacer worth her salt knows about the possibility of an high-energy particle creating a computer or electrical failure on a satellite. For this reason and many others, we do our best to make redundant systems. Any solar burst that hit the satellite would have to hit a system that has become non-redundant because of prior events. That’s certainly possible — but not nearly as likely as any of the hundreds of other partial failures we deal with on a regular basis.
In short: this is interesting, but it is NOT a major concern.
16. Atoyota | 05.06.09
John V: Exactly my point (vulnerability of infrastructure) However 2012 is about the time our solar system passes the galactic plane, which is what the Mayan (Olmec) Calender is based on; an event that I theorize is connected to solar activity as our sun intersects forces originating from the center of our galaxy.
Ron Scheurer: Our polar alignment with the Sun is very important in respect to CME’s, as the affect of the charge will be more intense with reverse alignment as it currently is.
And finally George F. Kennan: Your link has to do with debunking the global warming frenzy, and nothing to do with predictions. It’s more about assumptions of a mini ice age than anything else.
Man does impact climate, yet CO2 is a symptom and not the cause; and yes without solar activity Earth will cool, although not as fast because of our influences in energy and ecology.
17. Atoyota | 05.06.09
Jeni, you are describing the magnetosphere http://csep10.phys.utk.edu/astr161/lect/earth/magnetic.html
And a youtube describing the radiation fields http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c-RM-DCJ6K0
What was not described is the magnetosphere can be pushed back from solar wind. It can be pushed past high orbit objects and further.
Not a major concern?
18. stan | 05.06.09
the Mayan keep very good track of what was going on in our solar system.what they predicted on solar eclipse and so are to accurate to this day, the mayan said in 2012 that many things will happen and the earth as we know it will be no more, it happens to be the year nibiru comes back into our solar system and the year of the galactic alignment that happens like every 25000 years or so, they call it the great year and the end of age.and the sun has a normal cycle the mayan knew this.and because it has no sun spots dont mean a thing. call it the calm before the storm.
the mayan,the bible, and many other things lead to the 2012 mark.
the bible says the earth will be destroyed by fire.
a CME could do just that.
my opinion is. something major will take place.
i think the mayan have a pretty good track record on events the predict.
why do you make a calendar to track solar system events over time?
same reason you keep records of weather patterns.
to predict what the future may hold.to give people
an understanding of what will be on any given day or year.
20. Mayan Astronomer | 05.06.09
2012 was declared as a time when there would be a significant change that effected most of the world. It was the ‘dawning of a new era.’ A ‘fifth age.’ The Mayans never declared it would be the end of our world. Only the end of the world as we know it. The world depends so much on electricity now and if the solar flare were to damage our electronics/transformers/satellites, it would take years for the world to get back to where it was.
Much would change culturally and much in a societal sense, especially for places like the U.S. We use more power, per person, then any country in the world. Imagine all of the power being off for even a week across this entire country. Can you imagine how this country could potentially tear itself apart?
21. Vandrare | 05.06.09
Yeah, right. Somehow the data doesn’t support this news.
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/05/090504-sun-global-cooling.html
22. Rod Wood | 05.06.09
2012 is also a presidential election year, when candidates on both sides will claim the end of the world will come if their opponents are elected.
23. Editorial_Response | 05.06.09
From the article: “But with the sun entering a period of increased activity, more frequent solar flares could be headed our way.”
Huh? Did anyone do any fact checking before they wrote the story?
Took me less than five seconds. The entire story above is incorrect:
http://www.abc.net.au/science/articles/2009/04/08/2538378.htm
According to NASA’s Space Weather website the sun is in the middle of a solar minimum, with 266 sunspot-free days last year - the lowest for nearly a century.
In 2009, the sun has been blemish-free for more than 80 days, putting it on track for an even quieter year.
24. Dave | 05.07.09
We can’t even figure out how to solve global warming. Let’s worry about problems really affecting us, like now!
25. Frank W., New Mexico | 05.07.09
Like a guy the other day said, “The scientist’s have got it all figured out, what could possibly go wrong?”
26. Kash | 05.07.09
I agree with Dave, lets worry about Global Warming first..we already have enough issues with EARTH itself with all our resources depleting and water ~
27. Chris Gaylord | 05.07.09
Interesting headline from Wired: Big Solar Flare Portends Sun’s Return to Normal
While the sun had been quiet for a while, this seems to mark the “long-awaited beginning of the next solar cycle.”
28. Al Tish | 05.07.09
And this would be bad? A massive coronal mass ejection would be lovely. It would finally shut up all the big mouth talking heads on TV, internet, radio etc. Let us live in peace and quiet with nature. Let’s keep our fingers crossed that this wipes out the “System”, Matrix, Internet whatever you call it, so we can go back to living in harmony with the world.
29. Mike K | 05.07.09
I think you’re all getting this confused with the popular 1970s rock album “2112″ by Rush.
Excerpts below:
“And the meek shall inherit the earth.”
“They left the planets long ago
The elder race still learn and grow
Their power grows with purpose strong
To claim the home where they belong
Home, to tear the temples down…
Home, to change..”
“Attention all planets of the solar federation
Attention all planets of the solar federation
Attention all planets of the solar federation
We have assumed control.
We have assumed control.
We have assumed control.”
30. John | 05.07.09
Don’t forget that the earth’s magnetic field is in a period of reversal. This WILL be a very vulnerable time for Earth and its inhabitants.
31. Atoyota | 05.07.09
This is a link for daily sunspot activity http://www.swpc.noaa.gov/ftpdir/indices/DSD.txt
Bottom line is we do not know if the current minimum will be extended or if and when the next cycle will begin. But… the risks to infrastructure remain and with an event of sufficient magnitude there will be serious consequences due to our dependence on a technology that is not shielded from the affects. One that can happen with little or no warning, my guess is 45 minutes at most.
I expect we will see a Max in the next few years if not sooner. I’m surprised it has not already begun, but that could be as bad for our systems as it is good for our climate. When you add climate to this scenario it makes matters worse because warming will resume with a vengeance.
32. Lee Kington | 05.07.09
NOAA/SWPC will be releasing an update to the Solar Cycle 24 Prediction
on Friday, May 8, 2009 at noon Eastern Daylight Time (1600 UT) at a
joint ESA/NASA/NOAA press conference.
Two months ago they left intact a predicted range of peak activity for Solar Cycle 24 to be from an SSN of 90 two an SSN of 140 (with a 10.7cm Radio Flux levels of 140 to 185). Those numbers are consistent with David Hathaway’s projections. However, Leif Svalgaard of the Solar Cycle 24 Prediction Panel is on record of predicting Solar Cycle 24 having a peak activity of 75. David Archibald, Bob Easterbrook, and a few others place it a 40 to 45. Peak activity for Solar 24 should not be occurring before 2013.
Rather than solar activity “coming back with a vengeance” as Hathaway has predicted it is far more likely that the sun has entered a period at least as quite as the Dalton Minimum. Doing so would be consistent with a longer cycle activity pattern which spans approximately 100 years. A look at some data of fairly recent times / activity.
July 2000: Flux = 202.3 International sunspot# = 170.1
July 2008: Flux = 65.7 International sunspot# = 0.5
Dec 2001: Flux = 235.1 International sunspot# = 132.2
Dec 2008: Flux = 69.2 International sunspot# = 0.8
March 2008: Flux = 72.9 International sunspot# = 9.3
March 2009: Flux = 69.2 International sunspot# = 0.7
I expect Solar Cycle 24 to peak late in 2013 with a 10.7cm flux of about 110 and a peak SSN of about 45. A very quite and weak cycle. Solar Cycle 25 should be very similar. Concerns about the Sun should be centered on what it is NOT doing rather that what it ‘can’ do.
Sincere Regards,
Lee Kington
33. tc | 05.07.09
Basing your beliefs on a bunch of people who lived 2000 years ago and played soccer with severed heads is silly. Props to the person who said we need more scientists.
34. steve | 05.09.09
This story has major problems. Poor reporting is the least of the problem.
I do enjoy reading and checking in on this site… But, come on folks… report it correct. Even a Wiki can report better than this:
Anyway the story should be about the lack of Sunspots..
The Little Ice Age (LIA) was a period of cooling occurring after a warmer North Atlantic era known as the Medieval Warm Period. While not a true ice age, the term was introduced into scientific literature by François E. Matthes in 1939.[1] Climatologists and historians working with local records no longer expect to agree on either the start or end dates of this period, which varied according to local conditions. Some confine the Little Ice Age to approximately the 16th century to the mid 19th century.[2] It is generally agreed that there were three minima, beginning about 1650, about 1770, and 1850, each separated by slight warming intervals.[3]
36. R B | 05.09.09
Theres a bit more to 2012 than seems to be acknowledged here.
We are approaching the Galactic Equinox. (even according to NASA)
Happens every 26,000 years….We will be in line with the strongest linear gravitational pull of the black hole in the center of our galaxy….
NASA also says the Earth is not the only planet showing climatic changes….
Whats amazing is the Mayans and 1/2 other ancient civilizations seeing the year 2012 as a renewal age…. should be interesting
37. YRM | 05.11.09
On Lou Dobbs this evening, they did a report on the potential damage from a solar flare. A scientist admitted the power grid, satellites and military surveillance could be disabled for a long, long time. If they know an hour or two advance, it’s possible to send out a warning and get everything powered down. But that X-40 of a few years back got here in 30 minutes. For more articles on this subject, check out the 2012 site at thecityedition.com.
39. john collins | 05.12.09
What significance might the wanderings of our North Magnetic Pole have on this topic? In the past 40 years or so, it has stopped meandering in circles near Canada’s Boothia Peninsula, and is making a bee-line to the north-north-east at about 50 miles per year. It is presently about 84 deg north latitude and 124 deg west longitude. Never in the nearly 180 years since it was first measured, has it been so far north, well over the Arctic Ocean.
40. Ed | 05.14.09
If Internet and satellite communications go down globally I’ll die! The Internet and my cell phone are my life, my air, my blood!
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1. Matt | 05.05.09
2012. Figures.