From what I can see the sun's irradiance has changed a lot over the last two years, so perhaps it is simply too early to be looking for less melt in the artic as a result of this relatively recent change in the sun's brillance.

Sun's brilliance? If you mean the energy output of the Sun, it it nearly constant, at least on a timescale of decades. The 11-year solar cycles involve profound changes in the solar activity - things like sunspots, prominences, coronal mass ejections, the amount of solar wind, etc - but the energy involved in these phenomena is negligible compared to the stable thermal emission of the solar photosphere. The changes on longer timescales - hundreds of years - are less well known.

few factoids:

It would take about 109 earths to equal the width of the suns diameter (Sun=1.39 million km Earth=12,700 km)
Over 1 million Earths would fit inside the Sun’s volume
The sun has a total luminosity output of 386 YottaWatts
(386,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 watts, some background here and here)
The total luminous energy output received by earth from the sun is 174 PETAWATTS (174,000,000,000,000,000) watts.
A 0.1% increase in luminosity dumps an extra 174 trillion watts (174,000,000,000,000) watts into our planetary energy balance.


Data source for graph: http://www1.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/pale ... diance.txt

Note: In the graph above, the low flatline from 1645-1715 is the Maunder Minimum, a period of virtually no sunspots, where the historical reports from the northern hemisphere tell a story of dramatic climate change: harsh winters, cools summers, crop failures, famine and disease.

From the abstract referenced above: “Estimated increases since 1675 are 0.7%, 0.2% and 0.07% in broad ultraviolet, visible/near infrared and infrared spectral bands, with a total irradiance increase of 0.2%. “

So its not just 0.1 %, it is 0.2% which translates to a 348 TeraWatts global irradiance increase.

Now lets put 348 trillion watts into perspective:

Hurricanes: the heat energy released by a hurricanes category 1-5 equals about 50 to 200 trillion watts or about the same amount of energy released by exploding a 10-megaton nuclear bomb every 20 minutes.

Katrina, released about 200 trillion watts over its life cycle.

Now imagine double that amount of extra energy being added to earth’s atmosphere every second by small increases in the suns output that have been documented to exist. That’s what the increase in solar irradiance is doing. Since 1675, after the depths of the Maunder Minimum, we’ve seen an increase in solar irradiance of about 2.5 watts per square meter.

Climate modelers say that the extra CO2 equates to a forcing of about 2 watts per square meter, which totals about 1.12 Petawatt (1,120,000,000,000,000 watts). The problem is, they can’t always recreate that reliably between all of the different models out there, with the positive and negative feedback mechanisms, and other variables involved. There’s disagreement on the total contribution. A lot of it. Nonetheless they seem all to agree that CO2 makes some contribution, and that’s likely true. But compared to the sun, I believe it’s minimal.

Now lets look at us: 13.5 TeraWatts is the average total power consumption of the human world in 2001.

Compared to solar variance, do you think we could change the planets atmospheric energy balance with that if we squeezed all the power we made that year together and radiated it into our atmosphere ?

What is very clear though, when you look at history, and the graph above, is that our earths atmosphere and resulting climate is extremely sensitive to variations in solar output. The sweet center point seems to be about 1365 watts per square meter of irradiance…what we consider as “normal” climate. Take 1.5 watts/sq. meter away, and we get significant cooling, harsh winters, cool summers, and increases in ice and glaciers. Add 1.5 watts,/sq. meter and we get hotter summers, mild winters, and melting of ice and glaciers.

Now irradiance aside, as it’s only one component, there’s also the chnage in the suns dynamic magnetic field and solar wind, which according to Svensmark, which modulates the number of cosmic rays that enter our atmosphere (I think there may be some possible effect also due to modulation of the earth’s magnetic field), which modulates the number of clouds that form, hence changing the net surface irradiance. Plots of changes in the suns magnetic field line up very well with climate change.

Climate modelers say that the extra CO2 equates to a forcing of about 2 watts per square meter.

which totals about 1.12 Petawatt (1,120,000,000,000,000 watts). The problem is, they can’t always recreate that reliably between all of the different models out there, with the positive and negative feedback mechanisms, and other variables involved.

There’s disagreement on the total contribution. A lot of it. Nonetheless they seem all to agree that CO2 makes some contribution, and that’s likely true. But compared to the sun, I believe it’s minimal.

Now lets look at us: 13.5 TeraWatts is the average total power consumption of the human world in 2001.

The CO2 forcing

Ideinostre - it is refreshing to read the opinions of someone who takes a view that C02 is a primary cause of the warmer weather and backs it up with a good grasp of the physics behind the theory.

Most warmists are simply mud slingers. At Wattsupwiththat.com they need people to argue the case for the IPCC (who seem to be quite a bad lot, hiding their data and mixing their science with political statements),

Werner
For the arctic domino theory of AGW models it is not the sea ice volume which counts, it is the surface. Albedo change happens when you change the ice coverage area. It may matter whether the ice is thin or very thin. Only if the polar sea becomes ice free quickly in early summer, significant albedo change may occur (domino stone number 1).
Only then this may be sufficient to warm up the permafrost areas in adjacent northern Sibiria, Canada and Alaska. And to possibly free further greenhouse gases such as methane in great numbers. And by that to warm further (domino stone number 2) so that the Greenland glacier starts to melt significantly which should raise the sea level by meters (domino stone number 3).
If however run-off from the Sibirian rivers increases due to warming, salinity in the polar sea may drop and freezing may occur at higher temperatures, a negative feedback. Sibirian rivers seemed to have had a 10 % increase in run-off during the last, warm decades.
Incidentally, Hudson bay has had ice coverage long into the summer, probably because of the sweeter water there.
Are such feedbacks all included in Dr. Maslowski’s models?
Surely, the ice was thicker in the Nineteen-sixties. Remember, at that time we had predictions of a new ice age coming soon.
Now 30-40 years of warming have occured. Whether this happened by 2/3 due to AGW and by 1/3 due to strong solar cycles - this is the official IPCC statement - or whether it happened by somewhat more of solar cycle effects and somewhat less of AGW, that is the big question under debate.
There are indications of global cooling for the last two or so years and a plateau before. Solar cycle 23 has not been too strong in its waning years, whenever they may end, so a lower bound for the solar impact would be to assume a -1/3 contribution from the sun. AGW should have increased even more, mainly because of the dramatic increase of the Chinese coal consumption from less than 1 bn tons to now 3 bn tons in the last ten years.
This still should lead to net warming of 1/3 of the previous values or more., but not to cooling.
Finally think of the thermal expansion of the oceans which caused the sea level to raise by 3 cm- hard data. Temperature increases are observed down to 1000 m and more. From the distribution of the temperature rises - hard data - you can calculate the additional heat stored. It is ten times the additional heat which is stored in the atmosphere. This is a big buffer when cooling starts. So you wonder a bit why this buffer and the increased AGW have not prevented cooling at all.
In conclusion you may think that this somewhat more of solar contribution is 1/3 or even bigger. Then a 2/3 or bigger total solar contribution to the previous warming may also easily explain why the oceans have been warmed in such big depths. Sun light pentrates down to 100 Meter, while the infrared light of the AGW effect penetrates only 1 Millimeter.
DR (18:19:14) :