Highly Unusual And Unexpected

This is not about some decline in an economic indicator especially not about the latest trends in unemployment claims. It is about the coming of a quiet sun.

A missing jet stream, fading spots, and slower activity near the poles say that our Sun is heading for a rest period even as it is acting up for the first time in years, according to scientists at the National Solar Observatory (NSO) and the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL).

As the current sunspot cycle, Cycle 24, begins to ramp up toward maximum, independent studies of the solar interior, visible surface, and the corona indicate that the next 11-year solar sunspot cycle, Cycle 25, will be greatly reduced or may not happen at all.

Will we be heading for a period of cooling as we have seen in other periods of a dormant sun such as the Maunder Minimum? No one knows. But it does seem stupid to be shutting down coal fired power plants in the face of that possibility.