Source: BBC1: Inside Out
URL: N/A
Date: 28/10/2013
Event: Inside Out: "we may well be heading into more severe Maunder Minimum territory"
Credit: BBC1: Inside Out, Yorkshire and Lincolnshire
People:
Toby Foster: Welcome to Inside Out. I'm Toby Foster, and tonight we're in Sheffield. This week scientists are warning that we could be heading towards a mini ice age. Could winters, like the ones in 1963 and 2010, become more frequent? And, if so, how would we cope?
Katherine Smailes: I honestly don't know whether, seriously, we'd have to think about moving.
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Toby Foster: Now it's a typically rainy autumn day here at Ladybower Reservoir, just outside Sheffield. But apparently we could be returning to a period in climate history known as the Mini [sic] Ice Age. Scientists have been monitoring a massive drop in sunspot activity, which, in the past, has been linked to a higher number of Siberian winters here in the UK, as weatherman Paul Hudson has been finding out.
Paul Hudson: They certainly know a thing or two about cold winters, up here in Goathland, on the North York Moors. When the fierce winter of 1962/63 came calling, Katherine and John Smailes found themselves slap-bang in the front line.
[Paul Hudson arrives at the Smailes' house.]
Katherine Smailes: Good morning.
Paul Hudson: Good morning, can I come in?
Katherine Smailes: Yes, help yourself.
[Archive news footage from the winter of 1962/63.]
Male newsreader: Now it's Siberia - worst for 82 years, more to come!
Katherine Smailes: It was a long one. It started Boxing Day. My parents came up for Christmas and went home early because of the forecast. And I had a three month-old baby, so I was snowed in for two and a half months. And the snow got deeper and deeper and deeper.
Paul Hudson: The winter of '63 was savage, with 30-foot snowdrifts. Even parts of the sea froze over. And, as the thermometer dropped like a stone, the Smailes witnessed the evacuation of nearby RAF Fylingdales.
Katherine Smailes: They were snowed in, up there, and some of them, led by, I presume, someone who knew the moors pretty well, walked down the railway.
Male newsreader: It was only four miles, but the drifts were fourteen feet deep and the snow was very soft. By the time they reached the railway, most of them were done in.
John Smailes: Bless them, they walked single-file all the way down the moors, onto the railway track and down the railway track, and they all came past our house.
Paul Hudson: Well, it's been really interesting hearing their recollections of that severe winter, back in '62/63. But what I haven't told them is that those type of winters could come back with a vengeance.
We all know how we struggle with periods of severe cold weather. Our last taste of Siberian conditions came in December 2010 and the results were predictable. It was the coldest December since 1890, and there was widespread travel disruption - parts of the country ground to a halt. But as severe as it was, it only lasted a matter of weeks. So how would we cope, should it last for several months?
The idea of prolonged and severe winters isn't based on science fiction. One leading solar scientist thinks it could be linked to a dramatic fall in sunspot activity.
Mike Lockwood: The sun is quietening really rapidly. We think it's actually quietening more rapidly than at any time in the last 10,000 years. So this is a major change. And we think that the lower solar activity does seem to tie up with more cold winters in central Europe and in the UK.
Paul Hudson: The sun drives our climate and our weather patterns are dictated by the jet stream. And it's becoming increasingly apparent that declining solar activity may make the jet stream weaker, forcing it further south than normal and leaving us more prone to cold air in winter. And, if you peel the record books back far enough, there are two periods that give us a clue as to what the future may bring.
In the last 400 years, there are two fascinating periods of UK climate, both of which coincided with weak solar activity. The first, the Maunder Minimum, otherwise known as the Mini [sic] Ice Age by climatologists, lasted through part of the 1600s into the early 1700s. And more recently, in the early 1800s, that was the solar Dalton Minimum. And both periods coincided with very cold winters and often poor summers.
The Maunder Minimum was the more severe of these two climate periods. During this time the Thames famously froze over. But while there were more harsh winters during this period, not every winter was a bad one.
Well, you might think that all this talk of Arctic and Siberian winters is just a load of hot air. After all, the past two decades have mainly consisted of mild, wet and windy winters, and, if anything, the perception has been that flooding is the main risk in winter.
So, what about global warming? Well, most scientists believe that long-term global warming hasn't gone away, and any increase in cold winters is likely to be a regionalised event that would hit areas such as north-western Europe. A drop in winter temperatures could dampen the rise in global temperatures, but the effect is likely to be temporary. And it's the position of our islands, on the edge of continental Europe, that makes us especially vulnerable to change.
Dennis Wheeler: When we've had these periods when the sun has been, shall we say, quiescent, quieter than usual, we get these much colder winters, the sort that we had in 2010. And so when the weather, instead of coming to us from the Atlantic, as you might say - it's wet and it's windy and it's mild in temperature - comes to us from Europe, and indeed, in some respects, could be regarded as coming to us from Siberia, I need add little more to the descriptions of the weather we get.
Paul Hudson: So, if our winter weather does change, how bad could it get? Professor Mike Lockwood, who's been monitoring the drop in sunspot activity, thinks we may well be heading into more severe Maunder Minimum territory.
Mike Lockwood: You have to say "Okay, if we had a Maunder Minimum..." and I'm estimating that - I used to say, about 8%, but I'm beginning to think it's more like 25, 30% - so a much larger chance that we might actually -
Paul Hudson: That's not an insignificant risk.
Mike Lockwood: No, it's not. It's not. And there's also the scientific probability that this link is real - but I think it is, there are other factors, but I think the link is real.
Paul Hudson: So, Professor Lockwood thinks the link between falling solar activity and cold winters could be highly significant. If he's right, what could it mean? We know our transport links are easily disrupted during severe cold spells. And power supplies and energy prices are especially sensitive to changes in the weather. In December 2010, demand rocketed, the cold snap putting a real strain on the energy system. So, if we are heading for more harsh winters, how would we cope, in supplying the basics of everyday life?
Steve McDonald: We got a taster of it in 2010, and we saw that as extreme. I do think it, kind of, opened our eyes in terms of - well, we are going to see more of this. So, for us, going forward, it's about more usage of 4 x 4 vehicles where, typically, we might use normal vans, things like that.
Mark Glover: I guess we'd have to look at the trends and how often it did happen, you know. I think if we thought it'd happen this year, would it be a one-off? If it happened next year as well, then we'd really have to look at it, look at the investment, you know, and then look at purchasing snow tyres and other things that we might need to use, to make sure we can supply the customer.
Andrew Burgess [harvesting Brussels sprouts]: This is definitely vulnerable, yeah, to that type of really long cold spell. The short sharp one we can cope with, the long prolonged one - goes on for weeks on end - that starts to get very difficult. Sprouts are vulnerable to cold winters, because what happens is that the water crystals in the cells freeze, and when they're frozen they're sharp. But if you handle it while it's frozen, it actually bursts the cells, and the minute that thaws out, that will just go black and mushy and be no good to anybody.
Paul Hudson: While climate scientists might disagree on what may lie in store, they do agree on one thing - that Britain, as it stands, isn't ready to cope with extreme winter episodes.
Dennis Wheeler: It's self-evident that the issues are profound here, because the winters'll be colder, they're quite likely to be longer as well, and heating bills, as we've seen, irrespective of the background policy associated with the fuel companies and so on, will just continue to rise. And it will expose weaknesses in fuel policy and the system.
Mike Lockwood: We, maybe, need more snow ploughs. We, maybe, need to warehouse some things. We, maybe, need more power stations to meet the energy demands. We, maybe, need to cut down our energy demands by insulating our houses better. All these things become more sensible and more economic to do , if you're going to face many more cold winters. And indications are that we very well may.
Paul Hudson: Back in Goathland, Katherine And John Smailes can look back on the winter of '62/63 as a severe test, and one that they came through unscathed.
[To Katherine and John Smailes.] So, how do you think you would cope, should we see a return of winters like that?
Katherine Smailes: I honestly don't know whether, seriously, we'd have to think about moving. You can't expect people to help you, year after year, week after week, month after month - that's too much for anybody.
Paul Hudson: If more extreme winters are heading our way, how long have we got to prepare? One estimate is 20-40 years. But there are certainly those who feel that with winters like December 2010 under our belt, the change is under way now.