Globe Grows Darker as Sunshine Diminishes 10% to 37%

[gulfcoastliberal]

In the second half of the 20th century, the world became, quite literally, a darker place.

Defying expectation and easy explanation, hundreds of instruments around the world recorded a drop in sunshine reaching the surface of Earth, as much as 10 percent from the late 1950's to the early 90's, or 2 percent to 3 percent a decade. In some regions like Asia, the United States and Europe, the drop was even steeper. In Hong Kong, sunlight decreased 37 percent.

No one is predicting that it may soon be night all day, and some scientists theorize that the skies have brightened in the last decade as the suspected cause of global dimming, air pollution, clears up in many parts of the world.

Yet the dimming trend — noticed by a handful of scientists 20 years ago but dismissed then as unbelievable — is attracting wide attention. Research on dimming and its implications for weather, water supplies and agriculture will be presented next week in Montreal at a joint meeting of American and Canadian geological groups.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/13/science/13DARK.html?hp

This trend is probably growing much faster with the Bushgang in power.

[seasat]

1. Interesting that it contradicts a junk science theory

If pollutants are reflecting light back out of the atmosphere, then the solar radiation reaching the top of the atmosphere would not increase the warming like some propose. A 1.3% decrease, mentioned in the article is close to the "possible" increase theorized by some scientists. I say possible because the solar irradiance meters that have been in orbit above the atmosphere are not accurate enough to detect the slight changes. Some studies concluded that extraterrestrial solar irradiance has declined slightly, others that it increased, and some that it stayed the same. Others seem conclude (with pretty good research) that exterrestrial solar radiation increases with sunspot activity and we have been under a very active sun. The point is that if the solar radiation reaching the surface is dimmed by pollution, then greenhouse gases may be more effective than we suspected and as the article states, the temperatures will go higher when we clean up the particulate pollution.