Not all solar disruptions can be predicted, however. The latter satellite has already functioned for 10 years longer than it was designed to work, Viereck said, but NASA, NOAA and the DOD plan to launch a replacement, called DISCOVR, in January 2014. Those new electronics users will need to learn on the job how to adjust when solar storms hit.Ĭurrently, real-time warnings of solar storms come from a suite of NASA spacecraft, including its SOHO (Solar and Heliospheric Observatory) and SDO (Solar Dynamics Observatory) satellites, as well as a solar-wind monitoring craft called the Advanced Composition Explorer (ACE). ![]() Today, on the other hand, farmers use GPS to lay out fields, map yields, and guide farm equipment. At the last solar maximum, almost no farmers used GPS, he said. The need is becoming more urgent as more and more technology comes online that can be disturbed by solar storms, Viereck said. Currently, these groups can often give one-to-three-days' warning before a storm. ![]() NASA, NOAA (the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) and the Department of Defense (DOD) are working to improve forecasting of space weather. To make these adjustments, industries need to know when and where a solar storm might hit, and how strong it will be. Airlines may switch communications systems or even re-route flights to ensure that airplanes don't go silent. Companies that rely on precise GPS measurements, such as deep-sea drilling projects, may delay operations until the storm passes. Power-grid operators might adjust voltages to make sure energy fluctuations don't max out the grid, said Rodney Viereck of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association's (NOAA) Space Weather Prediction Center. With enough warning, there are ways for industries to protect themselves from these solar eruptions. Studying the causes and effects of space weather can help us to better predict these events and to take precautions to minimize their impacts. Airline passengers flying over the poles and astronauts can also be adversely effected. So much of our modern technology is at risk from space weather, including satellites, communications and power grids. Given that satellites affect everything from global-positioning systems to airline communications, disturbances can be costly and dangerous. However, they can also cause electrical fluctuations in power grids and disrupt satellite communications. On the plus side, these disturbances create beautiful auroras in the sky near the North and South Poles. The sun's activity matters on Earth because when the sun spews huge sheets of solar wind - called coronal mass ejections - the particles from these ejections can disrupt the magnetic field surrounding our planet. "Some of the largest solar storms on record actually occurred during modest sun spot peak periods," Baker said. Researchers expect this period of storminess to be no more intense than in previous high years in the cycle, but even a moderate solar maximum can spur impressive storms. Sunspots, dark patches caused by strong magnetic activity, are back up, Baker said, and the sun is entering another period of solar maximum, set to peak in 2013. Now, however, the sun is shaking off its slumber. "The most recent minimum was broader, deeper and was very much comparable to a very low period called the Dalton minimum back in the 1800s," Baker said. Lately, the sun has been at its quietest in two centuries, said Daniel Baker, the director of the University of Colorado, Boulder's Atmospheric and Space Physics Lab. ![]() The sun varies from phases of relative peace to eras rocked by magnetic solar storms over a cycle of roughly 11 years. This transformation comes at a good time.
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