In the picture, I show how most of us have become totally dependent on electricity. Consider this: On 1/9/1859, the whole telegraph network in Europe and North America suddenly went down. Telegraphists received electric shocks; sparks shot past the insulators. In many places, fires were reported. At the same time, there was an unprecedented spectacle of northern and southern lights to be seen that day, some even close to the equator. The incident went down in history as a so-called ‘Carrington event’. Richard Carrington observed that between 28 August and 2 September 1859 (Solar Cycle 10) there were exceptionally large sunspots visible on the sun. Apparently, it was these spots that resulted in outbursts of a large amount of energy during which a lot of radiation and charged particles were thrown into space. For more information about this: see also  here

Similar events on the sun are now also called CME’s (coronal mass ejection). As an example of such a solar storm of more recent date, I could mention the one of  March 1989  (SC 22). It caused a nine hour power outage of Québec’s hydro electricity transmission system.

What would happen if a CME the size of a Carrington event were to hit Earth now?

Our atmosphere and magnetic field protect us from most of the sun’s most dangerous radiation. But with an extremely large CME, the solar wind compresses the magnetic field where it reaches earth. That caused the induction power into the telegraph lines. Note that in 1859 the use of electricity was still in its infancy. Such an eruption now could have unprecedented dramatic consequences. It could generate huge amounts of power in our electricity and communications networks. Transformers would burn out, power plants would fail, communication networks, satellites and equipment would be destroyed. It would totally cripple our modern life and in one day it could send parts of the world like Europe, Asia, and America back to the Middle Ages. Everything would have to be repaired or rebuilt without the help of electricity. That would not take days, it could take years or possibly even decades. In the meantime, how does man survive without electricity, without computers and without communications? How do you heat your house and cook your food? How would you get water without power for the pumps?

Ironically, I think that here in Africa, in such an event, we could fall back more easily on the more traditional way of life.  

Most people visiting Bread on the Water already know that I have become skeptical about man-made warming due to more CO2. All my analyses of measurements and listed results just did not tie up with the theory, e.g.

https://breadonthewater.co.za/2021/01/26/am-i-a-climate-denier-denialist/

https://breadonthewater.co.za/2021/03/04/the-1000-year-eddy-cycle/

But what I did realize more and more from my studies is how dependent we all are on the work of His Hand. For example, I noted that the place of each planet in space and its very weight and speed is relevant for global temperature. In fact, a near-perfect balance between all kinds of forces of nature is constantly needed for the survival of our earth, just so that we do not boil or get caught with our feet trapped in ice. I think man is arrogant if he thinks he can ‘manage’ the weather… In fact, it seems to me that modern man wants to deny that we are in fact extremely vulnerable when it comes to nature and the weather and rainfall and everything that is needed for our daily bread. Hence, he wants to blame man if things are not right, instead of praying to God for rain. God’s Creation is in fact really Indescribable  (If you have not yet seen this video made by Louie Giglio, just click on the link)

Most scientists think that such a large solar storm like the one in 1859 is not to be expected soon. I think that is a false comfort. For example, in 2012, our world escaped an enormous catastrophe when a monster CME just narrowly passed by earth; see here  At least one biblical prophecy confirms that we should expect CME’s :

And the fourth angel poured out his vial upon the sun; and power was given unto him to scorch men with fire. And men were scorched with great heat, and blasphemed the name of God, which hath power over these plagues: and they repented not to give him glory. (Rev. 16-8-9)

[Careful about the precise interpretation of these words.  God is good. He does not wish us bad things. However, in the past, we have also often seen that big disasters somehow also bring people back to God, though not everyone will follow that path, as this scripture suggests].

Either way, I think it is good to consider beforehand what we would need to survive a monster CME. Maybe it is a good idea that we teach ourselves and our children again how to bake bread without electricity. What else do we need to survive? Perhaps we should make an investment in being able to generate some electricity ourselves. Despite the apparent chaos in my picture, it also shows that one can at least become partly independent of city power by installing a few solar panels on your roof, see here:

https://breadonthewater.co.za/2020/09/30/best-solution-for-the-creation-of-reserve-power-during-load-shedding-private-homes/

Wishing you God’s richest blessings,

Henry Pool

https://breadonthewater.co.za/blog/

For those of you who believe that all the ice of earth is melting, I have some good news. You will recall that in one of my previous posts I showed you this graph:

This article also appeared in Dutch, see here:

Alarm! Zuidpool koelt af! IJs groeit aan!

I was surprised to find that it IS getting cooler in Antarctica, measured two meters above the ground (1979-2021). The source of these data is from here. This being the case, I decided to look at the current surface area of the Antarctic that is covered by ice.

Fig. 1: Antarctic ice area. Source of cropped chart parts:  NSIDC.

Though Antarctic sea ice fell to a “record minimum” in 2017 – after having reached a “record high” in 2015 – the latest data from the National Snow and Ice Data Center show sea ice at the South Pole has bounced back robustly since, surging some 500,000 sq km above the mean (1981-2010). On March 26, 2017, Antarctic sea ice measured 3.055 million sq km. Four years later, sea ice reached 5.103 million sq km. That is a difference of more than 2 million sq. km., which is an area more than 1.5 x the size of South Africa!

So why would Antarctic ice grow so quickly? If the ice had disappeared, many would blame it on greenhouse gases – absurd of course. Obviously, there is a complex array of natural factors at work – factors that climate alarmists consistently have ignored over the past decades. Note this graphic here:

Fig. 2: Warming of earth versus latitude.

Shown in the picture above is a summary of the warming of all the earth from NASA-GISS made from all the data we have from 1960-2019. It shows that Antarctica is largely blueish/white. This confirms that there are still a few places on earth where it IS getting cooler, and Antarctica is one of them! Fig. 2 (bottom) shows the amount of warming as measured against latitude.

I am a bit skeptical of some of the data shown here for the southern hemisphere (SH). My own results for the SH are even lower than what is indicated here by NASA-GISS. See here some of  my results   (South Africa is mostly on the -30 latitude.)

Never mind all of that, even assuming Fig. 2 (bottom) is completely correct, it still shows exactly what I have been saying all along. Clearly, the pattern of temperature trends for the Southern Hemisphere middle latitudes and the Antarctic is not consistent with hypothesized significant man-made global warming.  Since carbon dioxide concentrations are relatively uniform across the globe on a time scale of years and show persistent upward trends since the 1970’s, these flat and downward temperature trends indicate that man-made global warming is not dominant and that other factors are likely to be more dominant over the last 40 years.  The implication is that the observed upward temperature trends in the Northern Hemisphere are also being dominated by other factors.  These other factors need to be resolved before any kind of accurate future climate predictions can be made. 

In my honest opinion, predictions made assuming that global warming due to carbon dioxide is dominant are likely to fail.