If you haven’t heard about it yet, you’re about to. The media is currently pouncing on a news story out of the National Astronomy Meeting in England this week that claims scientists are predicting a mini Ice Age by the year 2030.
Before you get swept into the media hype and start forming opinions however, here’s a few things you should know:
- This prediction was presented at a conference, and is not published by a peer-reviewed journal
- The Ice Age prediction is itself, based upon a predicted 60% decrease in “solar activity”, characterized by a significant decrease in the number of sunspots that occur on the sun’s surface.
- While the data has yet to be published, project lead Professor Valentine Zharkova asserts the model’s accuracy is around 97%.
- Scientists do not know how much global warming can or will offset this predicted mini Ice Age
Don’t just read the news, understand the news!