Are there more solar flares than expected during this solar cycle?

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Are there more solar flares than expected during this solar cycle?
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Dr. Ryan French is a solar physicist, science communicator and author. He is pursuing the mysteries of the sun at the forefront of modern solar physics research, using cutting-edge telescopes on the ground and in space.

Comparing the number of solar flares against past solar cycles is more complicated than you might think.Due to a change in flare calibration levels from 2020, you'll find two answers to this question online — but only one is correct.The sun follows an 11-year solar cycle of increasing and decreasing activity.

However, and here comes the twist: following the switch to GOES-16 data on a new detector, it was discovered that the original calibration had been correct all along, and the 2010-2020 calibration was the incorrect one. This meant that in 2020,data were again recalibrated to their previous correct levels, lowering back the threshold of different flare classes). With a lower flare threshold, it meant strong C-class flares became M-class events, and strong M-class flares became X-class flares.

This first plot shows this comparison from historic flare operation data, i.e. not taking the 2020 recalibration into account. This graph shows a massive difference in flare levels from cycles 24 to 25. According to this plot, the total number of M and X-class flares in Cycle 25 hasthe total flare numbers from Cycle 24, in less than half the time. This is a punchy headline and was posted by several prominent social media accounts. But as punchy as that statistic sounds, it is incorrect.

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