March 23, 2022: Solar Cycle 25 is intensifying–and Earth’s upper atmosphere is responding.
“The Thermosphere Climate Index (TCI) is going up rapidly right now,” reports Linda Hunt of Science Systems and Applications, Inc. “It has nearly tripled in the past year.”
TCI is a number published daily by NASA, which tells us how hot Earth’s upper atmosphere is. The thermosphere, the very highest layer of gas, literally touches space and is a sort of “first responder” to solar activity. Hunt created this plot showing how TCI has unfolded during the last 7 solar cycles. Solar Cycle 25 (shown in blue) is just getting started:
“So far Solar Cycle 25 is well ahead of the pace of Solar Cycle 24,” notes Hunt. If this trend continues, the thermosphere could soon hit a 20-year high in temperature.
Before we go any farther, a word of caution: This does not mean Earth is…
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Utopia, you are standing in it! 
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