Welcome to solar summer, the most intense sunshine of the year!
Solar summer features the year’s most intense stretch of sunshine—setting up summer’s heat and even some ugly burns
It’s the beginning of May—and the beginning of solar summer.
We’re quickly climbing into the three-month stretch of the year with the brightest and most intense solar radiation beating down on Earth’s surface.
This time of year is priming the atmosphere for summer’s heat, and it can be downright dangerous without the proper protection.
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We often discuss three different ‘starts’ to the summer season.
Meteorological summer is based on annual temperature cycles and the calendar months, running from June 1 through Aug. 31. Astronomical summer begins around June 20 when the Sun reaches its highest point in the sky and its direct rays shine on the Tropic of Cancer at 23.5°N.
But there’s also solar summer, which features the year’s most intense stretch of solar radiation. We can track the increase in potent sunshine by looking at the monthly UV Index average. Here’s a look at the average UV Index in Toronto, for example:
Longer days filled with brighter sunshine will allow the UV index to increase to very high levels, which will make sunburns a more frequent and painful threat without the proper protection. We can see that the UV Index typically increases to its highest levels in May, June, and July—marking the outline of solar summer.
If the Sun’s most intense radiation shines on Earth between May and July, then why do the year’s highest temperatures fall during meteorological summer instead?
Somewhat like a pot on a stove doesn’t immediately come to a boil when you turn on the heat, there’s a pronounced lag between the increased solar radiation translating to increased temperatures in the atmosphere.
With files from Nadine Powell, a meteorologist at The Weather Network.