TY - JOUR

T1 - Climatological Statistics of Extreme Geomagnetic Fluctuations with Periods from 1 s to 60 min

AU - Rogers, Neil

AU - Wild, James

AU - Eastoe, Emma

AU - Huebert, Juliane

N1 - This is the peer reviewed version of the following article: N. C. Rogers, J. A. Wild, E. F. Eastoe, J. Hübert (2021), Climatological Statistics of Extreme Geomagnetic Fluctuations With Periods From 1 s to 60 min. Space Weather. doi: 10.1029/2021SW002824 which has been published in final form at https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2021SW002824 This article may be used for non-commercial purposes in accordance With Wiley Terms and Conditions for self-archiving.

PY - 2021/11/11

Y1 - 2021/11/11

N2 - Using a global database of 125 magnetometers covering several decades we present occurrence statistics for fluctuations of the horizontal geomagnetic field (dBh/dt) exceeding the 99.97th percentile (P99.97) for both ramp changes (Rn) and the root-mean-square (Sn) of fluctuations over periods, τ, from 1 to 60 min and describe their variation with geomagnetic latitude and magnetic local time (MLT). Rates of exceedance are explained by reference to the magneto-ionospheric processes dominant in different latitude and MLT sectors, including ULF waves, interplanetary shocks, auroral substorm currents, and travelling convection vortices. By fitting Generalised Pareto tail distributions above P99.97 we predict return levels (RLs) for Rn and Sn over return periods of between 5 and 500 years. P99.97 and RLs increase monotonically with frequency (1/τ) (with a few exceptions at auroral latitudes) and this is well modelled by quadratic functions whose coefficients vary smoothly with latitude. For UK magnetometers providing 1-s cadence measurements, the analysis is extended to cover periods from 1 to60 seconds and empirical Magnetotelluric Transfer functions are used to predict percentiles and return levels of the geoelectric field over a wide frequency range (2 × 10−4 to 4 × 10−2 Hz) assuming a sinusoidal field fluctuation. These results help identify the principal causes of field fluctuations leading to extremegeomagnetically induced currents (GIC) in ground infrastructure over a range of timescales and they inform the choice of frequency dependence to use with dBh/dt as a GIC proxy.

AB - Using a global database of 125 magnetometers covering several decades we present occurrence statistics for fluctuations of the horizontal geomagnetic field (dBh/dt) exceeding the 99.97th percentile (P99.97) for both ramp changes (Rn) and the root-mean-square (Sn) of fluctuations over periods, τ, from 1 to 60 min and describe their variation with geomagnetic latitude and magnetic local time (MLT). Rates of exceedance are explained by reference to the magneto-ionospheric processes dominant in different latitude and MLT sectors, including ULF waves, interplanetary shocks, auroral substorm currents, and travelling convection vortices. By fitting Generalised Pareto tail distributions above P99.97 we predict return levels (RLs) for Rn and Sn over return periods of between 5 and 500 years. P99.97 and RLs increase monotonically with frequency (1/τ) (with a few exceptions at auroral latitudes) and this is well modelled by quadratic functions whose coefficients vary smoothly with latitude. For UK magnetometers providing 1-s cadence measurements, the analysis is extended to cover periods from 1 to60 seconds and empirical Magnetotelluric Transfer functions are used to predict percentiles and return levels of the geoelectric field over a wide frequency range (2 × 10−4 to 4 × 10−2 Hz) assuming a sinusoidal field fluctuation. These results help identify the principal causes of field fluctuations leading to extremegeomagnetically induced currents (GIC) in ground infrastructure over a range of timescales and they inform the choice of frequency dependence to use with dBh/dt as a GIC proxy.

KW - geomagnetic fluctuations

KW - Geomagnetically induced currents (GIC)

KW - Extreme value theory

KW - Space weather

U2 - 10.1029/2021SW002824

DO - 10.1029/2021SW002824

M3 - Journal article

VL - 19

JO - Space Weather

JF - Space Weather

SN - 1542-7390

IS - 11

M1 - e2021SW002824

ER -