The main point about the sun quieting down is that it makes inter planetary travel survivable since the largest source of radiation in space close to Earth is the Sun.
This could well be a godsend that lets us start manned missions to the planets without having to wait 50 years for inventing new ways to keep people alive in high radiation environments, e.g. either with increased biological cell repair or physical/magnetic shields. The last time we left Earth's magnetic field we got lucky and missed a flair that could have incapacitated/killed an Apollo mission:
http://science1.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2006/0...
There was a session at the last AGU meeting about the solar cycle which is more informative: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gIhBEF94YlM
The discussion there contradicts the idea that scientists are suddenly 'baffled' by this. Some groups predicted the current low cycle based on the polar magnetic fields, and it seems like they are being proven right. Also it looks like there might be a ~100 year cycle but obviously we have to wait quite a long time to really say anything certain about that. We have measurements for solar cycles this low in the past, so we know it isn't unprecedented. It just hasn't happened in our lifetimes.
This is a very good summary of current research, and it's excellent to see the BBC giving easy direct access to primary sources in scientific reporting. The Guardian is also good at providing links to source material, and this should be the default for inline media. Too many journalists simply summarise press releases from universities and give vague statements like 'in a recent paper, scientists say ...' and so on.
