The dilemma of geo-engineering

[pscot]

This is a long article published september 12 at Climate Central, that summarizes where we we are in regard to geo-engineering, and how we might move forward. Bill Gates is deep into this stuff, and has been for several years.

In May, a team of British scientists abruptly canceled an experiment they had been planning for nearly two years. The Stratospheric Particle Experiment for Climate Engineering, or SPICE, was intended to test ways of injecting tiny particles of sulfur dioxide into the upper atmosphere, with the eventual goal of filtering out sunlight to cool the Earth in the face of global warming. The main reason given for the cancellation was a potential patent dispute over some of the technology involved.

But a second reason, according to the project’s lead investigator, Matthew Watson, of the University of Bristol, was the fact that there’s no international agreement on whether, and under what circumstances, such experiments should happen. That being the case, he told Nature, it would be “somewhat premature” to go forward.


In fact, the entire field of geoengineering — a set of technologies that is aimed to try and combat rising temperatures by artificially cooling the planet, among other things — is highly controversial. That applies especially strongly to so-called solar radiation management, or SRM, the sun-shielding technique most scientists, including the SPICE team, have been talking about. (It’s also known as the Pinatubo Option: when Mt. Pinatubo erupted in 1991, it spewed particles of natural sulfur dioxide that lowered global temperatures slightly for months.)

One argument against geoengineering is that it does nothing to address the greenhouse-gas emissions that cause warming in the first place, and that the existence of such a backup plan would suck the energy out of efforts to control those emissions. Another is the law of unintended consequences, which dictates that the best-intentioned ideas can sometimes backfire.

The potential issues are so great, in fact, that scientists met in 2010 to discuss voluntary guidelines for geoengineering experiments, while policymakers have called on the U.N. to issue regulations.

http://www.climatecentral.org/news/geoengineering-faces-dilemma-on-whether-to-experiment-or-not-14977

[phantom power]

1. I think the risk-matrix ought to include the fact that we're already geo-engineering...

in fact we've been doing it at least since industrial revolution kicked human impacts into high gear.

Our 200-year project of burning fossil fuels and injecting the CO2 into the atmosphere is arguably the greatest uncontrolled geo-engineering project since blue-green algae came up with that clever trick of harvesting energy from photons and injecting the oxygen exhaust into the atmosphere.

But there's also the more diffuse impacts of our resource extractions, manufacturing, energy production, agriculture, wars, the sheer biomass of 7 billion people...

Everything we do every day is all adding up to geo-engineering. So "not geo-engineering" is not actually a choice we're making.

[Speck Tater]

2. The danger I don't see mentioned is...

...what doctors call masking the symptoms.

Suppose we inject something into the upper atmosphere that lowers temperatures globally by a little bit, and meanwhile the underlying causes of global warming continue unabated. In other words, we allow global warming to go right on getting worse and worse while we mask the symptoms of it so that if and when the program is discontinued suddenly we are faced with "paying back" all that warming we were "hiding", all at once. Like when the jets were grounded after 9/11 and global temperatures rose significantly (2 degrees F per day!) because there was less jet exhaust in the air shading the planet.

The only thing such massive projects would accomplish is give people a false sense of security and further cause to ignore the problem for even longer, making it far worse in the long run.

[pscot]

3. Mitigatiom that lets us keep right on doing what we're doing

Seems almost inevitable, doesn't it.

[Nihil]

4. The big money is in "Business As Usual".

Why else do projects that encourage boundless growth on a finite planet
get so much backing whereas anything that suggests/implies/requests a
modicum of self-control is blocked?

[Kolesar]

5. It has only been a few years since we realized we need a "zero carbon" energy plan

Heretofore, we thought we could ameliorate global warming by reducing carbon emissions to 70% below 1997 levels, or whatever that Kyoto standard was.

Zero carbon means a huge change to our energy infrastructure. YOu cannot expect that to change instantly, so a geoengineering gimmick may be our only hope.

I doubt if you can cite how we are going to replace petro for our transportation needs to accomplish zero carbon.

[Speck Tater]

6. You're right. I don't have a clue. nt