Geoengineering: The Key Issues

Earlier today, I caught a radio show on geoengineering, at the conclusion of which the host solicited listeners’ thoughts of the subject.  Here are a few of mine:

There are six completely different approaches to geoengineering, each of which has at least some scientific legitimacy, but which one is best?  In particular, which has the greatest safety associated with it, i.e., fewer and least potential damaging unintended consequences? A client asked me to edit this paper on Sea Cooling and Tropical Cloud Generation, and I personally favor it over the others, for what that’s worth.

As a practical matter, it’s unclear how a such a broad solution could happen in a world with more than 200 sovereign nations each demanding representation.  Keep in mind that after initial implementation, periodic decisions must be made.  Who would control the world’s thermostat?

At what point should we pull the trigger?  That is, how far above pre-industrial times should we let the temperatures of our oceans and atmosphere to rise before taking such drastic action?

Being realistic, the decarbonization of our energy and transportation sectors is relatively easy, if we commit ourselves to nuclear and renewable energy, and more responsible uses of land.  But since we are making such pathetic level of progress in this much simpler endeavor, it seems an impossible task to get even a serious discussion of geoengineering on the table.

We’re a civilization that loved to disagree, often with great violence.  Nations around the globe go to war at the drop of a hat, sending millions of young people to die each year for purposes that are usually judged to be meaningless soon after the conflicts end.  If we can’t agree that vaccinations prevent disease, can we agree to shoot gigatons of some chemical into our atmosphere?

The vast majority of the wealthiest people on this planet have essentially zero interest in this subject, since they know that there are no scenarios in which they will be affected personally.  Yes, more lives will be lost each year to the depletion of resources, floods, wildfires, and the loss of landmass due to sea-level rise, but rich people aren’t directly threatened by any of these events, and their pathological love of money is their only guiding voice.

The religious right believes that only God can destroy the Earth, as is explicit in the book of Genesis, and they’re going to have a collective seizure if our civilization gets anywhere close to implementing a science-based planetary solution to climate change.