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The cost is not the issue most people have a problem with; it's the general idea of geoengineering without (much) regard for unknown side effects. Also, geoengi

The cost is not the issue most people have a problem with; it's the general idea of geoengineering without (much) regard for unknown side effects. Also, geoengineering without fixing the root cause is backwards and risky. Reducing emissions is the best thing we can do and this process is actively sabotaged by the right-wing politicians and media. If reducing emissions is such a hard sell, geoengineering will be even more difficult to do. Increase taxes on the wealthy, use the money to improve inequality and pass legislation that heavily taxes or bans pollutants at the corporate level. Guarantee long jail time for leaders caught cheating the system. None of the climate change problems that exist are technologically hard to solve. We have solved much harder IMO. The problems are all political and denial-based. Removing the denial would go much further than any particular technological solution will.

klipt 5y ago
> Reducing emissions is the best thing we can do Too little too late. The system is already moving out of its old equilibrium. Simply stopping emissions won't fix it now.
- dylan604 5y ago
  No, but if you never stop emitting, you'll never have a chance.
  - jacquesm 5y ago
    You'll need to do better than just stopping emitting, you will have to undo some of the damage to have a chance to get back to equilibrium, all else is just a - relatively short - stay of execution. The last 200 years has seen humanity reverse a climate trend that held for many millions of years and yet there are still people that believe - strongly - that this is all just coincidence.
    - dylan604 5y ago
      I'm re-reading my comment, and trying to see how could you construe I'm advocating for only stopping. To make it clear, I'm simply stating that if you only work on something to "reverse" or "clean" you will not be successful UNTIL WE STOP EMITTING. (emphasis, not yelling). So until we stop emitting, it's spinning wheels with no forward progress.
      - jacquesm 5y ago
        You may actually have to emit more for a short time in order to be able to emit less in times further out, a bit like a mortgage downpayment, it hurts, but not as much as paying the interest further on. Solutions will come with a price tag, either in terms of funds, or quite possibly in terms of short term CO2 emissions on a scale even larger than the one that we have currently. But they had better be off-set by much larger savings further down the line. So 'stopping emitting' may not be a valid option, except for some things that are luxuries. Meanwhile, people will have to eat, there will have to be some level of transportation, there will be all manner of consumption all of which will continue emissions. To offset that and fix the damage is going to be the literal challenge of our lives. I hope you like seaweed, and I'm not sure how we'd go about farming that in sufficient quantity and with low enough emissions that we won't end up with massive famine and wars in the next 80 years or so. Bluntly put: there are too many of us to sustainably live on this planet at our current level of technology, and at the same time there may be too few of us to mitigate the damage already done. Stopping emitting = mass die offs, wars, famine and so on. Unless you're resigned to that I would research for a while to see if there are better options that will avoid those, because even though they are probably quite effective they lack in humanity and empathy. I'm not overly optimistic that such solutions are still on the table, but it can't hurt to look, though I'm skeptical about us being able to muster the necessary levels of cooperation, to start thinking as a species instead of a bunch of unrelated fiefdoms that can act independently of each other when it comes to major items of policy that affect everybody everywhere.
  - klipt 5y ago
    I'm saying at this point we probably need both. Solar radiation management and reduced emission (and hopefully negative emission AKA carbon capture in the future, but the tech isn't there yet).
alexose 5y ago
Even if we stopped emitting all CO2 tomorrow, we're still likely to see another half degree of warming. Maybe more. I can't imagine what that would do my home in the western US. Or Greece, or Turkey, or any of the places around the world already experiencing catastrophic flooding. There's no scenario where we reach net zero emissions in a decade. I'm not saying we should start geoengineering without further study. Only that at the present moment, from my perspective, it seems like the bigger risk is not to geoengineer.

klipt 5y ago

> Reducing emissions is the best thing we can do Too little too late. The system is already moving out of its old equilibrium. Simply stopping emissions won't fix it now.

dylan604 5y ago
No, but if you never stop emitting, you'll never have a chance.
- jacquesm 5y ago
  You'll need to do better than just stopping emitting, you will have to undo some of the damage to have a chance to get back to equilibrium, all else is just a - relatively short - stay of execution. The last 200 years has seen humanity reverse a climate trend that held for many millions of years and yet there are still people that believe - strongly - that this is all just coincidence.
  - dylan604 5y ago
    I'm re-reading my comment, and trying to see how could you construe I'm advocating for only stopping. To make it clear, I'm simply stating that if you only work on something to "reverse" or "clean" you will not be successful UNTIL WE STOP EMITTING. (emphasis, not yelling). So until we stop emitting, it's spinning wheels with no forward progress.
    - jacquesm 5y ago
      You may actually have to emit more for a short time in order to be able to emit less in times further out, a bit like a mortgage downpayment, it hurts, but not as much as paying the interest further on. Solutions will come with a price tag, either in terms of funds, or quite possibly in terms of short term CO2 emissions on a scale even larger than the one that we have currently. But they had better be off-set by much larger savings further down the line. So 'stopping emitting' may not be a valid option, except for some things that are luxuries. Meanwhile, people will have to eat, there will have to be some level of transportation, there will be all manner of consumption all of which will continue emissions. To offset that and fix the damage is going to be the literal challenge of our lives. I hope you like seaweed, and I'm not sure how we'd go about farming that in sufficient quantity and with low enough emissions that we won't end up with massive famine and wars in the next 80 years or so. Bluntly put: there are too many of us to sustainably live on this planet at our current level of technology, and at the same time there may be too few of us to mitigate the damage already done. Stopping emitting = mass die offs, wars, famine and so on. Unless you're resigned to that I would research for a while to see if there are better options that will avoid those, because even though they are probably quite effective they lack in humanity and empathy. I'm not overly optimistic that such solutions are still on the table, but it can't hurt to look, though I'm skeptical about us being able to muster the necessary levels of cooperation, to start thinking as a species instead of a bunch of unrelated fiefdoms that can act independently of each other when it comes to major items of policy that affect everybody everywhere.
- klipt 5y ago
  I'm saying at this point we probably need both. Solar radiation management and reduced emission (and hopefully negative emission AKA carbon capture in the future, but the tech isn't there yet).

alexose 5y ago

Even if we stopped emitting all CO2 tomorrow, we're still likely to see another half degree of warming. Maybe more. I can't imagine what that would do my home in the western US. Or Greece, or Turkey, or any of the places around the world already experiencing catastrophic flooding. There's no scenario where we reach net zero emissions in a decade. I'm not saying we should start geoengineering without further study. Only that at the present moment, from my perspective, it seems like the bigger risk is not to geoengineer.