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I'm in favor of doing geoengineering research. We already are geoengineering, we've got 1.2C to show for it. We're just doing it very badly and with little unde

I'm in favor of doing geoengineering research. We already are geoengineering, we've got 1.2C to show for it. We're just doing it very badly and with little understanding of what we're doing. The climate crisis is real and severe and it may be necessary to do something as terrible as spraying sulfur dioxide in the stratosphere for awhile. The interesting thing about aerosols is they aren't particularly expensive. Estimates are $2B-$8B a year. Not pocket change, but not a major expense for a wealthy country. Also there's no technical need for global consensus. It seems quite possible to me that a country, say China, will decide to just go do it. That's terrible politically, and could be dangerous. But it may happen. Here's a good book on the state of geoengineering, at least as of 2015: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/26189312-the-planet-remade https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/26189312-the-planet-rema...

beckman466 5y ago
> Also there's no technical need for global consensus. It seems quite possible to me that a country, say China, will decide to just go do it. That's terrible politically, and could be dangerous. But it may happen. it's not Chinese billionaires who are pushing their scary technofixes on talk shows. https://africasacountry.com/2021/03/bill-gates-and-his-technofix-dream-for-the-planet https://africasacountry.com/2021/03/bill-gates-and-his-techn...
- thatguy0900 5y ago
  Well a Chinese billionaire who did would be disappeared
willis936 5y ago
I've been beating this exact drum this past year. I recently had a discussion with a friend who is doing a dissertation on atmospheric chemistry soon. They agreed that solar geoengineering is an important thing to consider but informed me that injecting aerosols is a black sheep topic. It's highly controversial due to military cloud seeding operations, is banned internarionally, and mentioning it to the scientific field will get you shut down (it isn't funded). This isn't a surprising reality, but the game theory is that isn't just our decision. There are players that won't ask for consent when faced with an existential threat. We should be sitting up in our seats and making sure that if it's to be done then we have a bulletproof blueprint of doing it right.
- beckman466 5y ago
  "According to Keith and co-authors, “counter-geoengineering” could be effected through “counterveiling with a warming agent, i.e. injecting even more GHG into the atmosphere, and neutralising impacts with a physical disruption.”13 Counter-geoengineering represents the final step towards climate militarization and borrows directly from Cold War deterrence thinking. The authors are unfazed by this explicitly militaristic dimension: “Military action to stop SRM deployment by a powerful state would likely only be launched by another powerful state or states, potentially triggering a systemic war.”14 It is no coincidence that in the United States, geoengineering is supported by individuals and think tanks with ties to the military.15 At the end of 2017, a bill was introduced into Congress, which, if approved, would develop a strategic research agenda for Solar Radiation Management.16 The upshot of the US officially pursuing a geoengineering research agenda while simultaneously withdrawing from the Paris Agreement might be a strategic intensification of existing geoengineering research elsewhere, such as the government-led research programs in China and Russia.17 It is not only the deployment of geoengineering that has high-stakes geopolitical and security implications, but also the current pursuit of strategic technology development." https://magazine.scienceforthepeople.org/geoengineering/geoengineering-environmental-capitalism/ https://magazine.scienceforthepeople.org/geoengineering/geoe...
  - tgsovlerkhgsel 5y ago
    The easiest way to do "counter-geoengineering" would be simply lifting emissions limits, carbon taxes, etc., at least until the point where the economy is thoroughly decarbonized and we don't need to create pressure to emit less GHG, because right now emitting is cheaper than not emitting. I think right now, any country willing to invest resources to fix our shared mess would at worst be met with some grumbling about unknown risks, but otherwise mostly with a "sure, knock yourself out", and possibly a silently muttered "thanks". Counter-geoengineering is an interesting concept and long-term problem, but I don't think there are many powerful countries that don't want the planet to cool.

beckman466 5y ago

> Also there's no technical need for global consensus. It seems quite possible to me that a country, say China, will decide to just go do it. That's terrible politically, and could be dangerous. But it may happen. it's not Chinese billionaires who are pushing their scary technofixes on talk shows. https://africasacountry.com/2021/03/bill-gates-and-his-technofix-dream-for-the-planet https://africasacountry.com/2021/03/bill-gates-and-his-techn...

thatguy0900 5y ago
Well a Chinese billionaire who did would be disappeared

willis936 5y ago

I've been beating this exact drum this past year. I recently had a discussion with a friend who is doing a dissertation on atmospheric chemistry soon. They agreed that solar geoengineering is an important thing to consider but informed me that injecting aerosols is a black sheep topic. It's highly controversial due to military cloud seeding operations, is banned internarionally, and mentioning it to the scientific field will get you shut down (it isn't funded). This isn't a surprising reality, but the game theory is that isn't just our decision. There are players that won't ask for consent when faced with an existential threat. We should be sitting up in our seats and making sure that if it's to be done then we have a bulletproof blueprint of doing it right.

beckman466 5y ago
"According to Keith and co-authors, “counter-geoengineering” could be effected through “counterveiling with a warming agent, i.e. injecting even more GHG into the atmosphere, and neutralising impacts with a physical disruption.”13 Counter-geoengineering represents the final step towards climate militarization and borrows directly from Cold War deterrence thinking. The authors are unfazed by this explicitly militaristic dimension: “Military action to stop SRM deployment by a powerful state would likely only be launched by another powerful state or states, potentially triggering a systemic war.”14 It is no coincidence that in the United States, geoengineering is supported by individuals and think tanks with ties to the military.15 At the end of 2017, a bill was introduced into Congress, which, if approved, would develop a strategic research agenda for Solar Radiation Management.16 The upshot of the US officially pursuing a geoengineering research agenda while simultaneously withdrawing from the Paris Agreement might be a strategic intensification of existing geoengineering research elsewhere, such as the government-led research programs in China and Russia.17 It is not only the deployment of geoengineering that has high-stakes geopolitical and security implications, but also the current pursuit of strategic technology development." https://magazine.scienceforthepeople.org/geoengineering/geoengineering-environmental-capitalism/ https://magazine.scienceforthepeople.org/geoengineering/geoe...
- tgsovlerkhgsel 5y ago
  The easiest way to do "counter-geoengineering" would be simply lifting emissions limits, carbon taxes, etc., at least until the point where the economy is thoroughly decarbonized and we don't need to create pressure to emit less GHG, because right now emitting is cheaper than not emitting. I think right now, any country willing to invest resources to fix our shared mess would at worst be met with some grumbling about unknown risks, but otherwise mostly with a "sure, knock yourself out", and possibly a silently muttered "thanks". Counter-geoengineering is an interesting concept and long-term problem, but I don't think there are many powerful countries that don't want the planet to cool.