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Although the article says that particular strike didn't cause a temperature plunge, is it implying that an impact _can_ cause a temperature plunge? Ridiculous

Although the article says that particular strike didn't cause a temperature plunge, is it implying that an impact _can_ cause a temperature plunge? Ridiculous thought that just came to my head, can our current climate problems be mitigated somehow with a well... precisioned... humanity-created impact or explosion? I wonder if some kooky people have considered this as a solution.

pmichaud 5y ago
Yes definitely! A large impact can kick enough debris into the atmosphere to cool the earth. And people have floated the possibility of injecting basically a bunch of “debris” to combat global warming. The problem is that the system is chaotic and injecting and then maintaining the exactly correct level of debris that cools us off a bit without triggering a global crop failure or runaway ice age is effectively impossible, not to mention the air quality issues intrinsic to basically all versions of this scenario.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- saiya-jin 5y ago
  Me naively thinks its better to ie put some nano foil which takes ie 5% of the light passing through on some stable orbit between earth and sun and have sun blocked without any further particulate pollution, which would end up falling on us while we breath it. It has benefit that its position may degrade on its own over time, or be just moved when convenient. Still a gargantuan engineering project, possibly out of reach for current technology to do reliably.
  - fifi_conner 5y ago
    It's completely doable, it just takes some multi-government commitment. A fleet of solar sails would be the cheapest and fastest, for example, it can accomplish this with great redundancy, whilst being steerable and powered using the very sun they'll block. The size of the sails would have to be huge, so a very interesting engineering problem to be solved.
wlesieutre 5y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_geoengineering https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_geoengineering
pharke 5y ago
Changing the Earth's albedo at the surface would be more controllable than pumping a bunch of particulate matter into the atmosphere. Probably a lot more expensive as well but the tradeoff is worth it since it would allow you to quickly undo it or modify it if things go badly.
- fennecfoxen 5y ago
  High-albedo urban areas also generally need less power for cooling during warm weather.
alophawen 5y ago
It's explained in great detail in this infomercial https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0SYpUSjSgFg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0SYpUSjSgFg
ectopod 5y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_winter https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_winter
sdeframond 5y ago
The problem is not so much climate warming but climate change: the increase in temperature is not even and the consequences are much more dramatic than a mere +2C. Dry places become drier, wet places become wetter, windy places become winder and so on. I would bet a big asteroid-like explosion would not be finely controlled and would cause unexpected changes too...
willcipriano 5y ago
That reminds me of a meme I can't find. Scientists: We can block out the sun to prevent climate change! Me: Is it going to rain tomorrow? Scientists: The climate is a complicated system we can't just... Me: Leave the fucking sun alone

pmichaud 5y ago

Yes definitely! A large impact can kick enough debris into the atmosphere to cool the earth. And people have floated the possibility of injecting basically a bunch of “debris” to combat global warming. The problem is that the system is chaotic and injecting and then maintaining the exactly correct level of debris that cools us off a bit without triggering a global crop failure or runaway ice age is effectively impossible, not to mention the air quality issues intrinsic to basically all versions of this scenario.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
saiya-jin 5y ago
Me naively thinks its better to ie put some nano foil which takes ie 5% of the light passing through on some stable orbit between earth and sun and have sun blocked without any further particulate pollution, which would end up falling on us while we breath it. It has benefit that its position may degrade on its own over time, or be just moved when convenient. Still a gargantuan engineering project, possibly out of reach for current technology to do reliably.
- fifi_conner 5y ago
  It's completely doable, it just takes some multi-government commitment. A fleet of solar sails would be the cheapest and fastest, for example, it can accomplish this with great redundancy, whilst being steerable and powered using the very sun they'll block. The size of the sails would have to be huge, so a very interesting engineering problem to be solved.

wlesieutre 5y ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_geoengineering https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_geoengineering

pharke 5y ago

Changing the Earth's albedo at the surface would be more controllable than pumping a bunch of particulate matter into the atmosphere. Probably a lot more expensive as well but the tradeoff is worth it since it would allow you to quickly undo it or modify it if things go badly.

fennecfoxen 5y ago
High-albedo urban areas also generally need less power for cooling during warm weather.

alophawen 5y ago

It's explained in great detail in this infomercial https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0SYpUSjSgFg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0SYpUSjSgFg

ectopod 5y ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_winter https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_winter

sdeframond 5y ago

The problem is not so much climate warming but climate change: the increase in temperature is not even and the consequences are much more dramatic than a mere +2C. Dry places become drier, wet places become wetter, windy places become winder and so on. I would bet a big asteroid-like explosion would not be finely controlled and would cause unexpected changes too...

willcipriano 5y ago

That reminds me of a meme I can't find. Scientists: We can block out the sun to prevent climate change! Me: Is it going to rain tomorrow? Scientists: The climate is a complicated system we can't just... Me: Leave the fucking sun alone