Here we go again, more geo-engineering. From Physicsworld:
Artist’s impression of a Flettner spray vessel. The wind would be blowing from the right-hand side of the image, the rotor spin would be clockwise as seen from above, and the rotors would push the vessel to the left. (Courtesy: J. MacNeill).
Cloud-seeding ships could combat climate change
It should be possible to fight the global warming effects associated with an increase of dioxide levels by using autonomous cloud-seeding ships to spray salt water into the air.
{The proposal] involves increasing the reflectivity, or “albedo”, of clouds lying about 1 km above the ocean’s surface. The idea relies on the “Twomey effect”, which says that increasing the concentration of water droplets within a cloud raises the overall surface area of the droplets and thereby enhances the cloud’s albedo. By spraying fine droplets of sea water into the air, the small particles of salt within each droplet act as new condensation nuclei when they reach the clouds above, leading to a greater concentration of water droplets within each cloud.
This project would require the deployment of a worldwide fleet of 1,500 free drifting ships.
According to the article, these ships ‘would be powered by the wind, but would not use conventional sails. Instead they would be fitted with a number of 20 meter high, 2.5 meter diameter cylinders known as Flettner rotors.
The researchers estimate that such ships would cost between £1m and £2m each. This translates to a US dollars cost of $2.65 to 5.3 billion for the ships only.
Here is what the original rotor ship looked like:
The Buckau, then renamed Baden-Baden crossed the Atlantic in 1926.
So the question is: who’s gonna fund this? And, how do we know the cure isn’t worse than the “disease”? Such hubris.
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One more thing:
If this actually worked it would lessen the sunlight reaching the oceans. Wouldn’t that be bad for photosynthesis and therefore carbon absorption?
[…] daffy “ Posted on September 8, 2008 by Iain Hall Ok this is lifted straight from Anthony Watts blog but I have no trouble agreeing with his notion that this scheme is just bonkers. This idea is […]
I love this plan, what could possibly go wrong with seeding moisure into the atmosphere at lets say the Equatorial Atlantic Ocean Region in September?
The Earth First folks. This is a group I could get excited about hanging with.
They party-down when it comes to Mother Earth! I’m ready to recycle my car.
[Reply by John Goetz – Nice catch]
What an stupid, wasteful, and completely useless idea. We’ve warmed some the past century, which is a very good thing. Now, we’re cooling, and these morons want to try to cool the planet even faster, at who knows what financial and environmental cost? Idiots.
Scott (13:25:32) :
Amen, the correct technology is nuclear. Too bad “China Syndrome” scared everyone. Joel, how many mainstream environmental groups want to do the right thing and go nuclear?
AAAAARRRRRGGGGGHHHHHH!!!
Crying for the pureed phytoplankton,
Mike
I apologise, Anthony, because this is completely off topic but I thought some of your readers who don’t regularly look at the UK Sunday Times might like to see this.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article4690900.ece
Not only is Oreskes still spouting nonsense but she seems to have joined the conspiracy theory kooks!
I wonder which sci-fi movie this idea came from – most of the crazy ideas come from past sci-fi movies 😉
Joel Shore (13:05:16)
It is the nations that develop the new energy sources and energy efficiency technologies that are going to prosper and those that stick their heads in the sand that are going to end up as yesterday’s technological powers.
new energy sources and energy efficiency? That leaves out solar and wind power. Neither one is new or efficient.
I think I saw this in the movie Idiocracy. Really lame, if that ship is what they intend to build then it will simply fall over and sink since it is so top heavy.
Joel Shore: Do you care to provide cites to any mainstream environmental organizations which are blasting all technology and calling for a return to the Dark Ages?
Here ya go…..in the words of Mr Paul “mankind is a virus” Watson himself.
While, admittedly, Mr Watson doesn’t call for a “return to the dark ages” in those exact words…..I’d be hard pressed to find a better description of his plan to reduce the population to less than 1 billion, live in communities of smaller than 20,000, power by wind, solar only, no air travel except by blimp when necessary, sea travel by sail only, and even road travel only for certain individuals and circumstances, switch to an entirely no meat diet, allow wildlife (predators included) free wandering rights through our towns, hand fishing only……and only allowing breeding by “qualified” individuals.
Watson was one of the original founders of Greenpeace, leaving to form the Sea Shepherds because they weren’t militant enough, was affiliated with Earth First, and from 2003-2006 was on the board of directors of the Sierra Club.
You can believe that the Sierra Club would vote him onto the board without agreeing with him if you like or that Greenpeace doesn’t share the beliefs of one of it’s founders (the “lack” of militancy notwithstanding), but I’d sure as hell be suspicious of it.
BTW, the addition of the “mainstream environmental” portion was a lovely misdirection, as the vast majority of environmental groups are too small to be considered “mainstream” by any stretch of the imagination, but they’re still awfully vocal about AGW and “returning to nature”.
What a crazy, nuts idea.
Anyway, I just wrote this about how Mann et (all of paleoclimatology) are manipulating the data on global warming.
http://noconsensus.wordpress.com/2008/09/07/global-warming-cookin-the-books/
Mike Walsh,
That was an enlightening comment. Somehow I believe the Dark Ages would be preferable to the visions you described.
Recently California tried to run the power lines to connect a new solar power facility. Any guesses what happened? Seems some groups believe those power lines will be a blight on the state. I’ll say it again, if it makes sense, it’s a no go for the earth firsters.
This is just soooo unecessary. The sea surface warms if the planet warms and more evaporation produces more clouds; all quite naturally without mankind having to lift a finger. Of course, there would be no government grant money to study the “problem”.
I just watched an episode of Discovery: Project Earth about doing this… A group of scientists built a prototype that didn’t quite do all that they hoped it would. Instead, they used about 300 salt flares (I think that’s what they were called) to create a new cloud 1 mile x 5 miles long.
This is the website — you can even watch the episodes on line for another month (if you are so inclined) http://dsc.discovery.com/tv/project-earth/project-earth.html
Keep up the great work Anthony!!
It is the nations that develop the new energy sources and energy efficiency technologies that are going to prosper and those that stick their heads in the sand that are going to end up as yesterday’s technological powers.
That is quite a non sequitur there, Joel. Just because people want to drill for oil domestically, and reduce our dependence on foreign oil doesn’t mean for one minute they are against developing new energy technologies or become more energy efficient. The fact is, we do need oil, though. It seems the ones with their heads in the sand (or somewhere else) are AGWers.
One of the authors is named Salter?
It is the nations that develop the new energy sources and energy efficiency technologies that are going to prosper and those that stick their heads in the sand that are going to end up as yesterday’s technological powers.
Let me fix that for you
It is the nations that operate intelligently and efficiently that are going to prosper and those that follow fool hardy and wasteful notions that are going to end up with wrecked economies.
A requirement that the new technologies be efficient should be a great guide. An old and efficient technology is better that an new and inefficient technology. The idea that we can excuse inefficiency by magically invoking the horrors of CO2 will lead to foolish choices unless we are certain CO2 is causing our problems.
“…1,500 free drifting ships.”
FREE DRIFTING?
I realize the oceans cover a lot of territory, and these things wouldn’t be in the sea lanes (right? right?), but…
Who is going to crew one of these? Robots?
I can’t imagine those funnels give much of a radar return — especially if they’re made of fiberglass.
What a disaster.
Here we go again – such presumptive arrogance. And what I take to be another sign that AGW is at the end of its rope.
At the end of the last generation’s panic attack of a new Ice Age came discussions of sootifying the Arctic. So too will this generation’s harebrained schemes be seen in the future as the signal of the end of this particular cycle of lunacy.
And in 2030 will all the rage be about how to stop the new Ice Age?
Those that advocate “fixing” the climate don’t give a flying rat’s hindquarters about the climate. They want money, power, and fame. And all received at the point of a gun.
Mike Bryant,
Heh. I don’t know if ya checked the link in my comment, but my description doesn’t cover it by half. Unfortunately, it looks like I didn’t make the link obvious enough so here it is again for any who want to read Watson’s little diatribe from a year or so ago.
http://www.seashepherd.org/editorials/editorial_070504_1.html
On topic (yeah, a surprise from me)…..while I’m not normally fond of the large-scale engineering type solutions, this one, at least, can be switched off relatively easily. That makes it not nearly as offensive in my books as, say, large scale algae seeding.
Especially if we’re going to make changes that are irreversible, we better be darn sure we have a problem to correct first.
Retired Engineer,
That was my initial thought as well. Exactly how much power are these turbines going to need to generate to make the water vapor rather than water droplets. If they just make water droplets how much energy is going to be needed to get them to the cloud layer?
My other ‘concern’ with this idea is that water vapor is NOT a cloud condensation nuclei, pumping more of it into the 100 meters above the ocean is not going to make more clouds or increase cloud albedo, there’s already plenty of water vapor there, just not enough condensation nuclei, which this, er, idea, will not address.
When automobiles became the preferred form of transportation, most people kept the horse, the wagon and the buggy whip. They even kept them as backup transportation. Fossil fuels are not buggy whips, and will not be for decades.
Here’s another thought.
What a pretty picture of such a calm ocean – so idyllic.
What happens when one of these “solutions” get caught up in a hurricane? Can anyone say class-action lawsuit?