Must be IPCC week. When it rains the stupid, it pours. From the Telegraph:
IPCC ‘considering sending mirrors to space to tackle climate change’
Reflective aerosols would be sent into space under a series of radical “geo-engineering” measures being considered by the UN climate science body to tackle climate change, leaked documents disclose.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) papers, leaked ahead of a key meeting in Peru next week, outline the series of techniques in which scientists hope will manipulate the world’s climate to reduce carbon emissions.
Among the ideas proposed by a group of 60 leading scientists from around the world, including Britain, include producing “lighter coloured” crops to reflect sunlight, blasting aerosol “mirrors” into the stratosphere and suppressing cirrus clouds.
Other suggestions include spraying sea water into clouds as another reflection mechanism, depositing massive quantities of iron filings into the oceans, painting streets and roofs white and adding lime to oceans.
Experts suggested that the documents, leaked from inside the IPPC to The Guardian, show how the UN and other developed countries are “despairing” about reaching agreement by consensus at the global climate change talks.
But the newspaper reported that scientists admit that even if the ideas theoretically work, they could cause irreversible consequences.
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Just an FYI, the documents in full are publicly available at SCRIBD here:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/57920959/Joint-IPCC-expert-meeting-on-geoengineering-keynote-abstracts
The key buzzphrase is – “solar radiation management”, but there’s a catch they mention:
That, and the fact that it’s batshit crazy and a powder-keg for priming a global explosion of the law of unintended consequences.
Even Joe Romm doesn’t like the idea because of this catch, and when Romm starts rejecting crazy climate ideas, you know it’s bad. I’ll bet Greenpeace has made a recommendation for it though.
h/t to WUWT reader AndiC
Has anybody mentioned that a quiet Sun equates to a drop in around 0.2 w/m2?
Painting all of Man’s structures and roadways white, I find this idea amusing. Without actually researching I’m going to make a wild guess that Man’s creations cover less than 1/2 of 1 one thousandth of the Earth’s surface. I’m no IPCC climate scientist, but in my experience it’s hard to have much overall affect on something when you’re manipulating such a miniscule portion.
Having said that I understand that this white wash could be an effective tool in affecting local surface temperatures in concentrated urban areas or particular edifices. I’m not buying it as a method of combatting so called “global” warming.
jcrabb says:
June 17, 2011 at 10:08 am
Hmm, No they haven’t! Pray tell from whence that figure (0.2 w/m2) is derived !
If we destroy the Sun that would solve this darn global warming problem. Let’s figure out ways to free the Earth from orbit.
I propose using CERNs LHC to fire a Black Hole gun at the Sun until it is disappeared, then fleeing to another — cooler — solar system.
IPCC? Aerosols. Nuff said.
C.A. – wouldn’t it be easier to simply widen our orbit and move further away from the sun?
Further away = cooler temperatures, AND a longer year! Think of how much more we could get done in a year if we had 15 months instead of 12! Think of how much more tax revenues governments could have if they had five quarters (wait, what…?) for each fiscal year!
Of course, there might be some unforseen and irreversible “consequences” to all this, but we can just cross those bridges when we get there…
I don’t think mirrors etc. do a thing for acidification….just sayin’….
I was more thinking in the lines of VLESC–Very Large Earth to Space Catapult–for free space rides for all green fundamentalists.
Maybe I’m a bit idealistic, but I think geoenginering is something that we can gain from and have to work on. It’ll be a natural step in evolution, by giving us the opportunity of a better control on our environment, if it works, and that could be quite handy. For future generations, maybe terraforming will be the answers to some issues, so we must start somewhere.
That’s the dumbest idea yet. If they put a solar sail in space facing the sun, it will be pushed into the atmosphere. The IPCC probably got this idea from the bright-lights a10:10.
“That, and the fact that it’s batshit crazy and a powder-keg for priming a global explosion of the law of unintended consequences.” <– LOL, so true.
Since Schneider’s death (who controlled what goes or doesn’t go into the IPCC soup) the IPCC has become a free-for-all for every subsidy-greedy lobbyist of the planet. Needless to say, they won’t get what they want; the Western nations and that abysmal replica of the SU, the EU, are as broke as can be, but still, it’s fun to watch the IPCC going the way of all flesh.
Chris says:
June 17, 2011 at 2:19 pm
“Maybe I’m a bit idealistic, but I think geoenginering is something that we can gain from and have to work on. It’ll be a natural step in evolution, by giving us the opportunity of a better control on our environment, if it works, and that could be quite handy. For future generations, maybe terraforming will be the answers to some issues, so we must start somewhere.”
You’re not idealistic; you’re crazy. The planet is fine. Even with 0.04 (instead of 0.027) % of CO2 in the atmosphere. Why shouldn’t it?
Chris:
Geoengineering is great! As long as I am in sole charge of it!
I simply pick a beautiful day… no matter where I am… and geoengineer the rest of the planet to maintain MY ideal conditions, forever. Fantastic! What could possibly be wrong with THAT!
Where and when do we define an ideal climate to engineer global climate to???
Would that be ideal for Canada??? For Chile?? For Greenland? GK
1. Buildings are but a tiny fraction of the surface of the earth. Look at satellite imagery and notice just how much one must zoom in before even seeing structures.
All geo-engineering ‘solutions’ have scale problems.
2. Most shingles already contain reflective materials. How much difference will the metal make? Besides there is probably not a need to be any more reflective than natural greenery.
The potential is a reduction of 0.01-0.19 W/m2. See link below.
3. Sun-baked metal gets seriously hot and conducts that heat, requiring more insulation.
I’m afraid you are wrong. A low albedo material like tile gets hotter and radiates more heat down into the roof space of a home.
4. The blinding light from shiny surfaces, especially near freeways, can be dangerous. This was a lesson learned by a local restaurant that had to coat or etch the metal to make it less reflective.
Perhaps 30% of homes here in Perth have reflective metal roofs and I’ve never heard reflected light as a problem.
5. With age and exposure, reflective surfaces do not retain reflective properties too long. And, there are more important uses for water than roof cleaning.
This may have been true of older materials but modern materials don’t lose their reflectivity significantly. Nor surprisingly does lack of cleaning significantly decrease reflectivity. Natural rainfall will clean roofs often enough in most locations.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cool_roof
The main disadvantage of reflective roofs is in cool climates where the reduction in heat transferred to the building requires more heating.
We need to recognize that the IPCC’s geoengineering requires international cooperation which they describe as an international regime which protects its interests and constrains the actions of others.
Aha, they are back to forming a one-world government, particularly as they also include in their thinking the idea that all individuals have to be involved in this effort. Of course, that means that they will be encouraged or forced, as needed, to cooperate.
In one of the statements, they want to deal with atmospheric CO2 removal, disposing of it in one or all of 3 ways.
Physical: injecting it into the oceans.
Chemical: making the oceans more alkaline to promote carbonate formation.
Biological: fertilize the oceans to promote biological activity.
All of these are either just plain stupid or they will do inordinate damage, not even considering the unforeseen unintentional consequences.
Alkalizing the oceans? Really? After all of the noise about a tiny bit of potential, as yet undetected, acidification? Now they want to kill the oceans as photosynthetic activity already raises body of seawater above 10 during the day—they want to make it higher! Welcome to the Drano Sea.
Fertilizing the oceans. Talk about messing with the ecology. The mere suggestion of this should drive the environmentalists crazy!
Put away your preonceptions, follow the link to the Telegraph, from there to the Guardian, and on to the keynote paper itself. Then, read it! You may be surprised. But if you haven’t read it, or at least looked at it, don’t think you know what it is about.
I would dearly like to see someone credible WUWT do a full article / report on what the IPCC is up to with geoengineering. Obviously there is money to be made from this as well as ‘control’. I am trying to get the word out, but alas is is being mocked as ‘garbage’ similar to crop circles, aliens and contrails…..
ANYONE out there who is interested in the history of this?
http://justmeint.wordpress.com/2011/06/17/lima-peru-june-20-22nd-2011-ipcc-on-geoengineering/
Jimbo says:
June 17, 2011 at 3:44 am
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LazyTeenager says:
June 17, 2011 at 12:55 am
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The whole debate about geoengineering has been on a while so I can’t understand how the WUWT readership missed it.
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Jimbo says————-
If you were not so lazy you would find that your statement is wrong. See here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here. There are more geoengineering stories on WUWT.
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BAZINGA!!!!!!!
John B (June 17, 2011 at 6:50 pm), you direct us to a series of abstracts generically entitled IPCC Expert Meeting on Geoengineering Lima, Peru 2011, which I had previously read.
From Keynote 1 we get “I will show examples of the use of climate models and process models to understand the science and technology needed to do SRM (Solar Radiation Management) research, and outline the conclusions resulting from the use of those models.”
The rest of the papers appear to take the results of the first as a given and content themselves with championing one geoengineering method over another or discussing the technicalities, economics (SRM is cheap they say), the politics of risk and the governance of geoengineering.
Keynote 2 does talks of unintended consequences but concludes “all these proposed techniques should be considered”
I see nothing from the commentators above which indicate a lack of a full and proper understanding of what is at stake.
I will therefore stick to my original comment. IPCC – aerosols – and flying ones at that!
Using the forcing from those last IPCC crazy ideas and some made-up reconstructions as input data, I ran my bug-free-real-time computer model, which resulted in this prediction: on the next IPCC report, the ultimate AGW solution will be presented: blasting all the world’s nukes (no more nukes around yay!), terminating all life in Earth (no more CO2 emission yay!) and setting a nuclear winter (all temperatures will drop yay!). /sarc?
Far from being “scifi”, all activities of the IPCC’s Working Group 3 are – and always have been – predicated on promotion of geoengineering the global temperature.
Richard
from what I have read Richard I have to agree with you. However as you have already shown many people ‘out there’ believe geoengineering is all suff and nonsense sci fi fantasy eytc. As it has already been banned (gulp) is will never happen.
Haven’t we learned anything yet from all of this – like something as basic as follow the dollar. The AGW train is so well stacked now it will be almost impossible to slow it down – a full derailment is what is require. Geoengineering concepts and planning has been in the pipeline for over 60 years. An enormous amout of money has gone into research and development. The Peru meeting will only pull loose ends together… wait and see.
the IPCC will, for the first time, assess geoengineering in view of risks, feasibility, mitigation potential, costs and governance requirements in its Fifth Assessment Report to be published in 2013/2014. In preparation for this, the three IPCC Working Groups are organizing an Expert Meeting to provide a platform for exchange and discussion among scientists from the different disciplines and to encourage more research on the implications of various geoengineering technologies as well as their potential impacts on biodiversity, human society, and the climate system.
http://www.ipcc-wg3.de/Members/edenhofer/in-the-media/25-november-2010-nature-correspondence-assessing-geoengineering-doesn2019t-mean-recommending-geoengineering
ETC Group on Geoengineering Developments and How to Take Action
There are three important new developments on geoengineering (large-scale intentional manipulation of the Earth systems in an attempt to affect the climate) that we we like to bring to your attention. What has long been lurking in the shadows of climate negotiations as a wealthy country Plan B has all of a sudden come front and center. We urge you to pay attention to these developments and intervene where you can.
this is an interesting article worth reading is you are skeptical of the geoengineering ‘hype’
http://climate-connections.org/2011/06/08/etc-group-on-geoengineering-developments-and-how-to-take-action/
I said follow the dollar……
The organizing committee of the meeting includes prominent proponents of geoengineering such as American scientist Ken Caldeira, and Canadians David Keith (University of Calgary) and Jason Blackstock (CIGI) and the topics up for discussion include governance and social, economic and legal aspects of the question. Keith and Caldeira were instrumental in the Royal Society report on goengineering and both testified before Congress and the UK House of Commons in favour of more research. They both have patents pending, as you can see from the ETC Group report Geopiracy and are involved in a wide variety of initiatives on geoengineering.
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They co-manage Bill Gate’s private geoengineering fund of $4.6 million. Jason Blackstock was recently described in the Canadian Walrus Magazine as “a young scholar with an almost luminous sense of self-confidence”. He was the main author of the peculiar Novim report on stratospheric aerosols and has been involved in getting prestigous mainstream foreign policy outfits involved in geoengineering in the UK, Canada and US . Blackstock is also slated to speak on a panel about geoengineering organized by the Canadian embassy (!) in Sao Paulo Brazil, 16 June 2011.
http://climate-connections.org/2011/06/08/etc-group-on-geoengineering-developments-and-how-to-take-action/