Guest essay by Eric Worrall
If you block the sun, you hurt food production. There’s even a study. But this terrifying problem has not stopped climate enthusiasts from pushing forward with an attempt to recreate the end of the dinosaur age, to “save” us from 1C of global warming.
Before geoengineering to mitigate climate change, researchers must consider some fundamental chemistry
By University of Pennsylvania
NOVEMBER 22, 2021It’s a tempting thought: With climate change so difficult to manage and nations unwilling to take decisive action, what if we could mitigate its effects by setting up a kind of chemical umbrella—a layer of sulfuric acid in the upper atmosphere that could reflect the sun’s radiation and cool the Earth?
According to a new study in the Journal of the American Chemical Society, a collaboration among Penn scientists and two groups in Spain, atmospheric conditions in the stratosphere pose a challenge to generating sulfuric acid, making its production less efficient than might have previously been expected. Thus more groundwork exploring the chemistry of how sulfuric acid and its building blocks will react in the upper atmosphere is required in order to confidently move forward with this climate geoengineering strategy, the researchers say.
“These fundamental insights highlight the importance of understanding the photochemistry involved in geoengineering,” says Joseph S. Francisco, an atmospheric chemist in Penn’s School of Arts & Sciences and a co-corresponding author on the study. “That’s critically important and it’s something that’s been ignored.”
Using sulfuric acid to blunt the sun’s rays as a means of curbing climate changeimpacts is based on a natural phenomenon: When volcanoes erupt, the sulfur they emit creates localized—or sometimes even far-reaching—cooling clouds that filter the sun. But those clouds emerge in the troposphere, which ranges from the Earth’s surface to about 10 kilometers up. Geoengineering using sulfuric acid would happen a good deal higher, in the stratosphere, from about 10 to 20 kilometers above the planet.
…
“One of the implications of this finding is, if you put sulfur dioxide up there, it’s going to just be recycling around,” Francisco says. “So it opens the door to whether we have a full understanding of atmospheric sulfur chemistry up in the stratosphere.”
…
The findings also highlight the need for a Plan B if the atmospheric chemistry doesn’t play out as expected. “It raises a fundamentally important question,” Francisco says. “If we put the sulfur dioxide in, can we get it out of the stratosphere?“
…
Read more: https://phys.org/news/2021-11-geoengineering-mitigate-climate-fundamental-chemistry.html
The abstract of the study which discusses what geoengineering could do to plant growth;
Estimating global agricultural effects of geoengineering using volcanic eruptions
Published: 08 August 2018
Jonathan Proctor, Solomon Hsiang, Jennifer Burney, Marshall Burke & Wolfram Schlenker
Nature (2018)
Solar radiation management is increasingly considered to be an option for managing global temperatures, yet the economic effects of ameliorating climatic changes by scattering sunlight back to space remain largely unknown. Although solar radiation management may increase crop yields by reducing heat stress, the effects of concomitant changes in available sunlight have never been empirically estimated. Here we use the volcanic eruptions that inspired modern solar radiation management proposals as natural experiments to provide the first estimates, to our knowledge, of how the stratospheric sulfate aerosols created by the eruptions of El Chichón and Mount Pinatubo altered the quantity and quality of global sunlight, and how these changes in sunlight affected global crop yields. We find that the sunlight-mediated effect of stratospheric sulfate aerosols on yields is negative for both C4 (maize) and C3 (soy, rice and wheat) crops. Applying our yield model to a solar radiation management scenario based on stratospheric sulfate aerosols, we find that projected mid-twenty-first century damages due to scattering sunlight caused by solar radiation management are roughly equal in magnitude to benefits from cooling. This suggests that solar radiation management—if deployed using stratospheric sulfate aerosols similar to those emitted by the volcanic eruptions it seeks to mimic—would, on net, attenuate little of the global agricultural damage from climate change. Our approach could be extended to study the effects of solar radiation management on other global systems, such as human health or ecosystem function.
Read more (paywalled): https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-018-0417-3
You can just imagine the scenario. Scientists pump a bit of sulfur into the atmosphere and nothing happens. Then they pump some more, the needle still doesn’t move. Then suddenly an extreme atmospheric event, like a large hurricane or a volcanic eruption, throws up some extra water vapour, and the entire sky goes black.
I’m glad at least one of them asked the obvious question, how to get the sulfur out of the atmosphere if it all goes wrong? But I’m guessing if the opportunity arose for a full scale test they would still probably want to try it out.
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Where’s Burl Henry when you need him to explain his simple theory of climate change where he tried to convince readers at Judith Curry’s site that SO2 is the control knob for temperature?
Keith Harrison:
Every stratovolcanic eruption (VEI4 or greater) goes through the same cycle:
Initial cooling of the Earths’ surface from the injection of reflective SO2 aerosols into the stratosphere, where they circulate around the globe, reaching their maximum cooling effect, on average, 16 months after the date of the eruption. This cooling normally results in a La Nina.
Their aerosols eventually settle out of the atmosphere, in roughly 24-30 months, and temperatures recover to pre-eruption levels, or a bit higher, usually resulting in the formation of an El Nino.
SO2 introduced into the troposphere, from industrial activities, has the same cooling effect, but it is usually from relatively constant sources, so that what settles our is quickly replaced.
If an American business recession occurs, idled factories, foundries etc. result in fewer SO2 aerosol emissions, and temperatures rise until the recession ends, thus mimicking the warming phase of volcanic eruptions and often resulting in an El Nino.
So, geo-engineering by putting Sulfuric Acid aerosol mists into either the stratosphere or the troposphere.is just business-as-usual, and nothing to be worried about (except that a volcano may pop of and cause more cooling than wanted)
Hang on a minnit’ we have been assured that the sun has no effect on our weather. It’s all controlled by Carbon Dioxide our vital plant food.
Did I miss out on a lesson somewhere,?
Sarc.
We have never been assured that the sun has no effect on the weather.
All the research related to global warming has been driven by the UN’s mandate for the IPCC to ONLY investigate HUMAN_CAUSED rising temperatures or other climate changes.
Human-Caused CO2 was a convenient scapegoat, most likely because is was proposed in 1902 or thereabouts. None of the colorful energy graphs, pages and pages of haphazard research could all be pointed to human caused atmosphere warming.
It’s main purpose was to elicit programs that could generate large amounts of cash for the UN, and start controlling the activities of as many people as possible so they could order people to do things.
It was not about weather threats, transport, emissions of CO2, or anything similar. It was about political control.
Most everyone has been hoodwinked into wasting time arguing a dead end instead of countering the real threat.
Nice imagination.
Same, as so many researchers that program excessive climate response into their models.
Only, the data doesn’t back that claim.
ATheok:
“Nice Imagination”
?? Volcanoes behave EXACTLY as I have described.
As I noted, it takes about 16 months for the maximum cooling for an eruption to occur. as their aerosols circulate around the planet.
Both of your graphs show a decrease in temperatures AFTER the eruption, confirming what I have stated. ..
As if anyone understands climate well enough to do engineering? As the computer models cannot handle clouds, except as a supplied parameter, it would be a bit presumptuous to try engineering,
Presumption is a fundamental part of Climate Science.
We presume that CO2 controls the climate, and then we use that presumption to create models that “prove” that CO2 controls the climate. QED.
So now it is presumed that SO2 will save us from the CO2 disaster we have modelled. And we will create models that “prove” it.
Science is so easy when you start with the conclusion and use mega-computers to derive that conclusion, innit?
It would be a good face-saving move for the elites to stage a salvation mission that puts an irrelevant amount of sulfate into the stratosphere and then “prove” that the continued failure of climate models is due to their continuous (presumably extremely expensive, graft-enabling) mitigation efforts rather than a fundamental error in the models. They could then back down from their suicide mission without admitting any error. The windmills and solar panels grift has run its course. A new scam is needed!
Was discussed here:
LOCKHEED MARTIN SOLAR AND ASTROPHYSICS LABORATORY SEMINAR
Date : Thursday, November 11th, 2021
Place: Virtual (via Zoom)
Time : 10.00m
Speaker: Greg Slater
(LMSAL, Palo Alto)
Title: The Strong Case For Immediate Global Cooling by Stratospheric Injection of SO2
Abstract:
The arguments and the data are presented to make the case for the rational and moral imperatives for the immediate deployment of the first large scale tests of global cooling using stratospheric injection of SO2, to be followed immediately thereafter by a transition to operational systems for continuous global cooling, in order to stabilize global temperature and sea levels, and extreme weather events, and to stop the associated rising global deaths, suffering, drought, forced migration, etc., which in turn are dangerously straining the very stability of societies worldwide.
https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0?ui=2&ik=9464d4ed4a&attid=0.1&permmsgid=msg-f:1715560182196139589&th=17cee4e5729af645&view=fimg&fur=ip&sz=s0-l75-ft&attbid=ANGjdJ9uc7woCEXCumDhrvPBjLh5PlckqBtfVS4XdW2rpU8laBEpy0NamOvqNjzic5JG_4yOSt4oP_0fLKL9McjbRqS__X-Z12vo79ZkkxiSA2sQyHrWa38myndQg_U&disp=emb&realattid=ii_kvej536l0
Figure Caption: Schematic climate futures [After MacMartin et al, 2019, ‘Mission-driven research for stratospheric aerosol geoengineering’].
————————————————————————–
Topic: LMSAL Seminar Zoom Meeting
Time: Nov 11, 2021 10:00 AM Pacific Time (US and Canada)
Join Zoom Meeting
https://lmsal.zoom.us/j/81304742258?pwd=aFJyM0xxaDJnc3A1Q2NGcDdZMGp0dz09
If it all goes wrong, can we sue Lockheed Martin?
No for the same reasons you can’t sue over the coronavirus … outside the reach of your country laws.
And here I was thinking gain-of-function “experiments” were the nadir of evil mad science. The criminally insane Dr. Frankensteins at Lockheed Martin are a million times worse. That corporate House of Horrors needs to be closed down immediately and their employees placed in straitjackets in padded cells. Their plan to BLOCK THE SUN dangerously strains the very stability of societies and Life Itself worldwide.
Yup.
That’s the plan.
BLOCK THE SUN
or maybe
“scorch the sky”?
We’re going to block the sun unless you pay us!
How ‘bout one QUADRILLION dollars?
(And I want sharks with frickin’ laser beams on their heads with that)
It is great fun to sit around of an evening over beer and pretzels speculating “what if” about assorted mad schemes. Unfortunately, there are always a few deluded individuals who then attempt to implement these mad schemes. As Bill Gates recently tried to implement his nutty idea for injecting chalk dust into the atmosphere. Luckily, cooler heads shot down his trial balloon.
Shouldn’t these True Believers establish that the Earth is actually overheating first, before they go messing with the atmosphere to try to cool things off?
First things first. They are putting the cart before the horse.
“ …for the immediate deployment of the first large scale tests of global cooling using stratospheric injection of SO2, to be followed immediately thereafter by a transition to operational systems for continuous global cooling…“
Umm.. I think he skipped the rather important step of evaluating the results of your test before implementing your scheme. I sincerely hope that there is some iron clad legal mechanism that can prevent nut cases from screwing around with the planet with little or no evidence that the intervention is need, would work, would not cause a disaster, etc. Oh wait, the UN is already screwing up the plant for no good reason with their anti-fossil fuels program so I guess there’s nothing to stop other foolish schemes. What was I thinking?
I’m glad to see that the real engineers are taking this on.
Of course, real engineers get paid big money to find solutions to pressing political problems. Always have and always will.
So when you hear about real engineers discussing geo-engineering, you already know that they have lined up big money grants from your politicians to proceed.
In other words, when you vote for a candidate that says they will “fight global warming”, you voted for geo-engineering and the funding dollars to proceed.
What did you expect? You can’t save the earth without it.
Dangerous loonies, the lot of them.
What could possibly go wrong?
Nuclear energy might be used to loosen polar ice caps. Sea ice could be melted by covering it with black soot to increase the absorption of sunlight. Dr Stephen Schneider is a climatologist from the National Center for Atmospheric Research:
“Can we do these things? Yes! But will they make things better? I’m not sure. We can’t predict with any certainty what’s happening to our own climatic future. How can we come along and intervene then, in that ignorance? You could melt the icecaps, what would that do to the coastal cities? The cure could be worse than the disease.”
if we could mitigate its effects by setting up a kind of chemical umbrella—a layer of sulfuric acid in the upper atmosphere that could reflect the sun’s radiation and cool the Earth?
____________________________________
I really didn’t need to read any further. What could possibly go wrong? It’s a legitimate concern that the ignorant and stupid people in charge these days actually have the power to try this sort of bullshit. Will they try, and will the people with their heads screwed on tight actually rise up and put a stop to it?
Think of it as a COVID-19 vaccine for Gaia, who is naturally immune.
I remember reading a sci fi story a long time back, one of the problems the protagonists had to deal with was that so many satellites had been launched into orbit, that there was a noticeable dimming of the sun.
You won’t know until it is too late. Geo’engineering’ should be halted world wide. Irreversible effects can be quite serious.
Soylent black.
I now believe that the CAGW movement is not a political one, nor a religious one, it is a cult, and a very dangerous one. It has all of the hallmarks of an organised cult.
These people urgently need deprogramming.
These people urgently need deprogramming.
____________________________________
One upon a time, the mice decided that the
cat needed a bell hung around its neck.
Archibald Douglas, 5th Earl of Angus known as Bell The Cat for dealing with the favourites of James III.
But who will bell the cat?
worshipers of death
Correct.
GangGreen are a bunch of very malicious, very stupid cults.
Would you prescribe a religious cull to deprogram them – permanently
This is just the latest attempt of the Lunatics to put themselves in charge of our Asylum.
OK if some jack asses actually try it I will get my pitchfork out and take part in stopping the madness.
You just can’t fix stupid, nor do degrees in science seem to increase use of the scientific method – or even an understanding of what it is.
“OK if some jack asses actually try it I will get my pitchfork out and take part in stopping the madness.”
Yes, I think that would be the time to hit the streets, if something this idiotic were to be put in motion.
Two thoughts. First is a quote from Galaxy Quest: Did you guys ever WATCH the show?
Second is the basis for Snowpiercier.
Apparently the proponents of this want to bring fiction to reality, however poorly that might turn out. Neither show was intended to be a How To manual. Snowpiercer was intended at some level (outside of bad SF) to be a cautionary tale. Cheers –
Just nuke china that would put plenty of fine particulates into the upper atmosphere and fix the worst offender while you are at it /sarc
these alarmist are mad enough to do it they want to destroy us in any case
Another idea that came from failure of synapses firing was the “nuclear winter”. Nukes don’t put dust in to the air. Maybe, in a very special case, you would actually want a ground burst as a bunker buster. I’m surprised nobody calls people out on nuclear winter fantasy.
Off Topic : Another fantasy is the saying we have enough nukes to kill the worlds population a hundred times over. Not nearly enough nukes to kill even a small percentage of the worlds population.
Ok maybe a big percentage of world population would die if all nukes exploded over all the major high population densities going from largest to smallest.
Latent radiation and loss of infrastructure would be a bigger problem than the explosions themselves if all nukes went off.
Do these people who call themselves ‘scientists’ ever have moments of self-reflection, do they ever look objectively at their own utterances, what climate are they attempting to achieve?
Most climate fanatics ,including those who consider them selves experts a
Have ignored an essential discipline to be fully knowledgeable in climate . This field Is Palio-geology …. It’s essential to know where we have been is we want to know where we are headed … Without the help of man we have had periods of time much hotter than what is feared now ..And earth adapted . Just as a hot tropical day often brings cool rain to balance temperature. Extremes like glacial advances inevitably lead to inter glacial periods that balance conditions . In all the geological history we can examine proxies show a nature adjustment .
The alarmist seem to always assume a fragile earth poised on a knife edge ready to tip into a catastrophic state .
If you want proof all you have to know that we are still here. We’re we constantly at “tipping points we as a race would have been erased eons ago .
Don’t worry alarmists , I’m sure that you too can adapt …in a few decades you can proclaim global cooling ….blamed on man of course
Firstly, these people need to get together and without the “precautionary principle” in mind, decide what is the BEST average temperature for the planet, mankind, plants, and wildlife. They will probably decide on about 19 degrees C. Then consider what they think would be the best way to warm it up.
Considering the inability of these nutters to agree on much of anything within their own set of parameters, it would probably take them decades to decide on their ideal temp/climate. Witness that to date they have yet shared this with the rest of us.
They want it to be a constant temp, ie, no change. They have not noticed that in nature, the only constant is change. You can’t fix stupid.
So, instead, why not dump iron oxide into the ocean, to absorb CO2 and feed some salmon or krill? It’s been done already (in the Gulf of Alaska), resulting in many more salmon and no harm to the environment. It could be ramped up in small steps, for caution, and terminated at once if untoward effects were noticed. Its only defect is that it would work, a no-no per green thinking.
There was a study a few years ago, they found if you dump iron in the ocean you deplete other nutrients, causing an area of reduced growth elsewhere, resulting in no overall change in plankton growth.
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/02/200217162348.htm
The postulated that iron might reduce other elements else where nothing was found
Whales it is postulated enriched the upper ocean with iron as we have reduced their population we need to replace that iron
Greentards hate it there might be a simple productive answer to CO2 increase in the atmosphere
It is high time we started looking after the oceans ie replace what nutrients we remove, photosynthesis will do the rest
But we need more CO2, not less. 1000ppm looks about right.
Yes good point, but why not just leave the whales to engineer the oceans, recycle iron and farm the krill, as they have done for millennia. All we need to do is just stop killing them.
We did stop killing them. I checked and all the whaling ships and processing plants are gone. You cannot buy a can of whale oil anywhere.
Now, we are also postponing crabbing season and re-routing shipping lanes to stop impeding whale migration.
It’s a great time to be a whale.
“But this terrifying problem has not stopped climate enthusiasts from pushing forward with an attempt to recreate…”
As so often, none quoted. Who are the enthusiasts pushing that? Everyone quoted in the article seems to think it is a bad idea.
You didn’t read the article well:
“The findings also highlight the need for a Plan B if the atmospheric chemistry doesn’t play out as expected. “It raises a fundamentally important question,” Francisco says. “If we put the sulfur dioxide in, can we get it out of the stratosphere?“
Francisco is not pushing the idea. He’s a leading author of the paper cited, saying that it is a bad idea. The quote you give is not supportive.
They won’t even speak to Francisco.
Joe Biden and Boris Johnson may discuss with their wives, but their genius is quite sufficient to determine what is THE SCIENCE and ensure that no real scientists get funded, let alone heard.
Nitpicking Nick. I think I made it clear the article was about scientists noticing a problem. I speculated they might all want to push ahead anyway, but this is just “my guess”. You know as well as I do that a there is plenty of interest in this kind of geoengineering.
Nick,
How about this recent paper as a starter for 10 – it also contains references to a load of other publications on the same topic:
https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/ab76de
“Halving warming with stratospheric aerosol geoengineering moderates policy-relevant climate hazards”
The idea of using SO2 is hardly new – it’s been around for at least 15 years that I know of.
Nick, the nutter from Lockheed Martin, quoted above, seemed pretty keen to get moving with the plan.
That’s often the problem with this kind of noble cause fallacy where well meaning people create a crisis out of nothing to advance a reasonable agenda. The unintended consequences can be some idiot from a well funded, massive and under utilised military engineering company can spot a global opportunity of almost immeasurably profitable but harmful endeavour and is willing and able to lobby cretinous politicians to get it done. That’s the problem with the climate crisis and incidently similarly with covid.
Hey, guys!
We really were just kidding when we called you the Climate Cult of Doom! We were just trying to use irony and satire to make our point! You weren’t supposed to take it literally!
Griffter? Simon? Izaak? Guys!? GUYS!!? Oh, shit!
leftards don’t have a sense of humour.
“ the obvious question, how to get the sulfur out of the atmosphere if it all goes wrong?”
Boris Johnson and griff to the rescue …..
I mean, they’ve done so well with carbon dioxide. Maybe I missed something ??
“What did you find, Lieutenant?”
“Well, General, there appears to have been the beginnings of an advanced civilization on this planet just 300,000 years ago! They were beginning the exploration of space and moving along towards the first steps of an interstellar polity when suddenly they committed societal suicide!”
“Suicide? Whatever for?”
“Well, sir, they apparently destroyed their nascent civilization to “Save the Planet!” The irony is that this destruction left them incapable of dealing with lowering CO2 levels during the second period of glaciation following, and almost ALL life forms perished as the base of their food chain collapsed!”
“You have successfully translated many of their historical records!?”
“Yes, sir! We have been able to decipher much of their written and electronically recorded material! We haven’t finished translating all their records; would you believe that they had dozens of languages still, and didn’t have written fonts for expressing sarcasm OR irony!”
“No fonts for sarcasm or irony!? How bizarre! Perhaps their leaders didn’t understand them!”
“Sir! Our leaders don’t understand sarcasm or irony!”
“That will be all, Lieutenant! I’m giving your report an UltraSecret code; disclosure brings death!”
Children’s scenarios. They wouldn’t know how to get enough sulphur compounds into the atmosphere to make any difference.
Get rid of low sulfur diesel and go back to the original.
“And if we just change this little bit of DNA on this virus …”
Don’t trust them.
Obviously before we embark on planet changing measures, in this case ones that are designed to change the global temperature, we need to have a global referendum and take a vote on whether the inhabitants of the planet are in favor of them.
I mean, for one country or two or three to just get together and do it would be profoundly undemocratic and wrong.
And for the UN to think it has the right to approve such measures would also be quite wrong. This is a matter for elected politicians and voters all over the world to decide.
I guess we could get the UN to organize the global referendum. It would keep them out of mischief for a few years…
Michael, Why include the politicians?
“…get the UN to organize the global referendum.” ???
C’mon, they would be pushed to organise a piss-up in a brewery.
“I guess we could get the UN to organize the global referendum. It would keep them out of mischief for a few years…”
Er, no. That would be the beginning of world government right there, which is exactly what they want. Far from keeping them out of mischief it would’ve a trojan horse for tyranny.
I guess I should have marked this as sarcasm. Or irony.
I am beyond uncertain as to how creating near global ice-melt acid rain will slow sea level rise.
I thought we’d solved the “acid rain crises” of the 70s & 80s
Now these idiots want to bring it back?
Again, What’s Up With That has joined the mob against an innovative
scientific/engineering advance which could represent a valid alternative to the
usual pathetic nostrums and elixirs being offered to us by the dumbed-down
“science” and “intellectuals” of our age. Contrary to the comments being thrown
around by many think-they-know-it-all trolls, geo-engineering, through the
reduction of sunlight striking the surface of the earth by the introduction of
an upper atmospheric haze, represents a golden alternative to the lowering of
the temperature of the earth compared to any and all other crackpot ideas we are
now being offered to effectuate that result by our crazy world.
First, it is fantastically inexpensive compared to the big-government schemes
of the global warming whackadoodles (as an example, just use a swarm of
solar-powered, self-flying drones going up and down all day long for several
months in some isolated area near the equator). The global-warming hoaxsters
hate it on this basis alone.
Second, from MUCH past experience we know it is guaranteed to be effective:
if Nature can cool the earth over and over again by sheer chance exploding a
highly toxic mixture of gases and particulates up into the atmosphere whenever
it randomly decides to volcanically erupt somewhere on earth, surely we can do a
much better job with advanced technology, deliberate intention, and carefully
controlled measures. Of course it can also easily be intentionally stopped at
any phase of its introduction so as to prevent any further cooling activity, if
that’s what the monitoring suggests should occur.
And of course it’s self-limiting. Did you ever hear of gravity? It’s on all
the time and would eventually clear any part of the atmosphere, lower or upper,
of any sunlight-blocking, particulate/aerosol matter suspended in it given a few
years. This would especially be true considering the presence of water vapor in
an atmosphere with some very cold regions in it, which regions would eventually
condense enough of this unending supply of water vapor near or around such
matter and drag it down with the precipitation it would inevitably and
continuously cause.
Of course the amount of sunlight falling on the Earth is not the limiting
factor for photosynthesis. So we don’t have to worry about light-starving the
plants. MANY experiments have shown that the amount of CO2 in our air is far
more a limiting factor for photosynthesis and we know (courtesy of China) that
that’s not going down anytime in the future … for sure, no matter what the
“carbon footprint” of America or Europe does.
The earth has been warming, off and on, for 1000’s of years since the last
ice age. And it has taken an extra little hit of warmth these past few
centuries, especially in the lands and surface waters of the Northern Hemisphere
(this is probably anthropogenic, but definitely NOT caused by CO2 — or anything
else in our atmosphere — absorbing outgoing infrared radiation! The atmosphere
can cool by sending incoming heat energy back into outer space, but it is too
tenuous and rapidly moving all over the place to do much differential warming
anywhere on earth). This extra hit might continue some more in the future and
might become a wee bit inconvenient, especially when (not “if”) the Sun decides
to go back to its usual sunspot activity cycle stopping those cosmic rays from
slamming into the Earth, thereby cooling it. Cooling the earth a small amount
now, extremely easily accomplished through some sun-veiling, atmospheric
technology, would have zero chance of causing a consequential “catastrophic”
cooling effect thereafter and be just what the doctor ordered for our planet.
And none of this could possibly result in a new Ice Age as long as it’s used
only over short periods of time. The ice ages came about through many 100’s of
years of gradual, reflective ice accumulation in the Northern Hemisphere in the
past (see Milankovich). But the technology we are talking about could be
stopped by man in a matter of hours as soon as the slightest questionable
massive ice buildup was noted, if not before.
David Solan
I’ve noticed sunlight is a limiting factor when there isn’t enough, like when I tried to grow veggies in a place which had a bit too much shade.
Likely the net effect of even a major geoengineering effort would be zero. But the fact some people want to make the attempt bothers me. There is no need for any cooling, we’re currently in midst of the Quaternary Glaciation, one of a handful of prolonged cold periods detectable in our Earth’s geological past.
Our brief interglacial is precious, lets not do anything to jeopardise it, however small the risk.
it’s quite possible you could both be right.
The only issue I see setting Solan apart from solon is that this study suggests that sulfer dioxide particles injected higher in the atmosphere are less assured to follow the same reaction pathways they do from volcanic injection in the troposphere meaning notably less sulfuric acid production and thus less effective ‘shade’ as well as inadequate knowledge of what interstage SO3 chemistry would get up to. But this is just a rest stop on the way to theoretical and emperical knowledge about how to actually engineer the climate and I can’t see on what basis Worral worries that we would acheive no result although he could be right that it we don’t need a ‘shade’.
In general though, the arguments here seem far more the eeyore type. I don’t know where that attitude comes from. Forgetting what climate change there actually is and to what extent it is anthropogenic, we have no problem pumping CO2 into the atmosphere so considering other changes, incidental or directed seems logical. I don’t think this is frankenworld because there is a bit more CO2 and I can equally see no issue with the thought or actual experiments at mimicking volcanoes IF cooling were actually desirable. We might not be perfect mimics and it could have unintended consequences as vaguely hinted at in this research.
The hostility to the idea here seems overblown although it’s ironically apoplectic in the warmist camp where they writhe in agnoy over the harm that a little CO2 might bring. If they truly thought warming was the existential threat they claim and that economic and geopolitical forces are proving too great to permit a change in energy production on the scale they propose they would be at the forefront of geoengineering research.
But in our camp of folks that suggest that human priorities ought to be the focus of national and international undertakings, it does seem passing strange that there is such hostility to inquiry into active management of the climate. If we’ve changed the environment through various large scale activities like agriculture, even changed the earth’s rotation from mass water storage I have no doubt that we could engineer the climate; albeit it quite reasonable to question whether the current or emerging climate is actually detrimental such that such means ought to be employed.
“But in our camp of folks that suggest that human priorities ought to be the focus of national and international undertakings, it does seem passing strange that there is such hostility to inquiry into active management of the climate.”
We’ve seen how humans screw things up in the past.
Besides, we don’t need to cool the Earth’s atmosphere, it’s cool enough already. Only bogus “unprecedented warming” Hockey Stick charts say it is “the hottest year evah!”.
All we really need to do is throw away the bogus Hockey Stick charts. That will cool the Earth sufficiently.
Tom Abbott:
“We don’t need to cool the Earth’s atmosphere, it is cool enough already”
If net-zero is implemented, temperatures will soar, because the cooling SO2 aerosols from the burning of fossil fuels will have been eliminated. We may very well need to have cooling down the road.
I know that’s your hypothesis, Burl.
How did temperatures cool from 1880 to 1910? Was it because CO2 was reduced at that time, which allowed SO2 to take over? During this time, how much human-derived SO2 was going into the atmosphere? Was it equivalent to today?
Tom Abbott:
Between 1880 and 1910,average anomalous global temperatures decreased from (-) 0.227 deg. C- to (-) 0.490 deg. C., a decrease of 0.263 deg. C.
Over the same period Industrial SO2 aerosol emissions increased by 23 Megatons, and temperatures dropped, as expected.
(and forget about CO2, it has no climatic effect)
With respect to today, as the result of global Clean Air efforts, atmospheric SO2 levels are decreasing, and temperatures are increasing, also as expected.
“We’ve seen how humans screw things up in the past.”
that is a throwaway line. It is the same one used by the environmentalists to push net zero, i.e. we’re screwing up the world by emitting CO2.
I concede that I’m not sure cooling is needed (albeit see @burl henry’s comment) but with the world poised to drive itself off a cliff in the name of warming, folks who are thinking about the various ways to put the brakes may have worthwhile ideas. Indeed better theoretical and emperical understanding of such potential control measures reveal whether it is fear of warming that is actually driving this policy or just plain misanthropy. I doubt neither man’s ability to make great accomplishments nor his ability to screw things up, but you never get the former without a bit of the latter and the precautionary principle inherent in outright rejection of this technology is frightening.
“concede that I’m not sure cooling is needed (albeit see @burl henry’s comment) but with the world poised to drive itself off a cliff in the name of warming,”
I think you are assuming too much. There is no evidence that the world is driving itself off a cliff with regard to warming.
The only “evidence” for that position are bastardized “Hockey Stick” temperature charts.
Legitmate unmodified, regional surface temperature charts tell a completely different story. They show that we are *not* living in the warmest times in human history. They show it was just as warm in the past as today. They show that CO2 is not the control knob of the Earth’s temperatures. They show there is no need to cool the Earth’s atmosphere.
The 1000-year-long Mann Hockey Stick has been invalidated by the National Academy of Sciences, and the Jones, instrument-era Hockey Stick has never been validated because Jones refuses to show his work and won’t allow others to try to duplicate his work.
This is the ONLY “evidence” that the Earth is overheaing. Think about that. Your only evidence are a couple of bogus, bastadized Hockey Stick charts, which are disproven by the written, historical temperature records, and the NAS, and which show a completely different picture of the Earth’s temperature history.
There is no unprecedented warming today.
“The earth has been warming, off and on, for 1000’s of years since the last
ice age. And it has taken an extra little hit of warmth these past few
centuries”
There’s the fly in the ointment. There is no evidence for an extra little hit of warmth today. Today is cooler than it was for humans in the not-too-distant past.
We don’t need to cool the atmosphere. It is cool enough right now.
The earth stopped warming during the Holocene Optimum. For the last 7000 years, there has been a gradual cooling. Since the end of the Holocene Optimum, the peak of each warm period has been cooler than the previous.
David Solan:
“The technology we are talking about could be stopped by man in a matter of hours”
Assume that SO2 aerosols have been introduced to achieve a desired amount of cooling, and then there is a large volcanic eruption. Temperatures will plummet, and stopping the introduction of aerosols will have no effect.until they eventually settle out of the atmosphere
Large scale GEO-engineering should be tried ONLY after a method of removing excess SO2 from the atmosphere has been developed..