14 October 2017, The Guardian, Geoengineering is not a quick fix for climate change, experts warn Trump. Leading climate scientists have warned that geoengineering research could be hijacked by climate change deniers as an excuse not to reduce CO2 emissions, citing the US administration under Donald Trump as a major threat to their work. David Keith, a solar geoengineering (GE) expert at Harvard University has said there is a real danger that his work could be exploited by those who oppose action on emissions, at the same time as he defended himself and colleagues from the claims GE strengthens the argument for abandoning the targets set by the Paris climate agreement. Leading climate scientists have warned that geoengineering research could be hijacked by climate change deniers as an excuse not to reduce CO2 emissions, citing the US administration under Donald Trump as a major threat to their work. David Keith, a solar geoengineering (GE) expert at Harvard University has said there is a real danger that his work could be exploited by those who oppose action on emissions, at the same time as he defended himself and colleagues from the claims GE strengthens the argument for abandoning the targets set by the Paris climate agreement. “One of the main concerns I and everyone involved in this have, is that Trump might tweet ‘geoengineering solves everything – we don’t have to bother about emissions.’ Read More here
Tag Archives: geoengineering
11 October 2017, Carbon Briefing, Geoengineering: Scientists in Berlin debate radical ways to reverse global warming. Research scientists, policymakers and ethicists gathered in Berlin this week to discuss the emerging field of “climate engineering” and what it could mean for the planet. Climate engineering, also known as geoengineering, is a term used to describe an array of technologies – many of which remain hypothetical – for altering the global climate in order to lessen the effects of climate change. The four-day conference has been organised by the Institute for Advanced Sustainability Studies (IASS) in Potsdam, Germany, and includes speakers and participants from across the world, including Japan, Jamaica, the US and India. Tuesday Tuesday’s proceedings kicked off with talks aimed at bringing the audience up to speed with the latest research into the two main categories of geoengineering technologies: carbon dioxide removal (CDR) and solar radiation management (SRM). First up was Dr Naomi Vaughan, a researcher from the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research at the University of East Anglia. Her talk touched on recent research into a variety of CDR technologies, including biomass energy carbon capture and storage (BECCS), soil carbon sequestration and reforestation projects, and how important these techniques could be to meeting the goals of the Paris Agreement. She told the conference: Read More here
1 August 2017, Building a Climate Engineering Clearinghouse: Climate engineering (CE) is an umbrella term for a set of mostly prospective technologies that might be developed and used to counteract some of the effects of climate change. The technologies under consideration could do much good. They also, though, present myriad risks. Because of these risks, CE experts and observers have long emphasized the need for transparency in research, experimentation, and deployment. The Forum for Climate Engineering Assessment is an initiative of the School of International Service at American University in Washington DC. Our overarching objective is to assess the social, ethical, political, and legal implications of emerging technologies that fall under the broad rubric of climate engineering (sometimes referred to as “climate geoengineering”). We produce high-quality and policy-relevant research and commentary, and work in a variety of ways to ensure that the climate engineering conversation maintains a focus on issues of justice, equity, agency, and inclusion.
27 July 2017, Climate News Network, Geo-engineers propose climate compromise. Humans have unintentionally changed the world and turned up the temperature. A climate compromise might turn down the heat. Geo-engineering, the deliberate alteration of the planet to undo its inadvertent alteration by humans over the past 200 years, is back on the scientific agenda, with a climate compromise suggested as a possible solution. One group wants to turn down the global thermostat and reverse the global warming trend set in train by greenhouse gases released by fossil fuel combustion, by thinning the almost invisible cirrus clouds that trap radiation and keep the planet warm. Another group proposes to inject sulphur particles into the stratosphere, and keep on doing so for 160 years, to block enough sunlight and lower the planetary temperature. And a third group wants to see a cocktail of both approaches: thin the high cirrus clouds that stop heat from escaping, and at the same pump particles into the stratosphere to scatter the incoming sunlight and limit the disadvantages of each approach by mixing them. The verb “wants” in all three studies is neither fair nor appropriate: all three groups concede that the healthy answer is for humans to fulfil the pledge made in 2015, and start to reduce fossil fuel emissions so drastically that global average temperatures stay well below the 2°C maximum rise agreed by 197 nations at the Paris climate conference. Read More here