Slashdot Mirror
Climatologist Speaks On the Effects of Geoengineering
Lasrick writes: In this interview with Rutgers University climatologist Alan Robock, he discusses geoengineering and nuclear winter. Robock believes that geoengineering is not the solution to global warming because of its many risks and unknowns. He notes that some of the technology that would be required to implement geoengineering has not been developed and that many socio-political questions would have to be resolved before it could be put into practice. To start with, the world would have to reach agreement on a target temperature and on what entity should do the implementing. Robock's biggest fear with regard to geoengineering is that disputes over these questions could escalate into nuclear war which in turn could cause nuclear winter, producing global famine among other effects. Fascinating, wide-ranging interview with one of the world's top climatologists.
To paper over a deep problem with a shallow solution.
While I see many challenges to geoengineering, talks breaking down into nuclear war is not one of them. I mean, I have challenging talks with my wife all the time about the budget, but I never think going into it that she's going to burn down the house in response to a dispute.
When climatologists say geo-engineering is not the solution, they mean a political solution to drastically and immediately reduce CO2 emissions, is a better choice. Of course, that is NOT going to happen. So the choice is not between geo-engineering and some theoretical perfect solution, but between geo-engineering and doing almost nothing. I don't think we are to the point where we should roll out large scale geo-engineering, but we certainly should be doing the research so it is an option in the future. Currently it is politically incorrect to do even minimal research.
Of course there are serious risks to engineering... to be traded off against the huge risks of the planetary science experiment ongoing since the dawn of agriculture and the industrial revolution, the risks of modifying that science experiment and waiting to see what happens, or of potentially fighting over the enforcement of planetary carbon, water, pollution, and etc. rights inferred by those modifications.
Plus, some nations want warming.
Table-ized A.I.
At least with carbon reduction we're attempting to reverse climate changes through a mechanism believed to trigger those changes. However, with new intervention mechanisms that aren't fully understood, I don't trust anybody's model of what they think will happen.
My (likely) worst case scenario: an ice age in 100 years. That would be worse than global warming.
Tere is no solution to human-made global warning, and there never will be - too much money to make on all the "scientists" and corruption and CO limits and everything.
Because Robock is pulling the threat of nuclear war right out of his ass. Sadly, the nations most likely to suffer from geoengineering gone wrong, or failing to fix the climate 'problem' using geoengineering are too small and weak to threaten anyone with nukes. The few big players in the nuclear game are also big enough globally that, unless we have their cooperation, unilaterally trying to tweak the climate just won't work.
We can do what we want. But unless China, India and Russia get behind such an effort, they can pretty much push the climate any way they want.
Have gnu, will travel.
The Ambulance Chasers would LOVE geo-engineering. Every possible weather event, from drought, to flood, to little Bobby's rained out birthday party would no be blamed on the geo-engineers and open the door to endless litigation.
The alternative solutions are:
1. Doing nothing.
2. Pretending to reduce CO2 emissions while not actually doing it because the instant anyone tries they suddenly realize they can't afford to do the thing they set out to do... so they just make it LOOK like they're doing it.
3. Geo engineering.
Choose any of the three.
I prefer 1 or 3 because 2 is just 1 with pretensions.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
Right winger before denial became untenable: you can't trust the models! Climate change is a hoax!
Right winger after denial became untenable: our models say geo-engineering is safe and will work! Trust us!
If you can't get the political will to do the simple safe thing, you won't get it to do the complex reckless thing.
Have gnu, will travel.
Sorry, but you can't equate a nations survival against a different nation with an argument with your wife. Not even close to the same thing, and much more is at stake. Take his biggest example, what should Earth's surface temperature target? Any fixed rate will impact someone's growing seasons and food production. Somebody has to lose something, or perhaps it's best to term it "sacrifice" something. Does Asia lose rice production, or does Europe/North America lose grain production?
The article does not even tough the bigger issues. The particles that have been patented for use in GeoEngineering are hazardous. Perhaps there are other patents we don't know about, but the ones we do know about are primarily barium and aluminum. Neither humans or animals process large amounts of metals very well, and metals have a toxic effect over time because we can't process them out of our systems. Somebody has to take the blame when people start dropping, and war is probably going seen as the only option to fight off "those evil poisoner people".
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
Geoengineering would hurt some people. Global warming is good for some of us in the northern climates because it is giving us a longer growing season.
Note I'm not arguing about if it exists, but the reality is climate changed is a mixed bag that hurts some people and benefits other people depending on where you are. There are scientific papers about this. Thus any geoengineering to reverse climate change will also hurt some people and benefit others.
A better idea would be to focus on the real problems such as pollution, reducing waste, war, etc.
"maybe we don't know everything there is to know about geoengineering"
That is the understatement of the year. More like, we know almost nothing about geo-engineering. The reason we know almost nothing is that we have only studied a few dozen accidental effects on the climate from human activities. We have these accidental effects, and we have computer models. While I concede that the computer models have gotten quite good lately, I certainly would not bet the planet's future on their ability to accurately predict unintended consequences. So, that leaves what? Are you proposing that we try some trial and error experiments? If you are to get much data from this it would have to be huge. It has taken a century of burning fossil fuels as fast as we can get it out of the ground to get us into this mess. What kind of trial do you suggest?
I guess it depends on who you believe, but there have been climate scientists that have said we are beyond the tipping point, that even if we reduce emissions warming will happen. Ok well if that's true, and if it is true that the warming will be a net harmful thing, then some kind of geo engineering would be necessary. You can't very well say "Reducing CO2 won't fix the problem, but let's do as much of that as we can and only do that and then cry about the problem!"
Your complaint about geoengineering is that it's unpredictable. The problem with global warming is that it's unpredictable. We don't know precisely what will happen, only that we probably won't like it.
My (likely) worst case scenario: an ice age in 100 years. That would be worse than global warming.
We know how to emit stuff. We know how to burn stuff to stay warm. But the only way we know how to cool stuff is by generating heat.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
There's nothing wrong with testing geoengineering techniques so long as there is no possible runaway state. We might spread nutrients to seed blooms of alga and seaweed that will pull carbon from the air and, after incorporating it into their own growth, sink to abyssal depths and then stay out of circulation for long periods of time. Such a process would run only in the presence of the added nutrient.
And nothing requires geoengineering to occupy the whole planet. There are all sorts of local processes that could be exploited, such as spraying seawater into the air off a dry coast to produce a cloud street blowing over land. You would get increased precipitation for the dry area as son as the could hit mountains, at the same time as having a cloud that raises the local albedo ("makes that part of the Earth white"). Again, this is not a runaway process; turn off the spraying, and the cloud street disappears.
Can you cite any evidence of "backpedaling"? The global warming 'pause' is more politics than science
Thus demonstrating and extremely narrow definition of geo-engineering (which somehow excludes dominating the landscape if climate changing practices like... oh, I dunno, forced agriculture, urban sprawl (as opposed to urban hives), fracking from one horizon to the other, mass deforestation, etc etc etc ad nauseam.) Developing healthy practices that both sustain people while reversing the damage (and yes, we've a myriad of examples to choose from, and many many more in the pipeline) AT SCALE... is geo-engineering, too.
... hopefully there are more somewhere out there to finally raise a public voice against the insanity that is geoengineering.
Disregarding the doubtful science/engineering for a moment, just the motivation behind geoengineering seems flawed. Seriously, we want to maintain some sort of agreed upon status quo of climate? What in the entire universe is unchanging? Nothing. So why should our climate somehow be exempt?
There is only one action required by people to 'engineer' the planet sanely: stop being wasteful.
Given the size of the human population, the reality of the requirements for survival, and the reality of human nature, we will always need fossil fuels, factories, massive farming, etc. The problem is that we use our resources with gross inefficiency and thoughtlessness. Curb that tendency and accept that things will always change, and our species will probably do fine.
"Consensus" in science is _always_ a political construct.
An obvious one is small scale experiments on oceanic plants, possibly engineered, that could sequester carbon dioxide. For example, the ideal plant would be a carbon-fixing plant that has relatively small iron and phosphorus needs and sinks once it dies. You could drop a lot of carbon into the bottom of the ocean fast with a plant like that. And if it's a huge monoculture, then eventually something will figure out how to eat it.
I guess I should have been shorter.
My suggestion is that when you are presented with two doors, behind one you know there is death, behind the other you have no f'ng idea. Only an idiot would chose the death one. Taking a chance is better than not having a chance!
Every study that comes out says that we need to cut unrealistic amounts of carbon and we need to do it yesterday. Meanwhile politicians only commit to mandates that aren't even as good as what realistically could be done and industry just continues on as usual.
Do you all think this problem is going to solve itself?
On the hopeful side... at least once everything that naturally lives on Antarctica is dead because it can't adapt fast enough we will have a nice chunk of land we can bomb to create the nuclear winter we will need just to keep alive.