Fwd: [geo] ARCTIC MOMENTUM – International Event on Arctic Climate Intervention
H simmens
Author of A Climate Vocabulary of the Future
@herbsimmens
HerbSimmens.com
De : Anton Keskinen <keskin...@gmail.com>
Date: sam. 26 août 2023 à 14:10
Subject: [geo] ARCTIC MOMENTUM – International Event on Arctic Climate Intervention
To: <geoengi...@googlegroups.com>Hello everyone,--
I wish to inform you that Operaatio Arktis (operaatioarktis.fi/en) is organizing a public event ARCTIC MOMENTUM on 31st August in Helsinki, Finland. This event is about the state of the Arctic, and why we should conduct more research on climate interventions. Event page with more information on the high level goals, as well as the program: https://www.operaatioarktis.fi/arcticmomentum
We are a group of climate activists, turned from the street movement to advance and lobby for climate intervention research. Our goal is to preserve the Arctic Summer Sea Ice. For that we urge the Finnish government to take lead on the research needed. We are open for the possibility of finding several complementing methods to achieve this – perhaps some direct sea ice growth manipulation and SRM combined with the obvious emission reductions and GHG removal. Part of our mission is to bring different stakeholders and research teams together to enable visioning how climate intervention methods could compliment each other, instead fo focusing on debating which one is better or worse idea.
The public session on 31st August is part of a larger three-day gathering, where we bring together indigenous leaders, activists, scientists, government officials and policy makers, to discuss who, if at all, should we move forward with preserving the Arctic.
One of our main messages is that we must shift from the old climate paradigm (Climate Mitigation) to a new climate paradigm (Climate Repair). The old paradigm is about reducing emissions, accepting the damage that's unavoidable with emission cuts, and adapting when possible. The new paradigm states that we must reduce emissions, and try to prevent and repair the damage that's unavoidable even with sharp emission cuts, and adapt when possible. While the old paradigm presents what we call in our publication Arctic Endgame "politics of accepted victims", the new paradigm is antidote for this.
We aim to change this climate paradigm first in Finland, and then in the whole World.You can read Arctic Endgame here: https://www.operaatioarktis.fi/en/arctic-endgame
For those of you (I assume most) who cannot attend our public event on 31st in person, the event will be streamed on our Youtube page: https://www.youtube.com/@operaatioarktis2193
Follow us onInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/operaatioarktis/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/OperaatioArktis
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/OperaatioArktis
Subscribe our news letter on the bottom of our website: operaatioarktis.fi/en
Attached the program of our public event:
All the best and thanks for reading,
Anton Keskinen
Operaatio Arktis
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John Nissen
with stringent emission reductions.
losses that will be caused by the greenhouse gases already emitted into the atmosphere.
2. Carbon Dioxide Removal (removing greenhouse gases from the atmosphere)
3. Targeted Geoengineering (e.g. supporting glaciers with physical structures)
reductions.
- Sauli Niinistö, President of Finland
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rob...@rtulip.net
Dear Anton
I write on behalf of the Planetary Restoration Action Group and the Healthy Planet Action Coalition to warmly welcome your initiative in organising the Arctic Momentum Conference this week. Congratulations on arranging such an excellent program.
PRAG and HPAC members plan to attend the public online sessions of the conference via the YouTube link in your email and welcome this opportunity to listen to the discussion.
We would like to hear more about your work and could invite you to present to one of our fortnightly online discussion meetings.
We fully support your Arctic Endgame analysis that explains why climate repair to preserve the year-round ice cover of the Arctic Ocean should be researched immediately. The research in your paper is superb and I hope it can be widely read. I like your analogy of the Arctic as the heart of the Earth’s global climate system, and particularly note your comment that current policy “sends a clear and unrelenting message to Finland's young people: our future and security do not truly matter in Finnish politics.”
Best wishes for a successful event.
Robert Tulip
From: geoengi...@googlegroups.com <geoengi...@googlegroups.com> On Behalf Of Anton Keskinen
Sent: Saturday, August 26, 2023 9:50 PM
To: geoengi...@googlegroups.com
Subject: [geo] ARCTIC MOMENTUM – International Event on Arctic Climate Intervention
Hello everyone,
I wish to inform you that Operaatio Arktis (operaatioarktis.fi/en) is organizing a public event ARCTIC MOMENTUM on 31st August in Helsinki, Finland. This event is about the state of the Arctic, and why we should conduct more research on climate interventions. Event page with more information on the high level goals, as well as the program: https://www.operaatioarktis.fi/arcticmomentum
We are a group of climate activists, turned from the street movement to advance and lobby for climate intervention research. Our goal is to preserve the Arctic Summer Sea Ice. For that we urge the Finnish government to take lead on the research needed. We are open for the possibility of finding several complementing methods to achieve this – perhaps some direct sea ice growth manipulation and SRM combined with the obvious emission reductions and GHG removal. Part of our mission is to bring different stakeholders and research teams together to enable visioning how climate intervention methods could compliment each other, instead fo focusing on debating which one is better or worse idea.
The public session on 31st August is part of a larger three-day gathering, where we bring together indigenous leaders, activists, scientists, government officials and policy makers, to discuss who, if at all, should we move forward with preserving the Arctic.
One of our main messages is that we must shift from the old climate paradigm (Climate Mitigation) to a new climate paradigm (Climate Repair). The old paradigm is about reducing emissions, accepting the damage that's unavoidable with emission cuts, and adapting when possible. The new paradigm states that we must reduce emissions, and try to prevent and repair the damage that's unavoidable even with sharp emission cuts, and adapt when possible. While the old paradigm presents what we call in our publication Arctic Endgame "politics of accepted victims", the new paradigm is antidote for this.
We aim to change this climate paradigm first in Finland, and then in the whole World.
You can read Arctic Endgame here: https://www.operaatioarktis.fi/en/arctic-endgame
For those of you (I assume most) who cannot attend our public event on 31st in person, the event will be streamed on our Youtube page: https://www.youtube.com/@operaatioarktis2193
Follow us on
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/operaatioarktis/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/OperaatioArktis
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/OperaatioArktis
Subscribe our news letter on the bottom of our website: operaatioarktis.fi/en
Attached the program of our public event:
All the best and thanks for reading,
Anton Keskinen
Operaatio Arktis
Anderson, Paul
The starting time of the 4-hour event is 10 AM Eastern (Daylight) Time USA. You only see that when you get into the registration section of the website. They made it convenient for USA and Canada to participate. Thanks!!
Paul
Doc / Dr TLUD / Paul S. Anderson, PhD
Email: psan...@ilstu.edu Skype: paultlud Mobile & WhatsApp: 309-531-4434
Website: https://woodgas.com see Resources page for 2023 “Roadmap for Climate Intervention with Biochar” and 2020 white paper, 2) RoCC kilns, and 3) TLUD stove technology.
From: planetary-...@googlegroups.com <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>
On Behalf Of rob...@rtulip.net
Sent: Monday, August 28, 2023 6:09 PM
To: keskin...@gmail.com
Cc: 'Planetary Restoration' <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>; healthy-planet-action-coalition <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: [prag] RE: ARCTIC MOMENTUM – International Event on Arctic Climate Intervention
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John Nissen
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Stephen Salter
John
In your email of 14:35 today the attachment ‘Polar restoration v6 clean’ section 4.1 says that marine cloud brightening could have a theoretical limit of 1.5 Petawatt and sites a reference [26]. However I cannot find this reference in this attachment or the other three attachments to your email.
Please point me to it.
Stephen
Emeritus Professor of Engineering Design
School of Engineering
University of Edinburgh
Mayfield Road
Edinburgh EH9 3DW
Scotland
0131 662 1180
YouTube Jamie Taylor Power for Change
From: planetary-...@googlegroups.com <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>
On Behalf Of John Nissen
Sent: 29 August 2023 14:35
To: keskin...@gmail.com
Cc: rob...@rtulip.net; Planetary Restoration <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>; healthy-planet-action-coalition <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com>; Anderson, Paul <psan...@ilstu.edu>; Hans van der Loo <hans.va...@iier.eu>;
Wouter van Dieren | Inis Vitrin <wouter.v...@inisvitrin.nl>
Subject: Re: [prag] RE: ARCTIC MOMENTUM – International Event on Arctic Climate Intervention
This email was sent to you by someone outside the University.
You should only click on links or attachments if you are certain that the email is genuine and the content is safe.
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John Nissen
Stephen Salter
John
Following your statement in section 4.1 in attachment ‘v6 clean’ in your email of 29 August to Anton and your email to me that I was the source of the limit of 1 Petawatt I have NEVER said that there was an upper limit to the cooling power of marine cloud brightening. It just gets harder as we try to do more.
The Twomey work showed that each doubling of the concentration of condensation increases cloud reflectivity by 5.8%
The total solar input is 173 Petawatts. Charlson and Lovelock in their CLAW paper gave the fraction of low but not high clouds over the ocean as 18% so a doubling would remove 1.8 Petawatts and a quadrupling 3.6 Petawatts.
Vallina’s maps below show large areas with nuclei concentrations below 20 /cm3 and if necessary we could increase this to 320 giving an increase of 23% but I think that this would never be necessary.
However Ahlm et al showed that marine cloud brightening was just as effective under blue skies so the 18% is not a limit. I think that this was because of the longer life of the nuclei and the time to move to a region of higher relative humidity.
If you compare grey scales and ship tracks you will see sometimes see contrast changes far higher than the 15% threshold of contrast detection of the human eye, 3 to 4 bars in the 20 bar grey scale below.
We do not always see ship tracks but with improved forecasting we should be able to cherry-pick the ocean regions which would be highest in the merit order of cooling susceptibility.
The solar energy reflected by a cloud drop is millions of times more than the surface tension energy needed to make a condensation nucleus on which it grew. The short life of spray and the speed of spray vessels gives regional and seasonal control. Your statement about an upper limit does not help raise funding for research.
Stephen Salter
Ocean Cooling Technology Ltd.
Unit 3 Edgefield Industrial Estate
EH20 9TB
Scotland
0131 662 1180
John Nissen
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Douglas Grandt
Doug
On Aug 31, 2023, at 10:15 AM, John Nissen <johnnis...@gmail.com> wrote:
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rob...@rtulip.net
The Healthy Planet Action Coalition welcomes Mr Anton Keskinen, organiser of the just completed Arctic Momentum Conference in Finland, as our guest speaker this week.
Date: Thursday 7 September
Time: 10pm Finland (=3pm EST, 8pm UK, 5am Friday Australia AEST)
Duration: 90 minutes
Link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/88954851189?pwd=WVZoeTBnN3kyZFoyLzYxZ1JNbDFPUT09
Anton will explain key outcomes from the Conference followed by discussion with meeting participants. All welcome.
Operaatio Arktis (operaatioarktis.fi/en) organized the public event ARCTIC MOMENTUM on 31st August in Helsinki, Finland, about the state of the Arctic, and why we should conduct more research on climate interventions.
Event page with more information on the high level goals, as well as the program: https://www.operaatioarktis.fi/arcticmomentum
Description
“We are a group of climate activists, turned from the street movement to advance and lobby for climate intervention research. Our goal is to preserve the Arctic Summer Sea Ice. For that we urge the Finnish government to take lead on the research needed. We are open for the possibility of finding several complementing methods to achieve this – perhaps some direct sea ice growth manipulation and SRM combined with the obvious emission reductions and GHG removal. Part of our mission is to bring different stakeholders and research teams together to enable visioning how climate intervention methods could complement each other, instead of focusing on debating which one is better or worse idea.
The public session on 31st August is part of a larger three-day gathering, where we bring together indigenous leaders, activists, scientists, government officials and policy makers, to discuss who, if at all, should we move forward with preserving the Arctic.
One of our main messages is that we must shift from the old climate paradigm (Climate Mitigation) to a new climate paradigm (Climate Repair). The old paradigm is about reducing emissions, accepting the damage that's unavoidable with emission cuts, and adapting when possible. The new paradigm states that we must reduce emissions, and try to prevent and repair the damage that's unavoidable even with sharp emission cuts, and adapt when possible. While the old paradigm presents what we call in our publication Arctic Endgame "politics of accepted victims", the new paradigm is antidote for this.
We aim to change this climate paradigm first in Finland, and then in the whole World.
You can read Arctic Endgame here: https://www.operaatioarktis.fi/en/arctic-endgame
For those of you (I assume most) who cannot attend our public event on 31st in person, the event will be streamed on our Youtube page: https://www.youtube.com/@operaatioarktis2193
Follow us on
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/operaatioarktis/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/OperaatioArktis
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/OperaatioArktis
Ron Baiman
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_z-OwNu_8Uo&t=1333s
The Arctic Momentum movement and Anni's statement (that in addition to Anton's and the Momentum group's organizing efforts - inspired I believe by the June 6, 2023, CCRC Workshop on Albedo Enhancement and Refreezing the Arctic initiated by Robert Tulip - also benefited from the input of Daleanne Bourjaily and others) is in IMO brilliant!
Best,
Ron
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H simmens
Subject: HPAC this week: ARCTIC MOMENTUM Conference
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John Nissen
john moore grisco ?project - exciting - jakobshavn?
Leslie Field - Bright Ice Initiative (nonprofit) to Everyone 20:47
they gave arctic endgame to the environment minister of finland and he was already reading it
Jonathan Cole to Everyone 20:48
Anton, thank you for your personal story of urgent change of career path.
Doug Grandt to Everyone 20:51
'Climate Change in Sápmi – an overview and a Path Forward' was posted September 4 on @The Saami Council Facebook page
Download the PDF (English translation) here:
https://sametinget.no/_f/p1/iad354070-146e-4b02-ab4a-fd19df0c04fc/climate-change-in-sapmi-an-overview-and-a-path-forward-pdf.pdf
Jonathan Cole to Everyone 20:54
https://youtu.be/n1lHYM5Afkw?si=U0hReRYC7hOzZ682
XR rep seems somewhat excited about SRM via reflective materials.
Anton Keskinen (Operaatio Arktis) to Everyone 20:58
Herb, can I ask for a link to that statement you mentioned? From African NGOs
Clive Elsworth to Everyone 21:00
Thanks all. Got to go. ☺️
Leslie Field - Bright Ice Initiative (nonprofit) to Everyone 21:00
Robert’s ref to book on paradigm shifts - didn’t catch author and title - repeat or put in the chat please?
Doug Grandt to Everyone 21:02
Laptop battery died … back on phone
Lee McNair to Everyone 21:03
This has been wonderful; so good to hear from a young person. Have another meeting so must go. Thanks all.
Herb Simmens to Everyone 21:03
Leslie,he Structure of Scientific Revolutions Thomas Kuhn
Leslie Field - Bright Ice Initiative (nonprofit) to Everyone 21:03
Thanks, Herb!
You to Everyone 21:05
Stewardship for the planet!
Barbara J. Sneath MEER.org to Everyone 21:06
Thanks everyone.
Herb Simmens to Everyone 21:07
Anton, Here’s the group in Africa I spoke of…
https://www.realafricaclimatesummit.org/declaration
Leslie Field - Bright Ice Initiative (nonprofit) to Everyone 21:14
they’ll be virtual at nyclimate week and in person at cop in dubai and in person at arctic circle assembly
Daniel Kieve to Everyone 21:14
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jan/01/extinction-rebellion-announces-move-away-from-disruptive-tactics
Anton Keskinen (Operaatio Arktis) to Everyone 21:15
thank you Leslie
Leslie Field - Bright Ice Initiative (nonprofit) to Everyone 21:16
ronal larson salty ice
Anton Keskinen (Operaatio Arktis) to Everyone 21:20
great Jonathan!
Daniel Kieve to Everyone 21:22
Roger Hallam's https://twitter.com/RogerHallamCS21/status/1691410488452657152
Herb Simmens to Everyone 21:26
I’ve been starting to promote to activists that the two H’s - Hansen and Hallam - support cooling…
Anton Keskinen (Operaatio Arktis) to Everyone 21:26
that's great
read.ai meeting notes to Everyone 21:28
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rob...@rtulip.net
The recording of this meeting is at https://youtu.be/unPOcBY3idU
Thank you very much Anton for joining us.
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John Nissen
I am bringing the Planetary Restoration Action Group (PRAG) into the discussion, since we have focussed on refreezing the Arctic as the top priority for climate action. We are having our next meeting on Monday and would welcome you to join. We normally have our meetings at 9 pm UK time but could make it at 8 pm to suit you better if you were to attend. Please let us know if you might be able to make it.
People are particularly concerned about Stratospheric Aerosol Injection (SAI) being "high risk"; but researchers have given a great deal of attention to all the scientific arguments raised against SAI and say that there appear to be no risks which are not manageable in the case of injection of SO2 at mid to high latitude for refreezing the Arctic. Furthermore, if they were proved wrong, and some dreadful side-effect appeared, the aerosol injected at these latitudes only stays in the stratosphere for a few months, so its effects can be stopped reasonably quickly.
BTW, PRAG has tried to bring in the best science possible, and our members include Professor Peter Wadhams, who is a top expert on Arctic sea ice and has written the book "A Farewell to Ice" which I can recommend everyone to read if they haven't already.
Ron Baiman
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Ron Baiman
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Ye Tao
Dear Ron,
First, I also applaud Anton for an excellent presentation and
thank the whole team at Operatioo Arktis for being excellent
hosts. I thank you, Ron, for your enthusiasm, which I sadly find
problematic.
A major learning, or rather realization, for many of us at Arctic
Momentum is how little we understand the science of SAI, MCB, and
any of the many proposed regional techniques presented at the
conference. Some discussion groups also mentioned that we don't
yet have a clear idea on how to decide among various climatic
outcomes, even if assuming the science and engineering
eventually advance to such a point that climate and weather could
be designed with high fidelity. Our general state of ignorance
inspired my recent post about starting to develop "figure of
merit function(s)" to evaluate climate outcomes based on globally
agreed upon targets ultimately stemming from a set of morally
robust values. Given ubiquitous chasms in knowledge gaps, we
would be mistakenly putting the horse before the cart try
leveraging the moment for the specific end of getting SAI
implemented.
There is no skipping steps to good science and engineering, and
SAI and MCB are a couple decades of research away from acceptable
scientific understanding and technical readiness. There are so
many known unknowns and known problems with SAI, some of which I
have mentioned before here on this forum and which have yet to be
addressed.
In the interim, there are a variety of local geoengineering methods that need to be given priority. Global safety must be prioritized in our line of work. Promising local methods include mechanically slowing down ice melting by raising kinetic barriers, MEER for adaptive mitigation to help victims of our excesses here and now, ice thickening methods to preserve annually average albedo, and targeted preservation of Arctic ice by new methods I will hopefully soon share in a HPAC talk.
While collaboration and support by Finland, Norway, Canada, the
US, [RUSSIA], and Arctic indigenous peoples would be
critically important, they are insufficient for ensuring that
modifying global climate is done in a factually democratic
fashion, by the people and for the people. While we know very
little about SAI, what we do know is that anything SAI with polar
impact would have a global impact elsewhere. All sovereign
states need to be included in this conversation, at the very
beginning.
Since the science is simply not there. Let's start here.
Experimental science is where priority must be place, not computer
simulations which not event the coders trust. It is insufficient
to appear to be inclusive. I see a growing trend towards building
a facade of inclusiveness. It is suspect to fund a selected few
high profile and visible Global South researchers to participate
in research using computer codes developed by academics from the
Northern, studying specific methods proposed by a handful of
individuals from the North. If we were truly undertaking this
endeavor for justice and a future worth fighting for, we must do
much more and much better.
Best
Ye
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Sev Clarke
On 9 Sep 2023, at 3:15 pm, Ye Tao <t...@rowland.harvard.edu> wrote:
Dear Ron,
First, I also applaud Anton for an excellent presentation and thank the whole team at Operatioo Arktis for being excellent hosts. I thank you, Ron, for your enthusiasm, which I sadly find problematic. Ron’s and our enthusiasm has many legs to its' stool, several of which seem likely to be both feasible and effective. This is far better than fatalism, denial, obstruction, BAU, mild or delayed action, or apathy.
A major learning, or rather realization, for many of us at Arctic Momentum is how little we understand the science of SAI, MCB, and any of the many proposed regional techniques presented at the conference. Some discussion groups also mentioned that we don't yet have a clear idea on how to decide among various climatic outcomes, even if assuming the science and engineering eventually advance to such a point that climate and weather could be designed with high fidelity. We cannot afford to wait for high fidelity. Nor do we need to decide now on which are to be the specific climate interventions and locales in which to deploy them. Our general state of ignorance inspired my recent post about starting to develop "figure of merit function(s)" to evaluate climate outcomes based on globally agreed upon targets ultimately stemming from a set of morally robust values. A small group at NOAC/HPAC/PRAG are now developing those very same figure of merit functions. Given ubiquitous chasms in knowledge gaps, we would be mistakenly putting the horse before the cart try leveraging the moment for the specific end of getting SAI implemented. There are several NOAC-based methods that are safer and often easier, cheaper and quicker to develop that is SAI.
There is no skipping steps to good science and engineering, and SAI and MCB are a couple decades of research away from acceptable scientific understanding and technical readiness. I disagree, several NOAC methods might well be sufficiently developed to warrant testing within just a few years. There are so many known unknowns and known problems with SAI, some of which I have mentioned before here on this forum and which have yet to be addressed. But less so with some of the other methods.
In the interim, there are a variety of local geoengineering methods that need to be given priority. Global safety must be prioritized in our line of work. In the emergency situation we find ourselves, and using gated, localised testing, global safety means that some risks must be taken as they are far less than not acting. One needs to balance risk and likely effect against risk and likely effect, just as do professional risk managers. Promising local methods include mechanically slowing down ice melting by raising kinetic barriers, MEER for adaptive mitigation to help victims of our excesses here and now, ice thickening methods to preserve annually average albedo, and targeted preservation of Arctic ice by new methods Agreed, though our figure of merit assessments may well rule out many such methods. I will hopefully soon share in a HPAC talk.
While collaboration and support by Finland, Norway, Canada, the US, [RUSSIA], and Arctic indigenous peoples would be critically important, they are insufficient for ensuring that modifying global climate is done in a factually democratic fashion In an emergency situation democracies typically delegate decisions to those best placed to make them, by the people and for the people. While we know very little about SAI, what we do know is that anything SAI with polar impact would have a global impact elsewhere. All sovereign states need to be included in this conversation, at the very beginning. But not where the effects of gated testing are likely to be localised. Then, only early notification and published EIS’s should be required.
Since the science is simply not there. Let's start here. Experimental science is where priority must be place, not computer simulations which not event the coders trust. Right, but do not stop trying to model the effects. It is insufficient to appear to be inclusive. I see a growing trend towards building a facade of inclusiveness. It is suspect to fund a selected few high profile and visible Global South researchers to participate in research using computer codes developed by academics from the Northern, studying specific methods proposed by a handful of individuals from the North. If we were truly undertaking this endeavor for justice and a future worth fighting for, we must do much more and much better. I repeat my words on emergency situations. Inclusion is great if it can be achieved with little loss of development speed. Moreover, as developing nations are likely to be first and most adversely affected by global warming (Arctic nations excluded), these are just the locales where early testing should take place - inclusively.
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Douglas Grandt
On Sep 9, 2023, at 3:15 AM, 'Sev Clarke' via Planetary Restoration <planetary-...@googlegroups.com> wrote:
Folks,
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Robert Chris
Really important issues being touched on
here. I've been otherwise occupied in recent days but plan to
watch the recording shortly and offer some further thoughts
then. I sense we're getting to the core of why decisive and
effective action is so challenging. I don't think it's
impossible, but to make it happen we need to calibrate our
expectations across a number of interconnected realms of which
the technology is possibly the least demanding.
Robert
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Tom Goreau
For Albedo modification fans:
This paper just received says that plastic pollution in the sea acts to increase foam at the surface.
I’ve asked the author if he thinks it significantly decreases 1) Albedo and 2) CO2 Exchange, and 3) Temperature Transfer through the double boundary layers.
Tom
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Ye Tao
Hi Sev and Doug,
Thanks for sharing your responses. I see fundamentally agreement in our stances. I provide responses in blue.
Ye
Folks,
I have a mixed response to this post by Ye. Those ideas I somewhat disagree with, or which require greater nuance, I respond to in bold print below.
On 9 Sep 2023, at 3:15 pm, Ye Tao <t...@rowland.harvard.edu> wrote:
Dear Ron,
First, I also applaud Anton for an excellent presentation and thank the whole team at Operatioo Arktis for being excellent hosts. I thank you, Ron, for your enthusiasm, which I sadly find problematic. Ron’s and our enthusiasm has many legs to its' stool, several of which seem likely to be both feasible and effective. This is far better than fatalism, denial, obstruction, BAU, mild or delayed action, or apathy. I share the enthusiasm for research and action. I warm against a blind and dangerous enthusiasm for SAI, demonstrably the most problematic tool in our kit.
A major learning, or rather realization, for many of us at Arctic Momentum is how little we understand the science of SAI, MCB, and any of the many proposed regional techniques presented at the conference. Some discussion groups also mentioned that we don't yet have a clear idea on how to decide among various climatic outcomes, even if assuming the science and engineering eventually advance to such a point that climate and weather could be designed with high fidelity. We cannot afford to wait for high fidelity. Nor do we need to decide now on which are to be the specific climate interventions and locales in which to deploy them. Agreed, hence the need for immediate local adaptation with mitigation cobenefits. Our general state of ignorance inspired my recent post about starting to develop "figure of merit function(s)" to evaluate climate outcomes based on globally agreed upon targets ultimately stemming from a set of morally robust values. A small group at NOAC/HPAC/PRAG are now developing those very same figure of merit functions. Excellent. Given ubiquitous chasms in knowledge gaps, we would be mistakenly putting the horse before the cart try leveraging the moment for the specific end of getting SAI implemented. There are several NOAC-based methods that are safer and often easier, cheaper and quicker to develop that is SAI. Great! My question is why are they not featured in Arctic Momentum, let alone the main televised event? ;)
There is no skipping steps to good science and engineering, and SAI and MCB are a couple decades of research away from acceptable scientific understanding and technical readiness. I disagree, several NOAC methods might well be sufficiently developed to warrant testing within just a few years. A few years does not mean steps have been skipped. Nothing should be allowed into the field without rigorous testing. There are so many known unknowns and known problems with SAI, some of which I have mentioned before here on this forum and which have yet to be addressed. But less so with some of the other methods. Agreed. Again perplexing why SAI gets all the attention and mention, even by Ron?!?
In the interim, there are a variety of local geoengineering methods that need to be given priority. Global safety must be prioritized in our line of work. In the emergency situation we find ourselves, and using gated, localised testing, global safety means that some risks must be taken as they are far less than not acting. One needs to balance risk and likely effect against risk and likely effect, just as do professional risk managers. Key word here is localized. Full agreement. Promising local methods include mechanically slowing down ice melting by raising kinetic barriers, MEER for adaptive mitigation to help victims of our excesses here and now, ice thickening methods to preserve annually average albedo, and targeted preservation of Arctic ice by new methods Agreed, though our figure of merit assessments may well rule out many such methods. I will hopefully soon share in a HPAC talk.
While collaboration and support by Finland, Norway, Canada, the US, [RUSSIA], and Arctic indigenous peoples would be critically important, they are insufficient for ensuring that modifying global climate is done in a factually democratic fashion In an emergency situation democracies typically delegate decisions to those best placed to make them, Be careful here! So much assumptions and choice of value systems. by the people and for the people. While we know very little about SAI, what we do know is that anything SAI with polar impact would have a global impact elsewhere. All sovereign states need to be included in this conversation, at the very beginning. But not where the effects of gated testing are likely to be localised. Certainly. I was referring to if SAI was the be considered, due to context in Ron's email. Then, only early notification and published EIS’s should be required.
Since the science is simply not there. Let's start here. Experimental science is where priority must be place, not computer simulations which not even the coders trust. Right, but do not stop trying to model the effects. agreed, with the understanding that modeling is of secondary value in the past and the foreseeable future of information technology. It is insufficient to appear to be inclusive. I see a growing trend towards building a facade of inclusiveness. It is suspect to fund a selected few high profile and visible Global South researchers to participate in research using computer codes developed by academics from the Northern, studying specific methods proposed by a handful of individuals from the North. If we were truly undertaking this endeavor for justice and a future worth fighting for, we must do much more and much better. I repeat my words on emergency situations. Inclusion is great if it can be achieved with little loss of development speed. Moreover, as developing nations are likely to be first and most adversely affected by global warming (Arctic nations excluded), these are just the locales where early testing should take place - inclusively. Localized approaches most certainly can be fully inclusive.
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Tom Goreau
The author’s response seems to be that even though we are fast approaching the point where there will be more plastic than fish in the ocean, it may stabilize ocean foam and increase albedo.
From:
Peter Fischer <peter....@hest.ethz.ch>
Date: Saturday, September 9, 2023 at 1:59 PM
To: Tom Goreau <gor...@globalcoral.org>
Subject: Albedo
Hi Tom,
If at all a). b) and c) need much higher concentrations. And a) only if the particle are primarily hydrophobic and anisotropic in shape: Round, hydrophilic particles normally stabilize foams. With most plastic garbage being hydrophilic and milled down (maybe not into a spherical shape but at least having smooth surfaces), we propose that microplastic is stabilizing sea foam i.e. increase albedo.
Best, p
Dear Peter,
Thanks!
The first time we saw plastic while diving it was a shock, but no surprise because the mangroves were the garbage dumps.
Now we see more and more on every dive.
Boaters only see what floats on the top, but we divers see it all through the water column and all over the bottom as well!
Best wishes,
Tom
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Ronal Larson
Also, biological material affects the fluid mechanics of the water surface, resulting for example, in long-lasting surface foams.58
Ron Baiman
Dear Ye, all,Last year I spoke to General Gus Perna who headed the covid vaccine task force in the US. The scientists were reluctant to approve the science, there was so much more research to be done.What the general said was that he took into account the strategic risk to health and the economy of waiting for a 100% consensus as he would do in a conflict situation.On those grounds he decided that 75% would translate to approval. So that is when the vaccine was launched. To wait in a situation of that magnitude was no longer an option. Have we not reached the same point on planetary cooling?So given that there are three or four nature -based/biomimetic interventions that could be immediately deployed in field trials, should we not together identify and choose the ones that have the most potential right now? That will allow us to seek funding and priorities for both governance and the trials themselves.Looking forward to your advice, as many of you as possible.Best regards,Dale AnneOp za 9 sep. 2023 01:15 schreef Ye Tao <t...@rowland.harvard.edu>:
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Ye Tao
Dear Ron,
We are in full agreement that the urgency of the situation
demands immediate cooling action by a range of safe
high-leverage methods. What explains our residual disagreement
include
1) Specific risks and known issues associated with SAI.
Examples requiring study are numerous and include direct NOx and
H2O combustion emissions during injection flights and their impact
on O3, CH4, and the
climate. Endemic stratospheric water and NOx
concentrations are sufficiently low that injection aircraft
flights could have a substantial impact. We also need to
understand the impact of particles and moisture falling over the
poles and impact on annual surface energy budget. And the UV
termination shock issue, which I have raised several times, will
need to be studied by evolutionary plant biologists.
2) Implication of the chosen cooling strategies for humanity's
future prospects for energy production, food production, and
social organization. The future is one of energy paucity. Nate
Hagens does a great job synthesizing that field. Under
foreseeable energy constraints, maintaining sufficient value for
Energy Return on Investment (EROI) will be crucial if we were to
deliver a prosperous future for all people. Empirical analyses by
Charles Hall's group suggests EROI>20 to be necessary to
deliver human development index of the current global average.
Unfortunately, wind and solar are probably between EROI10-20 using
currently scalable technology. This means that if solar
efficiency were to be further reduced by some 10% due to aerosol
blocking, we would be really looking at a very challenging energy
future, one that is unlikely to sustain a global SAI operation,
ensuring termination shock.
I must therefore disagree with your statement that: "We need to
get beyond the conventional concern about the "extreme known, and
unknown", risks of high leverage methods like SAI, and start
incrementally piloting and testing them." Short-termistic
thinking got us into this mess. Let us not repeat the same
mistake twice because we won't have another chance.
Lastly, the fact that we cannot yet levitate sulfur into the
stratosphere without also injecting H2O and NOx at the same time
makes it wrong to call it a "Nature-based solution". Perhaps SAI
proponents should learn to tame volcanos;)
We as a community need to stop presenting SAI as the primary
direct cooling intervention ready for deployment. This cannot be
farther from the truth. If someone at Arctic Momentum stated that
the primary difficulty with SAI were geopolitical (which they
are), then they have not looked into the state of science:
nonexistent from the perspective of chemistry, material science,
experimental ecology, and experimental environmental science.
Best,
Ye
The level of enthusiasm shown is not
Ye Tao
Hi Tom,
Thanks for sharing this unique and intriguing study.
The paper suggests that ocean surface micro plastic concentrations between 1-5 g/m2 would have a measurable increase over the baseline. If someone were to propose this as a way to brightening the planet, then a lot of plastics would be needed. 1.5 g/m2 as the "target" steady state concentration, global ocean would contain at its surface 540 Mton of plastics at any given time. This is almost twice the global annual plastic production. And since the lifetime of microplastics is on the order of a couple of years due to oxidative degradation, micro plastic-induced planetary brightening would need ensuring most of our plastics ends up finely ground and floating on the ocean.
In any case, I think we can all agree that this is not a viable
path forward. But it is still scientifically interesting to study
the actual albedo impact. I suspect CERES data coupled with in
situ plastic concentration measurements by boats operated by the
several nonprofits tackling ocean plastic problem could help to
put some number on global albedo impact. People who know those
nonprofits should perhaps reach out.
Cheers,
Ye
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rob de laet
Ye Tao
Thanks Bhaskar,
Fascinating field of study indeed.
Fig 2 in
this review suggests possibly significant radiative
impact. Getting to the bottom of the diurnal
cycle in aerosol emissions might inform ongoing brightening
methods and inspire new ones. This
study finds enrichment of biomolecules in the ocean surface
microlayer relative to the bulk sea water, but the enrichment
ratios are rather modest. Given the thinness of the surface
layer, this modest enrichment ratio means that the total amount of
material in the SML is negligible compared to what is found in the
ocean depths. This in turn suggests that the amount of material
exogenous delivered, if preferentially aggregating and
concentrating at the surface, could have tremendous impact on
ocean-atmosphere exchange. Here
is one example involving the infamous forever chemicals.
The sea-air interface thus appears to be a high-leverage
location. We need to proceed with caution!
Ye
Ocean Suface Microlayer ( not plastic), SML, may contribute more.
In nature Diatoms are the most likely contributors to SML.Diatoms produce lipids and expel it, the lipids float on the water surface.
Growing Diatoms is easier than dumping plastic in oceans.
Regards
Bhaskar
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Stephen Salter
Hi All
I am attaching a note about a way to concentrate plastic which came out of a surprising result from tank tests of wave energy devices. If the freeboard is low there can be downward forces during the crest and the trough of a wave and a net force into the wind direction.
Big rings would find their own way to the centre of a gyre in the same way that the plastic does. 1 km diameter high tensile steel would not survive but 250 micron poly ethylene can take 17% strain and so would be safe.
Stephen
From: Ye Tao <t...@rowland.harvard.edu>
Sent: 10 September 2023 14:25
To: Bhaskar M V <bhaska...@gmail.com>
Cc: Tom Goreau <gor...@globalcoral.org>; Sev Clarke <sevc...@icloud.com>; Ron Baiman <rpba...@gmail.com>; Stephen Salter <S.Sa...@ed.ac.uk>; Robert Tulip <rob...@rtulip.net>; healthy-planet-action-coalition <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com>;
Planetary Restoration <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>; NOAC <noac-m...@googlegroups.com>; geoengineering <geoengi...@googlegroups.com>; Anton Keskinen <keskin...@gmail.com>; Ellen Haaslahti <el...@operaatioarktis.fi>
Subject: Re: Does plastic pollution cause more sea foam?
This email was sent to you by someone outside the University.
You should only click on links or attachments if you are certain that the email is genuine and the content is safe.
Thanks Bhaskar,
Ye Tao
Hi Stephen,
I am confused by Fig 3 in your note. The figure does not seem
to provide curves for 10mm and 20mm "freeboard". Can you also
define "Freeboard" in this context and what is meant by vertical
force = 0, since force can be relative. It would be helpful to
sketch the force measurement setup. Also, can you discuss why a
cylindrical body model is a good approximation for all types of
plastic shapes? What about bags and caps? Do you expect objects
to jump over the barrier, i.e. completely exiting water, or is the
boundary crossing due to relative dynamic bouyance difference
between the enclosure and the object to be caught?
Why has no one tried this? What is the smallest sized-ring you
think would be big enough for some tests? Our team in Freetown
is able to make PET tubes from bottles that has decent leak
tightness. We maybe able to make rings up to 10s m in diameter.
Do you think there is a point in doing a small scale test along
the coast?
Ye
The University of Edinburgh is a charitable body, registered in Scotland, with registration number SC005336. Is e buidheann carthannais a th’ ann an Oilthigh Dhùn Èideann, clàraichte an Alba, àireamh clàraidh SC005336. --
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Ye Tao
Hi all,
This episode of the Reality
Roundtable by Nate Hagens discusses plight of the oceans and
features guests whose expertise could bolster the HPAC. The
episode contains many highlights, including mention total biomass
potentially being inversely correlated with ecosystem
simplification during mass extinction. SAI, olivine, and OIF are
discussed in the last part.
We could use more ecological perspectives in the comparatively (not absolutely) techno-utopian penchant within our ranks. In the very least, welcoming them to criticize our ideas would help us improve our approaches.
Thoughts?
Ye
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Ye Tao
Hi Doug,
I agree that computational modeling is indispensable for teasing
out climate impact. I am sorry for triggering you with the term
"computer scientists". From the naive perspective of someone like
me who spend most time making instruments and measuring things,
computational climate scientists are indeed computer gurus.
I am glad to hear that, to the best of your knowledge, no patent was or would be applied for SAI and MCB concepts and delivery technologies. I however heard rumors of otherwise. But let's hope those are only rumors and no profit making intentions are behind their funding and development. I would strongly encourage colleagues in SAI and MCB to make such nonprofit, purely for public good intentions vocally and prominently known in public presentations.
I have no problem regarding agricultural yields when it comes to
photosynthetic yields. My critique of SAI is its likely negative
impact on transition to renewable energy sources including
concentrating solar and likely
wind as well, due to global suppression of thermal
gradients. Regarding agriculture, global suppression of both
source and sink rates for freshwater (from soil perspective) is
another potential disadvantage of global solar radiation
management with respect to land-based radiative management.
Other comparisons are provided in Table 2 of Seneviratne et al
2018 (attached).
It is indeed naive to brushoff known issues as parts of the trade-offs. I hope you agree that the risks inherent in SAI and (much) larger than those from all other SRM techniques combined. If you think otherwise, I would be interested in reading your response to Table 2 in Seneviratne et al.
Cheers,
Ye
Couple comments on that to correct errors:
- People funded in places like Africa to understand impacts are *NOT* computer scientists, they are typically climate scientists. Conducting analysis that uses the output of climate models, because of course the only way to predict climate response is with a model. No experiment exists that will tell you some of the things that people are interested in, in terms of how a deployment would affect precipitation patterns, for example. (Also, most of the work in Africa was not funded by Silver Lining.)
- No clue what you mean by funding going to things amenable to patent protection. Basic ideas behind SAI and MCB are clearly not patentable, and no-one in the field has any interest in patents. So your claim here is simply false when it comes to SRM. If you meant CDR methods, then I’d agree.
- Re agricultural yield, cutting sunlight by order 1% (a HUGE intervention) by SAI might be expected naively to reduce photosynthesis by 1%, but because the direct light goes down by more than that and the diffuse light goes up, and because upper leaves are typically saturated anyway, then on average the net effect should be an increase in photosynthesis. There are uncertainties in how changing that direct/diffuse ratio affects ecosystems more broadly, though. As noted in an earlier thread, SAI would decrease CSP output but would yield benefits for solar PV as it is currently implemented. But regardless of the sign of the effect, nothing here is a showstopper, just stuff to be evaluated in trade-offs.
- Either MEER or MCB can be used for regional cooling, but any concentrated forcing over smaller areas, if it were implemented at sufficient scale to cool the global climate, will lead to larger shifts in precipitation and winds than a more spatially uniform forcing. So any method comes with different sets of risks and it is naïve to present any method as not having risks – they’re just different ones.
d
From: Ye Tao <t...@rowland.harvard.edu>
Sent: Sunday, September 10, 2023 5:51 AM
To: Dana Woods <oceans...@gmail.com>; Planetary Restoration <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>; Douglas MacMartin <dgm...@cornell.edu>; Anton Keskinen <keskin...@gmail.com>; Ellen Haaslahti <el...@operaatioarktis.fi>; 'SALTER Stephen' <S.Sa...@ed.ac.uk>
Subject: Re: [prag] Re: [geo] Recording of HPAC meeting with Anton Keskinen, Arctic Momentum Conference
Dear Dana,
Just saw your message after responding to Ron. Yes, experimental science must be supported. So far, we could do better. Those featured in televised portions of the Arctic Momentum were computer simulation students, not field scientists. Those groups Silverlining gave resources to in Africa to study geoengineering are similarly computer scientists. Let's hope an emphasis on experimental science becomes visible going forward.
As far as I can see, funding appears more plentiful for methods amenable to be put under patent protection. I presented MEER publically for years, including at Arctic Momentum, but have yet to be contacted by funders like Silverlining. I am not sure if our emphasis on open-source, nonprofit, grass-root, and people-centered approach has anything to do with the lack of interest.
Photosynthesis issue does not apply to MEER. Agricultural yields increase for ground-based shading between 20-80%, with the exception of grain crops. Shading is an issue for SAI and potentially MCB, and impact PV, concentrating solar, and ecosystems with multi-story canopies. I have pointed out the issue on concentrating solar thermal to Doug before. Doug is an expert on simulations. There are more fundamental science issues that experts on those aspects are more qualified to address. It is a mistake to think that SAI is well-understood because there are many simulation papers.
SAI is not amenable to be used regionally. It also has a very small design space, meaning there is not many choices on where to block the sun; everythings gets mixed up in the atmosphere. This is not the case for MEER and partially for MCB, which are able, in principle, to provide much more room for climate optimization, should the science, observation, and simulation advanced sufficiently. MEER at a scale to protect global agricultural land would help everyone, so the question is why a safer and immediately scalable method does not get the attention and funding compared to more risky and futuristic counterparts.
I don't recall discouraging you from making petitions because they would be dangerous. If you have the time, and enough enthusiasm left, please do!
Best,
Ye
On 9/9/2023 10:39 PM, Dana Woods wrote:
Ye,
Experimental science is exactly what the people sponsoring the Arctic momentum conference as well as what almost everyone in PRAG or who posts in PRAG is promoting !!! Why should we have not enthusiasm for that.and for seeing young people , as well as a politician and in an Arctic Country thinking about and acting on outreach and action for something other than either planning for global annihilation including their own deaths or a false solution to that in drawing down emissions alone?Noone (unfortunately) says that R and D for either MCB or SAI can be done in less than 5 years and Doug McMartin said 10 years (or maybe 5 , when I asked him if there's *aggressive generous spending* for R and D, which imo , there should be
Also people at both the conference and people in PRAG are almost all talking about studying both MCB and SAI (and some are working on getting funding to do some R and D for MCB ) as well as other things. If you still want MEER at scale to be implemented perhaps you should reach at to that group
As for your questions about SAI , why not ask Doug Grant since he's an actual developer , if he;s still willing and available to talk? The photosynthesis issue would pertain to any type of SRM including MEER if done at scale, would it not ? It's a subject that will obviously have to be addressed. I am surprised that, unless I'm missing something, it does seem like more attention should have been devoted to it already, but you can rest assured that it will be addressed before anything is implemented since it's one of the first questions most people ask when any type of SRM is discussed. Doug did say that the amount of sulfur from SAi would be only 10 percent more than what's presently in the atmosphere were sulphur dioxide used (I don't know if that includes the pollution from ships that's about to be phased out or not) The World Meteorological Society 2020 Report on Ozone Depletion that Kelly Wasner suggested reading Chapter Six of. addresses what was known at that point about SIA and the report , according to my reading, says that the ozone layer over the Arctic wouldn't be negatively affected by SAI . It says that SAI would delay the repair of the Regarozone over the Antarctic but not that it would destroy it. And this is with using sulfur dioxide while it;s also apparently still quite possible that other substances (tiny solids) could be used. What are your other questions and concerns again?
You say "SAI with polar impact would have a global impact elsewhere." I very much agree with that and if that impact isn't already known it should be before any such deployment and if there are significant and unacceptable negative global or regional impacts elsewhere , it should only be used on a global scale , which modeling shows wouldn't have a negative impact on any regions. I know David Keiith would agree with that and I'd be willing to bet that other SAiI developers would as well. I assume the same principle applies to MCB (and to MEER were it done on a large scale) Does it not? Are any developers actually talking about the possibility of using SAI regionally?Years ago , maybe 5 (?) you told an audience at Harvard that if MEER at scale wasn't implemented in 5 years noone in the room would be alive in 10 years. How do you now think we have an extra 20 years or what is your alternative? (I personally hope I'm wrong but I'm personally not at all convinced we have 5 years,)
Also , as you know I personally drafted a petition with science and sources, asking the US government to fund MEER at scale and in return was told by you that "petitions can be dangerous" ..... Talk about killing enthusiasm , lol (and 10s of people, at least, were already waiting to sign that petition without it having been discussed anywhere other than on Arctic News)It would be great if MEER on a local scale could be helping more people but it's only helping a few. People bake to death all over the globe every year and more each year, and there are countries where most people work outdoors that are some of the hottest. It wa just 116 degrees F in part of Bolivia at the end of February
~ Regards, Dana
On Sat, Sep 9, 2023 at 7:01 PM daleanne bourjaily <dalean...@gmail.com> wrote:
Dear Ye, all,
Last year I spoke to General Gus Perna who headed the covid vaccine task force in the US. The scientists were reluctant to approve the science, there was so much more research to be done.
What the general said was that he took into account the strategic risk to health and the economy of waiting for a 100% consensus as he would do in a conflict situation.
On those grounds he decided that 75% would translate to approval. So that is when the vaccine was launched. To wait in a situation of that magnitude was no longer an option. Have we not reached the same point on planetary cooling?
So given that there are three or four nature -based/biomimetic interventions that could be immediately deployed in field trials, should we not together identify and choose the ones that have the most potential right now? That will allow us to seek funding and priorities for both governance and the trials themselves.
Looking forward to your advice, as many of you as possible.
Best regards,
Dale Anne
Op za 9 sep. 2023 01:15 schreef Ye Tao <t...@rowland.harvard.edu>:
Dear Ron,
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Ye Tao
Hi Doug,
The relative risks of SAI and surface-based approaches are most
definitively not the same.
Land-based methods do not have the complicated atmospheric
chemistry to worry about, for instance. Most of that chemistry is
unknown. And land-based approaches do not have potential winter
cloud warming over the poles to worry about. Nor does it have
other issues I have raised in these posts, which still remain to
be addressed. These including process H2O and NOx co-injections
into the stratosphere. There is also the radiative impact on OH
radical due to scattering, which would prolong CH4 lifetime. I
am extremely worried by how nonchalant you are with respect to
these known issues, let along unknown ones. If the captain of a
ship had similar approach, I would hesitate before boarding!
Your critique of the scale of impact is misplaced. Reading
Fig.2 carefully, the achievable level of thermal offset is by no
means negligible, and Sonia's group presented only impact at 0.1
increase in Albedo. MEER can achieve 0.2 easily, and linearity
ensures doubling the cooling impact.
Fundamentally, I guess we differ at a philosophical level. Our
different views may not be amenable to be resolved, even if
assuming perfect scientific understanding. My personal opinion is
that we need be abandon hubris, proceed cautiously after testing
at every step, scale progressively, with constant monitoring of
impacts, stay ready to scale down immediately (meaning weeks, not
a couple of years), have a sustainable society in mind to look
forward to building, and keep a holistic systems view of Earth's
biological and human economic systems in mind.
We in addition need to think about trajectories in the social
dynamics sense, and not end states in climate only. Our kids need
to be brought close to nature and the land, and land-based method
provide ample educational opportunities, in addition to improving
our chances for a culture switch.
Best,
Ye
Indeed I do completely disagree with you (and with Sonia to the extent that she implied that) about the relative risks of SAI compared to other approaches, with the proviso being whether one is comparing them on the basis of equivalent change in global mean temperature.
If you are comparing whether a small-scale deployment of MCB or MEER or whatever that has minimal global effect is less risky than a large-scale deployment of SAI intended to meaningfully address large-scale effects of climate change, then of course the answer would change. I think that’s kind of summed up in the bottom row of Sonia’s table with the words “Less critical because of smaller/negligible global impact.” Which is pretty much the only reason the risks look different.
Ye Tao
Hi Doug,
I appreciate the thoughtful reply.
The +0.2 increase in albedo I mentioned is conservative and is
locally within cropland, and especially over forage crops. The
latter exhibit maximal yield when shaded at 50% areal coverage,
and can tolerate up to 80%. We have built prototype
mirrored shading systems that cover 40% of the surface area, with
an albedo of 0.85. This delivers a local albedo boost of
0.28 = (a_original*exposed areal fraction + a_mirror*mirror areal fraction)-a_original = (.15*.6+.85*.4)-.15
This is roughly 3 times the cooling power density as used in
Senevirantne18. It is in addition possible to produce mirror
systems that emit selective in the atmospheric tansparency window,
adding 30-40% to the local cooling power by working during the
night and winters via thermal IR cooling. We are currently
testing some of such films within a urban adaptation setting.
It is important for surface-based systems to be able to impact
large scale circulation climate and extreme weather. Otherwise
they would be useless. A instance where they would clearly be
immediately beneficial is in attenuating the annual extreme
flooding that China and Pakistan witness for 3 years in a row
since 2020. A brighter surface would lead to less land surface
heating and a weaker import of moisture from the South China sea
and Indian ocean.
Our agreement regarding the existence of substantial risk is important. In light of it, I believe you would agree that many of our distinguished and dear colleagues, including Ron Baiman and John Nissen, may need to start taking more measured tone and more prudent stance when calling for an immediate deployment of SAI.
Cheers,
Ye
They aren’t the same risks, but they all have risks.
If you tried to reflect 1% of global sunlight using land-based methods, first of all that would be pretty challenging if not completely impossible from an engineering perspective, as well as a land-use perspective (if you achieved 0.2 albedo then you’d need to be covering 5% of global surface area, so 2.5 times the area of the US…), and second of all it would create enormous risks from shifts to thermal gradients, wind patterns, and precipitation. You can’t just wish all that away and pretend it isn’t real.
And if you aren’t talking about that, then please read my email before you claim to disagree with it. Your complaints about SAI are all about hypothetical concerns at large scale deployment, but I suspect that, just like Sonia’s paper, you’re comparing that to small-scale regional deployment of some other method. No disagreement that making my roof reflective has less risk than offsetting a degree of warming with SAI, but what’s the point of making that observation? They have different benefits too.
So no, when it comes to the existence of risks associated with non-SAI approaches to reflecting sunlight, I don’t think this is a philosophical, I think it is an objective scientific one.
But as for everything else you said after suggesting philosophical differences, I agree completely with what you articulate as your philosophy… so no, we don’t have a philosophical difference!
Robert Chris
Is the risk/benefit equation a meaningful one when applied to albedo enhancement proposals? The argument here seems to be that SAI at a globally climatically significant scale would entail unacceptable risks, and therefore should not be undertaken. This assumes that the risks, which are, after all, only probabilities of harm, cannot be reduced by a heuristic process of refinement before getting to full scale deployment. It also assumes that the risks of harm from SAI at global scale would be greater than the risks of harm from no SAI, an assumption that is rarely considered in this somewhat lopsided discourse.
By the same token, while the benefits from local cooling are self-evident for those enjoying them, if that cooling is not achieved by expelling energy to outer space, it can only be achieved by redistributing it within the ecosphere so that others elsewhere will endure more heat or oceans warm or ice melt, which would also change temperature gradients and weather patterns in potentially harmful ways. Moreover, if it isn’t done at an expansive enough local scale with a sufficiently large aggregate impact, it will not amount to a reversal of global warming and therefore not help in averting the much-heralded dangers of imminent cascading tipping events.
Is there a danger that we are setting up a set of criteria that are simply impossible to meet? We want major interventions to avert a climate disaster, but we want those interventions to have only benign impacts. Really??
Reducing this to the basics we seem to have the following scenario:
1. Cumulative warming from human GHG emissions is already visibly destabilising many climate variables.At some point we must come to terms with the simple fact that we’ve run out of road for a Pareto optimal outcome. There is now no way that a climate catastrophe can be avoided without the interventions to do so themselves causing some harm. The trick is to act sufficiently wisely that the benefits outweigh the harms, although that is extremely challenging because ‘benefit’ and ‘harm’ are culturally specific terms about which there is much disagreement. It might also be nice to be willing and prepared to protect and compensate those that will be harmed, but while we talk a good equity game, we’ve not been that great in recent years in delivering on it.
2. A growing number of these climate variables are approaching tipping points that once reached begin to cause irreversible destabilisation of the natural and social systems on which humanity currently depends.
3. The timing of those tipping events is uncertain but for many it is measured in decades (or sooner?) rather than centuries.
4. If averting these tipping events is a primary policy objective (which for some it might not be), action to reduce warming cannot now be done quickly enough under any feasible scenario for the abatement of GHG emissions and GHG removal (nor, most probably, even from any infeasible scenario).
5. The only additional route to slowing and then reversing global warming is through albedo enhancement.
6. Albedo intervention can either be undertaken within the Earth climate system, whether in the stratosphere, on the surface or somewhere in between, or can be deployed in outer space, for example by deploying sunlight reflectors at L1,
7. Wherever it is undertaken, if it is to reverse the energy flux at TOA it is going to change temperature gradients at lower levels within the atmosphere, and probably within the oceans as well, which in turn will impact weather patterns in unpredictable ways and at different rates.
8. Certain albedo methods involve interference with the chemical composition of climate elements with potentially undesirable and unpredictable outcomes.
9. Ergo:
a. if you want to avert the tipping events, don’t impose conditions that prohibit changes to weather patterns, or discard those that may have chemical impacts whose benefits are outweighed by their harms.
b. If you are content only to intervene to lower local temperatures, also minimising the weather impacts of those interventions, accept that at a wider scale, global warming will continue and will, in due course, disrupt those local weather patterns anyway, probably more aggressively than would have been the case had global scale remedial action been taken sooner.
We might be better advised to start discussing the risks we are prepared to take rather than the ones won't.
Robert
Dear colleagues,
I think I have been included mid-way in this exchange, but was not in the original thread. Since I discussed SRM issues with Doug when we were both on sabbatical in Stanford a few months ago, I am happy to share my views on this topic, also related to land-based vs SAI-based approaches (although I don't know about the "MEER" project and in which context the current conversation is happening).
- I have strong concerns about any SRM approaches that are deployed to modify global temperature. Available evidence suggests that the regional effects of a global SRM intervention would in no way scale in the same way as the regional response to a given global warming change due to enhanced greenhouse gas forcing. Hence, any such intervention would create a novel climate, with both winners and losers at regional scale.
- These concerns in particular apply to SAI which has a dominant global scale forcing, with limited options for regional modifications (yes, SAI could be applied in priority in one hemisphere or a larger part of an hemisphere, but any regional fine-tuning is impossible)
- Land-based approaches have a more regional footprint by design, and thus would rather fit under "adaptation" than "global climate intervention". From this point of view, we argued in our article that regional LRM would be of less concern and easier to justify. Nonetheless, widespread modifications of land albedo will also have non-local effects as shown in Figure 1 of our article. As soon as such non-local effects become major, i.e. not controllable, similar concerns as those of SAI would apply. (However, I would find it difficult to imagine that we would use a large fraction of the land area only to reflect radiation - since there is competition with agriculture, forestry, and other land uses).
- I agree with Ye that SAI has other concerns associated to it, in particular related to chemical aspects.
For the reasons stated above, I mostly see potential for albedo modifications which are of regional scope and targeted at reducing local to regional temperatures. Any interventions that would be applied to modify global mean temperature in some substantial manner or would lead to major non-local effects are associated with large risks (both physical regional risks, and moral hazard).
Happy to discuss this topic further.
Cheers,
Sonia
PS: To answer Doug's comment: The criticism of SAI in our Table 2 is not limited to the moral hazard aspect (which indeed depends on the magnitude of the intervention). It also encompasses the lack of regional precision, the lack of testing, and the environmental side effects of SAI. However, since I don't know what is exactly proposed under MEER, I would not state that our description in the paper's table 2 applies to any land-based SRM approach (it was based on albedo modifications of the order of 0.1, assumed most likely to be applied in agricultural areas (modified crop albedo) or in cities).
------------------------------------------------------Prof. Sonia I. Seneviratne, ETH ZurichChair of Land-Climate DynamicsInstitute for Atmospheric and Climate Science
CHN N11, Universitätstrasse 16, 8092 Zurich, SwitzerlandPersonal assistant: Rahel Buri (rahel...@env.ethz.ch; phone: +41 44 632 81 85)
Vice-chair Working Group IIntergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
Email: sonia.se...@ethz.ch
Twitter: @SISeneviratne
From: Ye Tao <t...@rowland.harvard.edu>
Sent: Monday, September 11, 2023 7:13:16 PM
To: Douglas MacMartin; Dana Woods; Planetary Restoration; Anton Keskinen; Ellen Haaslahti; 'SALTER Stephen'; healthy-planet-action-coalition
Cc: Seneviratne Sonia Isabelle; Cziczo, Daniel James
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/planetary-restoration/5e3676dbeeab45978e33b57b41973ebc%40ethz.ch.
Ye Tao
Dear Robert C and Dear Doug,
Thank you for a rational analysis. As Doug points out, let us
more clearly enunciate our assumptions so all can better follow
and check the reasoning without distraction from varying
assumptions.
I admire your critical thinking skills a lot. So rather than I
directly commenting on your analyses, I would invite you to
analyze your own writing and points, taking perspectives contained
in Andreas Malm's The
Future is the Termination Shock: On the Antinomies and
Psychopathologies of Geoengineering. Part Two.
I believe Malm's piece is a must-read for all of engineer and
philosophers working on various adaptation, mitigation, and
non-adaptative geoengineering strategies. I would just comment
that moving to risk-benefit analysis is getting ahead of
ourselves. I am certainly to blame for steering the conversation
down that path. I have been often advised to meet people where
they are. And now I believe we as a group are ready to move on to
the next level of thinking.
Please ask yourselves if there are assumptions about reality you are making, or perhaps have internalized without realization, when promoting geoengineering interventions. Do you have a clear vision of what future generations can or could wish to achieve under a future of conventional solar geoengineering? What are the ethical implications of masking the symptoms for the future people and other species that would/wouldn't be born in a solar geoengineered/freely warming world?
Looking forward to starting the real conversation.
Best
Ye
p.s. I have again taken the liberty of inviting scholars into the
conversation by "out of the blue" cc'ing;)
Hello folks
Is the risk/benefit equation a meaningful one when applied to albedo enhancement proposals? The argument here seems to be that SAI at a globally climatically significant scale would entail unacceptable risks, and therefore should not be undertaken. This assumes that the risks, which are, after all, only probabilities of harm, cannot be reduced by a heuristic process of refinement before getting to full scale deployment. It also assumes that the risks of harm from SAI at global scale would be greater than the risks of harm from no SAI, an assumption that is rarely considered in this somewhat lopsided discourse.
By the same token, while the benefits from local cooling are self-evident for those enjoying them, if that cooling is not achieved by expelling energy to outer space, it can only be achieved by redistributing it within the ecosphere so that others elsewhere will endure more heat or oceans warm or ice melt, which would also change temperature gradients and weather patterns in potentially harmful ways. Moreover, if it isn’t done at an expansive enough local scale with a sufficiently large aggregate impact, it will not amount to a reversal of global warming and therefore not help in averting the much-heralded dangers of imminent cascading tipping events.
Is there a danger that we are setting up a set of criteria that are simply impossible to meet? We want major interventions to avert a climate disaster, but we want those interventions to have only benign impacts. Really??
Reducing this to the basics we seem to have the following scenario:
1. Cumulative warming from human GHG emissions is already visibly destabilising many climate variables.At some point we must come to terms with the simple fact that we’ve run out of road for a Pareto optimal outcome. There is now no way that a climate catastrophe can be avoided without the interventions to do so themselves causing some harm. The trick is to act sufficiently wisely that the benefits outweigh the harms, although that is extremely challenging because ‘benefit’ and ‘harm’ are culturally specific terms about which there is much disagreement. It might also be nice to be willing and prepared to protect and compensate those that will be harmed, but while we talk a good equity game, we’ve not been that great in recent years in delivering on it.
2. A growing number of these climate variables are approaching tipping points that once reached begin to cause irreversible destabilisation of the natural and social systems on which humanity currently depends.
3. The timing of those tipping events is uncertain but for many it is measured in decades (or sooner?) rather than centuries.
4. If averting these tipping events is a primary policy objective (which for some it might not be), action to reduce warming cannot now be done quickly enough under any feasible scenario for the abatement of GHG emissions and GHG removal (nor, most probably, even from any infeasible scenario).
5. The only additional route to slowing and then reversing global warming is through albedo enhancement.
6. Albedo intervention can either be undertaken within the Earth climate system, whether in the stratosphere, on the surface or somewhere in between, or can be deployed in outer space, for example by deploying sunlight reflectors at L1,
7. Wherever it is undertaken, if it is to reverse the energy flux at TOA it is going to change temperature gradients at lower levels within the atmosphere, and probably within the oceans as well, which in turn will impact weather patterns in unpredictable ways and at different rates.
8. Certain albedo methods involve interference with the chemical composition of climate elements with potentially undesirable and unpredictable outcomes.
9. Ergo:
a. if you want to avert the tipping events, don’t impose conditions that prohibit changes to weather patterns, or discard those that may have chemical impacts whose benefits are outweighed by their harms.
b. If you are content only to intervene to lower local temperatures, also minimising the weather impacts of those interventions, accept that at a wider scale, global warming will continue and will, in due course, disrupt those local weather patterns anyway, probably more aggressively than would have been the case had global scale remedial action been taken sooner.
We might be better advised to start discussing the risks we are prepared to take rather than the ones won't.
Regards
Robert
On 9/12/2023 9:39 AM, Douglas MacMartin wrote:
I think this email thread is completely bizarre. Painting my driveway white would have less risk than what one might envision as a regional-scale land-based albedo modification sufficient to reduce local impacts. So what? Why on earth would one compare those two things, other than the fact that they both involve reflecting sunlight?
The relevant question is what are the choices that are available, including doing nothing, or doing more than one thing, and what are the impacts and risks associated with the available choices. If there are multiple options that have similar suite of benefits, but different downsides and impacts, then they can be more directly compared, but that isn’t the situation being discussed in this email thread. Furthermore, there’s also no requirement that one pick a single best approach and discard others, any more than one is required to EITHER wear your seat belt OR drive safely. Does anyone seriously make that sort of choice? If not, why is the discourse around SRM so often like that, either when comparing SRM to mitigation, or when comparing different types of sunlight reflection?
Broadly agree with Sonia, “Any interventions that would be applied to modify global mean temperature in some substantial manner or would lead to major non-local effects are associated with large risks”. Of course, that doesn’t mean that they shouldn’t be considered, because any intervention that would modify global mean temperature would ALSO be associated with corresponding reduction in climate risks, so one needs to look at the relative risks compared with not deploying, not just the risks associated with the choice to deploy. If the concern is really as stated about a novel climate, then why not apply the same concern to climate change in general, which creates a much more significantly novel climate than would occur if some of the warming were offset with SRM? I’ve certainly heard many people argue in the context of mitigation that every tenth of a degree matters, because of the reduction in impacts and risks, but it is incoherent to simultaneously argue that that applies to mitigation, but that SRM shouldn’t be considered due to the *physical* risks involved. The sorts of things that Ye and Sonia bring up matter increasingly the more that temperature is being offset, but would be negligible at a tenth of a degree cooling, for example, and as such, it is meaningless to make generic statements about “SAI has large risks” without the sort of qualifier that Sonia includes regarding scale.
My presumption is that many people who say climate change is catastrophic but that SRM would have unacceptable *physical* risks and should never be considered on that ground are people who believe in the strongest form of moral hazard, that being that we’d wind up at the same temperature anyway as SRM would be a one for one substitute for mitigation – if that were a true assumption then the argument that mitigation is safer than SRM would hold, but I do wish that in those discussions people would make their assumptions clear, because ultimately that belief about moral hazard is someone’s guess, not a scientific statement, yet the consequent claims about SRM impacts are framed as being scientific without their implicit dependence on the non-scientific belief in a pure substitution effect. (The alternative guess is that people who say climate change is bad but SRM is worse on *physical* grounds don’t understand how to think about risk, or haven’t looked at the science.)
The risks that I worry more about (and the reason for emphasizing that the logic above applies only to physical risks of the sort mostly described in this thread), are the human ones; particularly risks of conflict. (As noted moral hazard would also be a risk, though Sonia and I have different guesses about the probability of a significant effect there, my own guess is that it is quite unlikely to be a significant effect, though I don’t know how to resolve Sonia’s and my difference in guesses other than to try to make choices today that are robust to that uncertainty – i.e., to carefully research and evaluate and assess the physical side while highlighting the importance of not viewing SRM as a substitute.) Important to note that unlike the physical ones, these risks are not obviously proportional to the scale of intervention
And ultimately it’s those human dimensions in particular that would lead me to express caution regarding any rush towards deployment.
Re Ye’s point about some folks like John Nissen’s claims, I would agree that labeling Arctic-SAI as “safe” is simply false, but I would also point out that that isn’t the right question to ask anyway. If you took John’s (and quite a few others) premise that there are catastrophic impacts looming quite soon from climate change (insert your favourite tipping point, others now make this argument based on AMOC), then it would be entirely reasonable to argue that all of the research to date would suggest that deploying something like Arctic-SAI will have a very high probability of leading to better outcomes than not, and given that we can continue doing research while developing deployment capacity, and that one would start small and gradually ramp up and learn as one went, with no irrevocable decisions, I entirely understand the logic of arguing for a push to deployment. Where I differ with people like John is not in that logic, but in my perceptions of the relative risks of failing to act quickly enough (will that really lead to a catastrophic change, vs just gradually worse) vs the societal risks if some actors pushed towards implementing something that doesn’t even have a rigourous body of research adequate to write something like an IPCC report on the science. I come down on the side of viewing that the latter risks are bigger today, but I’m entirely open to changing my mind.
Bottom line is that it is absurd to talk about risks without talking about benefits, or to talk about risks in any one-sided way. Inaction is also a choice.
doug
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/healthy-planet-action-coalition/38884221-9ea5-a10a-b2f5-205ca783d001%40gmail.com.
Tom Goreau
Ye, this is MUCH longer metaphysical paper than I have time to read, so no comment!
But I’d like to point out the almost universally narrow misuse of the term “geoengineering” to mean things like atmosphere sulfuric acid baths, mirrors in space or on rooftops, armadas of salt spray vehicles, machines sucking CO2 from air into holes in the ground, etc., which have come to be generally viscerally feared by most people for their potential side effects, mostly poorly known except for acid rain.
But this is much too narrow a definition, geoengineering has been done for thousands of years for irrigation, drainage of wetlands, flood control, dams, agriculture, reservoirs, dredging for ports, seawalls, land terracing, canals, landfill, mining, waste management, aquaculture ponds, dikes, levees, sand dredging from rivers and bays, etc.
Humans have modified the earth to their own purposes wherever they had the will and the means for thousands of years, and they will have to do so even more very soon to mitigate sea level rise, so perhaps we should use the term “climate geoengineering”, to distinguish it from everyday geoengineering: dynamite, drills, back hoes, bulldozers, earth movers, shovels, dump trucks, dredges, barges, suction pumps, etc.?
I’m developing projects to grow solar powered Biorock reefs to protect atoll islands from sea level rise, isn’t that geoengineering too?
Geo-engineer:
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/healthy-planet-action-coalition/a361000f-72fd-eb81-04e1-5d34727107c5%40rowland.harvard.edu.
Ye Tao
Hi Tom,
First, thank you for suggesting better vocab. I agree that the
term "Climate geoengineering" is most precisely applicable to
SAI. Local geoengineering such as protection of glaciers and
icesheets should not be tarnished by association in name with
SAI.
Malm's paper is not nearly as metaphysical as you might expect. It is a thrill to read. Physics and logical discussions are numerous, new insights plentiful, one of which, quoted here, casts serious doubt to the feasibility of a globally democratic participatory process in development, decision making, and deployment:
3 Free Driving into Hell
So who will do it? The prime candidate for setting off
geoengineering remains the US. That is where the vast bulk of
research is conducted, the US being far ahead of everyone else –
an edge NASEM apparently wants to sharpen – and home to the
requisite platforms of technological, logistical and, not to be
forgotten, military capacities.182 Geoengineering cannot be
considered apart from the projection of imperial power. The very
notion of weather manipulation has its roots in military
planning, and the present enterprise bears plenty of bootprints
from the US military-industrial complex: the basic research at
Harvard has links to the defence and intelligence communities;
when Smith consulted companies for the design of planes, he also
sat down with Northrop Grumman, Lockheed Martin and other
suppliers of American aerial supremacy.183 The
rationalist-optimists do not shy away from the connection.
‘Militaries possess useful equipment and knowledge regarding
complex logistical operations at high altitudes and at sea’,
Reynolds justifies their involvement – but the militaries in
question are unlikely to be North Korean or Iranian.184 Given
the stakes, the US will not stand by idly as someone else –
least of all a rival or ‘rogue state’ – sends up the planes. At
the very least, the US will, if it continues to exist in its
current form, under any configurations of geopolitical power
conceivable from the present, insist on having the last word.
Junior partners might be given a go-ahead. But the US will seek
to ensure that geoengineering stays within the fold of its
empire.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/healthy-planet-action-coalition/BY3PR13MB499460EA153FB69432F3A61ADDF1A%40BY3PR13MB4994.namprd13.prod.outlook.com.
Robert Chris
Malm’s two papers total 110 pages. They warrant careful reading. While I think the thrust of his case against SRM is weak, he makes many good points and highlights many inconsistencies in the arguments used by others in its support. I have only carefully read some sections and scanned the rest. My initial impression is that in regard to his critique of SRM, there are so many holes in these papers that it’s remarkable there was sufficient space left for the text. However, he delivers a masterful piece on denial and repression but strangely applies this to those promoting geoengineering and not to those promoting continuing reliance on fossil fuels or wholly insufficient efforts to transition away from them.
What follows does not pretend to be a comprehensive critique of Malm's papers, but rather a pointer to the direction such a critique might go. On SRM, he appears to make a broadly valid argument but not a sound one. The subtle, but important distinction being, that for an argument to be valid it is not necessary for its premises to be true. For an argument to be sound they must be. Here I’ll just identify three untrue premises.
The most egregious untrue premise in Malm’s argument is that those promoting geoengineering perceive it as an alternative to emissions abatement. With very few exceptions, they do not because they recognise that both are necessary, and neither is sufficient. Malm wrongly declares that they ‘rarely if ever champion radical emissions cuts’. He may be correct in assuming that some, particularly those with vested commercial or political interests, might choose to treat geoengineering as an alternative to emissions reductions, but their abuse of power to protect their venal interests is an argument against their abuse of power, not against geoengineering. This is discussed extensively in the section on moral hazard but his argument is based on an implicit assumption that a sufficient response to climate change need not include SRM, and by extension, that emissions abatement and adaptation can be sufficient.
The question about whether a climate change response focused solely on GHG emissions and their reduction and removal from the atmosphere is sufficient, begs the question about sufficient for what? This opens a complex culturally sensitive debate about what we value and what we want our climate change policy to protect. This is not the place for a detailed discussion of this question and Malm doesn't engage with it either. But for convenience I shall assert that the most widely held primary objective is to prevent a climate change induced collapse of civilisation as we know it (COCAWKI) so that human society can continue to unfold into the future through gradual incremental change, much as it has done in the recent past. There are good arguments that this objective is infeasible on sustainability grounds, but apart from a few brief comments at the end of this note, they are for another place and time.
Returning then to the sufficiency of emissions-focussed responses to global warming, if the prevention of COCAWKI is our objective, the first question we must ask is how deep is the hole we’re in and how much time and resource do we have available to get us out of it. Unsurprisingly the answers to these questions are unknowable. We can make some informed guesses based on historical evidence and our models of how the climate system works, but informed guesses are by their nature uncertain.
Imagine you’re driving and you hit a patch of dense fog so that you are no longer certain whether the car in front is within your braking distance or not. You treat this as an emergency and you slow down so that if that car’s rear lights suddenly appeared in front of you, you’d have time to stop. You do not continue driving at your previous speed, or even a little bit slower, hoping that the fog will soon lifts, or waiting until the car in front becomes visible, and then slamming on the brakes. The point of this story is that when confronted by a potentially existential threat, the appropriate response is to overreact to create as much of a safety margin as possible. The uncertainty about what lies ahead is a spur to extreme caution, not a reason to carry on much as before until the fog clears.
Applying that to COCAWKI which, I submit, most would reasonably consider to be a disaster of epic proportions, one to be avoided at all costs, suggests we should overreact to the threats from climate change and if SRM can help in that regard, that’s a sufficient reason, at least to entertain the idea.
Moral hazard is a concept given a new meaning since the 2008
financial collapse and now applied to geoengineering. It now
carries a pejorative sense that it did not in its insurance
origins. Those claiming that geoengineering is a moral hazard
argue that by reducing surface temperatures it undermines the
imperative to decarbonise. In effect, geoengineering is bad
because it will cause more suffering from the negative impacts of
less emissions abatement. This argument assumes that
geoengineering is, or would be treated as, an alternative to
emissions reduction. However, because emissions reduction is no
longer sufficient, not doing SRM is likely to increase the harm
from climate change, and therefore arguments against it themselves
become instances of moral hazard. If we accept that emissions
abatement cannot be sufficient, there is a moral imperative to
cool the planet and SRM is necessary. If SRM is necessary, there
can be no moral hazard.
The first and perhaps most serious objection to Malm’s contribution is his failure to address the question of the sufficiency of an emissions-only policy and his implicit and untested assumption that SRM is unnecessary.
This also undermines the termination shock argument. Termination shock arises from an excessive reliance on cooling and a simultaneous inadequate attention to reducing emissions. If cooling is necessary, reducing the risk of termination shock by doing less or no geoengineering simply increases the other risks from the inability of emissions abatement to be sufficient. On this basis, the response to the risk of termination shock is not to do less cooling, but to do more emissions reduction.
A second false premise is Malm’s conflation of SRM and SAI. In Part One, he does briefly mention MCB, but quickly moves on, dismissing it as a mere regional intervention. There are many ways directly to cool the planet from fields of mirrors on or close to the ground, to mirrors a million miles from Earth to deflect a little of the sunlight that would otherwise have arrived at the top of the atmosphere. SAI is only one method. None of these methods has been tried at other than a very small scale, and most not at any scale. They all have different indirect impacts on regional and local climate. They have different cost profiles and different technical challenges. Some, or all of them, including SAI, may prove to be infeasible at scale, particularly if the need for their deployment is considered urgent. For Malm to base his entire argument on SAI alone is a fundamental category error. The purpose of SAI is to cool the planet, if for technical or other reasons, it is considered infeasible, there are many alternative cooling methods to explore; none of these methods is exclusive and it may be that a portfolio of several methods, including perhaps a bit of SAI, might be the best way forward.
The final false premise I shall consider here, but not the last of those in Malm’s papers, is his assumption that all risks are equal. It is unlikely that he actually considers them to be equal but his failure to engage with the relative risks from different responses and combinations of responses to climate change, including, crucially, no response or an inadequate response, is in effect to treat them as if they were all just members of an homogenous category called ‘risks’, and risks are bad so the fewer of them we have the better. The nature of risks is more important than their number. He also fails to consider the extent to which currently perceived risks could be reduced by further research and development, and the extent to which appetite for risk might change as the climate situation deteriorates.
(From a quick scan I sense that Malm has liberally scattered gems
from the Marxist canon across his 110 pages that offer great
insight into wider issues of climate change albeit that his
critical focus is somewhat bizarrely only on those promoting
geoengineering.)
So much for Malm’s views. Now some of mine.
My view, expressed in my PhD thesis in 2013 and subsequent book in 2015, is that SRM, if ever seriously contemplated as a climate intervention would be a definitive signal of the failure of global climate change policy. That appears to have been sadly prophetic. I also argued, for geopolitical rather than technical reasons, that it was extremely unlikely ever to be deployed at planet cooling scale. It isn’t so much that the risks from SRM are unacceptable, it’s rather that they are very challenging, and possibly impossible, to research and assess in such a way that it could be implemented at scale without causing unintended harm somewhere. SRM at climate cooling scale must inescapably involve changes to temperature gradients in a chaotic climate system and it will never be possible to have total control over their direct and indirect impacts. In my view this presents almost insuperable geopolitical obstacles in an anarchic world of independent nation-states mostly wedded to a Realist form of international relations.
Malm argues that geoengineering would breathe new life into capitalism, ‘that it has the merit of rescuing capital from liquidation’. I think that most unlikely because I consider our transgression of other planetary limits has already set capitalism on a terminal path. Geoengineering may sustain it a little longer, but with or without geoengineering, capitalism will become increasing unable to endure the tensions from a systemically driven contraction as economic growth becomes increasing difficult to deliver. It will gradually transform into a new economic order, repeating the process of its own emergence in the 16th and 17th centuries, but with a different outcome more suited to the needs of tomorrow.
I also am persuaded by the work of Lenton, Rockström and others concerning the imminent risks of cascading tipping events, and the work of Hansen and others indicating that these can no longer be averted by emissions reduction alone. I see no real prospect of emissions declining rapidly, even if, as the IEA has recently forecast, they will peak by 2030, and this means that the prospects of net zero emissions in the foreseeable future are negligible. I do not regard tens of gigatonnes of annual CO2 removal and sequestration as remotely feasible, despite the magical thinking of some.
The underlying reason for our failure to confront climate change is that we are in denial about its cause. Current policy assumes it is caused by an excess of GHGs. Well, that’s true, but the excess GHGs are caused by a combination of ultra-growth in consumption and the externalisation of the environmental costs of the fossil fuels used to power that consumption. The growth in consumption is caused by a human predilection for instant gratification and the externalisation of environmental costs is caused by a combination of factors but most particularly urban dwellers’ loss of intimacy with nature and capitalism’s voracious capacity to exploit free resources in what Garrett Harding named the Tragedy of the Commons. An adequate response to global warming has to go right down that causal chain. We’ve hardly dealt with its first link.
Accordingly, I anticipate that COCAWKI will be well entrenched within a few decades. One statistic illustrates this trend of growing instability. Since 1970 the percentage of the world population represented by migrants has increased by almost 80%, in absolute numbers from 84 to 281 million (UN DESA) and it showed a sharp up-tick in the years immediately prior to COVID.
A rational response to global warming now would be to accept it is unstoppable by any policy initiatives which we might actually implement, and to begin a shift to localism. In the hostile and rapidly changing geopolitical world of COCAWKI, nations or regional groups of nations that become effective autarkies will more likely be able to protect the best interests of their citizens, than those critically dependent on resource inputs from elsewhere. Small and local is beautiful and ring your borders with steel! It’s going to be a messy transition to a new societal equilibrium state. But who knows, thinking along these lines might be a sufficient wake up call to try to salvage more of what we now have, but I suspect we’ve already passed the point of no return.
However, it is important to recognise that just because humans
have the power of rational thought, it doesn't follow that their
collective decisions will be expressions of such thought.
Scientists and engineers are especially steeped in the
Cartesian/Baconian Enlightenment thinking of the scientific
method. That is not how public policy is fashioned. To
understand that, it is necessary to embrace complex adaptive
systems theory that explains how self-organising systems progress
through their adaptive cycle. Humanity is such a system and while
rational thinking is important, it is by no means the determining
factor in the emergence of the route we take into the future.
As a closing comment I want to make it clear that I see COCAWKI in a positive light. We must accept that we have seriously screwed up, the evidence is all around us. A correction is due, and like all corrections, this one will be painful, but particularly so because climate change is at root the mother of all market failures. But it will also be cathartic. There’ll no doubt be a bumpy restart, but a restart there will be. Humans are indomitable creative and gregarious builders. Our children and grandchildren will pick themselves up, dust themselves down and start all over again. We’re amazing!
PS. My next task is to read Malm more carefully. He’s clearly an erudite and articulate scholar and he doesn’t have to be perfect to be valuable. My guess is that his analysis is likely to be find a better mark if directed at the global elites who make and influence climate change policy, rather than at the handful of scientists who promote one way to enable that policy to deliver the UNFCCC’s ultimate objective of preventing dangerous human interference in the climate system. Their problem is that they're mostly one-trick ponies, relying on the scientific method without realising that reason and logic are not the primary drivers of public policy. The fact that geoengineering may itself be a form of dangerous interference whose effect is to reduce total dangerous interference – think chemotherapy – is part of the irony. What a mess we’ve got ourselves in!
One final note. I refer to Ye's questions about 'the ethical
implications' of our actions on future generations. I regard that
as an ill-defined and irrelevant question. This is a complex
issue that cannot be addressed in a paragraph but if you want to
examine your moral obligations to future generations, I suggest
you devote a little effort to understanding Derek Parfit's
Non-Identity Problem. You can find it through a simple search.
You can also download his Reasons and Persons book free.
Regards
Robert