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German researchers have re-ignited debate over geo-engineering by saying that “seeding” oceans with iron is an effective way to lock up CO2. While the principle behind seeding is simple enough – the iron acts as a fertilizer for phytoplankton, which multiply and consume carbon dioxide as they grow – the topic is fiercely debated. The core of the argument is also simple: it’s probably impossible to predict what other environmental impacts phytoplankton fertilization would have. The researchers, led by Victor Smetacek from the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in Bremerhaven, are reporting the results of a 2004...

Blue skies would fade to hazy white if geoengineers inject light-scattering aerosols into the upper atmosphere to offset global warming. Critics have already warned that this might happen, but now the effect has been quantified. Releasing sulphate aerosols high in the atmosphere should in theory reduce global temperatures by reflecting a small percentage of the incoming sunlight away from the Earth. However, the extra particles would also scatter more of the remaining light into the atmosphere. This would reduce by 20 per cent the amount of sunlight that takes a direct route to the ground, and it would increase levels...

The fact that the world is being restructured from decentralized diversity to collectivized hierarchy by an authoritarian regime cloaked in green trappings can hardly be disputed. The final push toward the next and perhaps final phase may be announced this June at the 2012 U.N. Conference on Sustainable Development in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. A Scientific American editorial by Gary Stix highlights a policy article written by several dozen scientists that appeared online March 15 in the journal Science. The conclusions reached by the scientists, as well as the editorial from a staff member of Scientific American are incredibly unscientific...

In what to some might seem almost ludicrous, (think Dr. Stranglove,) a British team of geo-engineers are set to launch a giant balloon a half mile into the sky pulling with it a water hose that will then spray water pumped from the ground, into the air. But this is only the beginning; the idea is to see if such a system is feasible. The real goal is to see if it might be possible to send such a giant balloon much higher, say twice as high as airplanes fly, so as to release aerosols into the atmosphere to mimic...

This Climate Plan B approach could cause wars and mass starvation. by Diana Bronson Think you've heard enough about climate change? Chances are you haven't heard anything about the dangerous and costly sci-fi climate fixes known as geoengineering. Geo-what? Geoengineering is a set of speculative, massive-scale technologies that would have humans intentionally modify the climate--rather than accidentally, as we've been doing since the Industrial Revolution. Many U.S. lawmakers are starting to take it seriously as a climate change Plan B. Yet, proposed geoengineering schemes are absurd and potentially devastating for the Earth. Here are a few examples of how you...

There is a hole in the Democrats' plan to fight global warming. A .270-caliber hole, to be specific. "I'll take dead aim at the cap-and-trade bill, because it's bad for West Virginia," Gov. Joe Manchin, the Democratic candidate for Senate, says in an ad put out last week. To demonstrate, he pops what appears to be a .270 cartridge in his Remington 700, then shoots a bull's-eye through a piece of paper reading "Senate of the United States" and "Cap and Trade Bill." If you look closely, you can see that the bullet tears through the word "jobs" in the...

PACIFIC GROVE, CALIFORNIA—An international group of scientists, ethicists, and governance experts meeting here this week has agreed that research into large-scale modification of the planet is "indispensable" given the "threats" posed by climate change. "It is thus important to initiate further research in the natural and social sciences to better understand and communicate whether alternative strategies to moderate future climate change are, or are not, viable, appropriate, and ethical," declares a statement by the organizing committee released today at the close of the conference. "Further discussions [on geoengineering] must involve government and civil society." The statement capped a 5-day meeting...

Enlarge Image Seeding the skies. Geoengineering approaches include spreading aerosols in the stratosphere, where they could block a small fraction of the sun's rays. Credit: Wikimedia Commons / Blink SAN DIEGO—The prospect of cooling the planet manually—geoengineering—was the subject of several presentations here today, including two presentations that involved new findings on the controversial idea. The scene was the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (which publishes ScienceNOW). It turns out that there’s a lot scientists don’t know about various cooling methods, but that’s changing steadily. And researchers are learning lessons that suggest that some...

The U.S. Congress will explore deliberate tinkering with the climate in its first ever hearing on geoengineering early next month, ScienceInsider has learned.Congressional committees have shied away from focusing hearings on the controversial topic until now. One reason might be that talk of a technical fix could distract from needed emissions cuts, especially with the U.S. Senate and international negotiators debating new controls on carbon pollution. The House of Representatives' science and technology committee has slated the hearing on the controversial subject for 5 November. The exact focus of the hearing is not known, but the meeting could be a...

Let's say the world will spend $250 billion a year for the next 10 years to minimize the suffering caused by climate change. What's the best bargain we can get for the money? The Copenhagen Consensus Center (CCC), a think-tank in Denmark headed by Skeptical Environmentalist Bjorn Lomborg, has commissioned 21 papers from leading climate experts and economists to answer that very question. Over the coming month, the CCC will be looking at the benefits and costs of proposed actions in four different areas: climate engineering, cutting future greenhouse gas emissions, economic growth, and green energy technologies. Each topic will...

Giving Mother Earth a Facelift by: Mytheos Holt, June 29, 2009 The American Enterprise Institute (AEI) recently hosted a discussion entitled “Governing Geoengineering.” Lee Lane, a resident fellow and director of the AEI Geoengineering Project, moderated the discussion, which focused on a working paper written by Dr. Scott Barrett, a professor at the Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies. The concept of Geoengineering developed in Barrett’s paper turns the premise of human-caused climate change alarmism on its head, arguing that if humans can cause climate change by emitting carbon, then they can counteract this same phenomenon through a...

Aerosols bumped up world’s plant productivity by 25 percent in the 1960s and 1970s, new research suggests The world’s vegetation soaked up carbon dioxide more efficiently under the polluted skies of recent decades than it would have under a pristine atmosphere, a new analysis in the April 23 Nature suggests. The trend hints that relying on forests and other vegetation to sequester carbon may not be effective if skies continue to clear, researchers say. Major volcanic eruptions throw large quantities of aerosols, such as small bits of fractured rock and droplets of sulfuric acid, high into the atmosphere. Those particles...

Geoengineering. Excerpts:  Tinkering with Earth's climate to chill runaway global warming - a radical idea once dismissed out of hand - is being discussed by the White House as a potential emergency option, the president's new science adviser said Wednesday...One option raised by Holdren and proposed by a Nobel Prize-winning scientist includes shooting pollution particles into the upper atmosphere to reflect the sun's rays. It still is radical, and stupid: But he said there could be grave side effects. Studies suggest that might include eating away a large chunk of the ozone layer above the poles and causing the Mediterranean...

DESPITE growing interest in clean energy technology, it looks as if we are not going to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide anytime soon. The amount in the atmosphere today exceeds the most pessimistic forecasts made just a few years ago, and it is increasing faster than anybody had foreseen. Even if we could stop adding to greenhouse gases tomorrow, the earth would continue warming for decades — and remain hot for centuries. We would still face the threat of water from melting glaciers lapping at our doorsteps. What can be done? One idea is to counteract warming by tossing small...

Last week, the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) held a conference that asked if geoengineering was a feasible solution to lower our planet's temperature, at least temporarily. The question is what to do if man-made global warming turns out to be a serious problem? At AEI, climatologist Tom Wigley from the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Colorado defined geoengineering as the deliberate modification of the earth's short wave radiation budget in order to reduce the magnitude of climate change. In his presentation, Wigley looked mostly at two possible approaches to geoengineering: injecting sulfate or other aerosols into the stratosphere, and...

Enlarge ImageOut of the frying pan.Studies show that pumping sulfur into the atmosphere could seriously damage the ozone layer.Credit: Ross J. Salawitch [via Science] The ozone layer protects all life on Earth, but it's frustrating scientists' attempts to curb global warming. Take geoengineering: Researchers have proposed that injecting sulfur particles into the stratosphere might counter the effects of greenhouse gas buildup, but a new study suggests that the approach could thin the planet's already fragile ozone layer. Leaving the ozone layer alone comes with its own risks, however. A second study warns that the gradual recovery of the Antarctic...

It may sound like science fiction, but it’s only a matter of time before the world’s militaries learn to wield the planet itself as a weapon. Preventing global warming from becoming a planetary catastrophe may take something even more drastic than renewable energy, superefficient urban design, and global carbon taxes. Such innovations remain critical, and yet disruptions to the Earth’s climate could overwhelm these relatively slow, incremental changes in how we live. As reports of faster-than-expected climate changes mount, a growing number of experts worry that we might ultimately be forced to try something quite radical: geoengineering. Geoengineering involves humans...

Concern.Scientists say that the rapid pace of climate change, such as melting of ice in Greenland, make it worth studying ways to reverse global warming. Credit: Nick Cobbing/Peter Arnold, Inc.CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS--Top climate scientists have cautiously endorsed the need to study schemes to reverse global warming that involve directly tinkering with Earth's climate. Their position on geoengineering, which will likely be controversial, was staked out at an invitation-only meeting that ended here today. It's based on a growing concern about the rapid pace of global change and continued anthropogenic emissions of greenhouse gases. "In this room, we've reached a remarkable consensus...

In Case We Can't Give Up the Cars -- Try 16 Trillion Mirrors What if we wait too long to act on global warming? What if nothing we do is enough? Already, scientists are working up plans of last resort: stratospheric sprays of sulfur, trillions of orbiting mirrors and thousands of huge off-shore saltwater fountains. Each is designed to counteract global warming by deliberately deflecting sunlight, rather than by retooling the world's economy to eliminate carbon-rich oil, coal and natural gas. More at link (a must read) http://online.wsj.com/article/SB118246650280644111.html Another related article from February 2007 http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/6298507.stm

The US wants the world's scientists to develop technology to block sunlight as a last-ditch way to halt global warming. It says research into techniques such as giant mirrors in space or reflective dust pumped into the atmosphere would be "important insurance" against rising emissions, and has lobbied for such a strategy to be recommended by a UN report on climate change, the first part of which is due out on Friday). The US has also attempted to steer the UN report, prepared by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), away from conclusions that would support a new worldwide...