some science-related strategic challenges - geoengineering excerpt

8/13/2019 Some Science-related Strategic Challenges - Geoengineering Excerpt

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Some science-relatedstrategic challenges

A report for the UKGovernment Office forScience

Ariel Research ServicesFebruary 2013Written by Michael Reilly+44 (0)7986599791michael@arielresearchservices.comwww.arielresearchservices.com

Prospero and Ariel by Steering for North 2012 All rights reserved

This report has been commissioned by the UK Government Office for Science. The views expressedin this report are not those of the UK Government and do not represent its policies.


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Created by Ariel Research Services February 2013

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2. Geoengineering return of the rainmaker

Summary

Geoengineering, or intentional, large-scale manipulation of the environment, is based on

solar radiation management (SRM) or carbon dioxide reduction (CDR). A small number ofenterprising scientists are developing technical methods for SRM and CDR but there have

been incidents of rogue experiments. The economics of geoengineering compares

favourably with mainstream mitigation and adaptation, the pay-off would be much quicker,

and action does not necessarily require tortuous international negotiation. Nevertheless,

geoengineering methods currently lack scientific credibility and practicability, and they may

have deleterious environmental consequences. Unforeseen transboundary effects could

increase tensions between nation-states or regions facing different climate change impacts.

Geoengineering on its own is inadequate to address the full extent of the problem of

anthropogenic forcing of the climate system. But it is conceivable that the risk calculus

between geoengineering deployment and the impacts of dangerous climate change couldalter. Without upstream research into social, ethical, and legal implications, and downstream

regulation of large-scale field experiments, there may be less preparation for an emergency,

and more rogue geoengineers pursuing its incredible economics.

There is nothing new under the sun?

In 1815 Mount Tambora in Indonesia erupted, releasing sulphur in to the stratosphere. It was

the largest volcanic eruption in recorded history. The resulting aerosol veil, by reducing the

solar radiation the planet receives from the sun, caused an extraordinary global climate

anomaly. Average global temperatures decreased by around 0.4-0.7C although regional

variation was much starker (Stothers, 1984). The volcanos veil also interfered with thehydrological cycle of evaporation and precipitation, disrupting the tropical Indian monsoon,

which led to harvest failure, famine, and outbreaks of infectious disease (Alfred, 2009).

The full impact of the Mount Tambora eruption is not lost on geophysical scientists today

wrestling with the prospect of dangerous climate change induced not by one volcano but by

billions of humans. In theory, it would be possible to reduce average global temperatures to

their pre-industrial levels by mimicking volcanoes and introducing sulphates or particles with

similar properties into the stratosphere (Royal Society, 2009). Unlike the challenge of

rebuilding the energy system, the technology is to hand. But the side-effects of this treatment

may be as powerful as the cure, and, moreover, it could only be palliative care if theconcentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere is unaffected.

Hacking the planet

Geoengineering, or intentional, large-scale manipulation of the environment, has an

alternative to solar radiation management (SRM), carbon dioxide reduction (CDR). Professor

David Keith at the University of Calgary, one of a relatively small number of scientists daring

to research this highly contentious domain, is also President of Carbon Engineering, a start-

up which is developing technology to capture CO2from the air for industrial use or

sequestration. The boundary between academia and practice is porous. Professor Peter

Eisenbeger at the Columbia University is pursuing a similar goal to Keith with a different


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technological solution at Global Thermostat. Other enterprising scientists include Brian Toon

at the University of Colorado at Boulder, and Leslie Field at Stanford University.

But geoengineering is also going rogue. CDR solutions also include the expansion and

enhancement of natural CO2sinks. In 2012, Russ George, a Californian businessman and

former fisheries and forestry worker, dumped 100 tonnes of iron into Pacific waters offwestern Canada (Fountain, 2012). Iron fertilises the ocean by stimulating additional growth

of plankton, which in turn sequesters CO2. The experiment was funded by a native

Canadian group from the islands of Haida Gwaii, in Northern Columbia, who are seeking to

diversify an economy suffering from a diminishing fish population with carbon offsetting.

Geoengineering has been described rather loosely as hacking the planet but do scientists

such as David Keith really fit the bill as hackers? Gabriella Coleman, an anthropologist at

New York University, has found that computer hacker practice is varied, but that

transgression against powerful, illiberal institutions is a common endeavour (Coleman &

Golub, 2008). In some ways, scientists, then, are natural hackers. Geoengineering shares

another similarity to the practice of hacking against powerful computing institutions.

Compared to the economic costs of mitigation and adaptation, hacking the planet can be

extremely cheap.

The incredible economics of geoengineering

Scientists are not just interested in geoengineering, then, to improve their domain

knowledge. With fiscally-challenged nation-states locked in a prisoners dilemma of inaction,

geoengineering could prove to be an economic opportunity.

Back in 1965, the US Presidents Science Advisory Committee delivered a report calledRestoring the Quality of Our Environment that warned against the impact of rising

atmospheric concentrations of CO2. Interestingly, its solution was not mitigation and

adaptation, but perhaps mindful of the realpolitik of Lyndon Johnson, it recommended solar

radiation management. Leaving aside the potential side-effects and undeniable

expediencies, introducing particles into the stratosphere to offset the warming effects of

anthropogenic climate forcing to 2100 is estimated to cost a mere $1-8bn per year (Barrett,

2008). Compared to mitigation and adaptation, the costs are negligible, and action does not

require the tortuous international cooperation that is currently impeding progress towards a

credible global climate change policy. The pay-off, furthermore, would be quick, and

propitious to politicians and electorates prone to hyperbolic discounting.

In a preliminary, though influential, evaluation of a variety of SRM and CDR proposals in

2009, the Royal Society found affordability for several suggestions, if not scientific credibility,

or practicality (see Figure 2.1). In reality SRM technologies are subject to the termination

effect withdrawing them abruptly with little progress on greenhouse gas abatement could

in of themselves unleash catastrophic climate change.


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Figure 2.1, Preliminary overall evaluation of the geoengineering techniques considered.

Source: (Royal Society, 2009). Note the size of the points indicates timeliness of

implementability and the colour of the points their perceived safety.

Beggar thy neighbour

The lesson of the Mount Tambora eruption suggests, also, that the side effects of treatment

using stratospheric aerosols would be non-trivial. Geophysicists at Carnegie Mellon

University working with climate model simulations found that impacts on temperature and

precipitation are unlikely to be uniform and, in particular, could differ between highly

populous countries such as India and China (Ricke, et al., 2010). The risks of a nation-state

or region developing under climate duress a beggar thy neighbour attitude vexes those

opposed to geoengineering research. In a globalised world, unilateral action that damages

another country may be less likely, counters Professor Ken Caldeira an experienced expert

at Stanford University, who also places limited trust in simulations employing a single model

(Biello, 2010). Other simulations find that agricultural crop yields would increase under SRM

as crops are protected from heat stresses yet retain the fertilisation effect of higher

atmospheric concentrations of CO2(Pongratz, et al., 2012). Nevertheless, there could be

local yield losses and, again, regional variations may produce winners and losers. These

variations would be more contentious than those produced by anthropogenic forcing if they

arose as a direct consequence of intentional unilateral action.

The inadequacies of SRM to address the extent of the problem are also clear from further

work. Research collaboration between the Universities of Bristol and Pennsylvania

determined that "surface air temperatures react faster than sea levels to changes in earth's

radiative balance" so that to halt sea level rise using SRM could result in a temperature fall

too rapid for ecosystem resilience (Irvine, et al., 2012). Would there be conflict betweenstates and regions acting to ameliorate heat stress and those vulnerable to inundation?


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Damned if you do, damned if you dont

Geoengineering modelling research predominates because the regulatory framework for

field research is flimsy. In 2011, the Stratospheric Particle Injection for Climate Engineering

project (SPICE) project, a UK academic consortium which aims to find the least-worst way to

implement stratospheric aerosols, was prevented from carrying out a seeminglyuncontroversial pilot study using water (Specter, 2012). Added to the risks of a beggar thy

neighbour attitude among nation-states and regions is the potential for moral hazard to

affect the billions of people that they represent. If geoengineering is cheap, practical and the

results are immediate, then awkward behavioural change may be deemed unnecessary.

Indeed, a survey of public attitudes towards geoengineering in the US was broadly positive

(Olson, 2011). Some scientists have called for a moratorium on geoengineering research

concerned that it may divert scarce resources away from mitigation and adaptation. Non-

governmental organisations like the ETC Group deem geoengineering to be environmental

piracy by powerful global actors (ETC Group, 2010).

But like the Royal Society, institutions like the Woodrow Wilson International Center for

International Scholars, whilst cautious regarding the paucity of evidence, take a more

measured view and do not as yet consider geoengineering an either-or choice with

mitigation and adaptation (Olson, 2011). If scientists cannot observe, experiment, and

adaptively learn within a legitimate framework, there will be no choice, and drastic action

based on insufficient knowledge could be disastrous.

Geoengineering highlights an ethical faultline between utilitarian and deontological

perspectives. The former looks favourably on consequences whereas the latter prefers

morally-right behaviour. If, as Professor Mike Hulme at the University of East Anglia

contends, we disagree about climate change because it is as much a social phenomenon asa physical phenomenon, the same may be true about geoengineering (Hulme, 2009).

Welcome to the anthropocene

What no ethical perspective can disagree with is that we have entered an era where humans

manipulate their environment to meet specific goals (The Economist, 2011). For example,

humans have reshaped the nitrogen cycle using the Haber process with profound

consequences for global population. The most technologically sophisticated method for

SRM, space-based reflectors, sketches the beginnings of an almost unbelievable vision of

anthropogenic weather control. The potential of geoengineering for dual-purpose use may in

the future become a geopolitical issue to rival nuclear proliferation. In 2009, Professor Yuri

Izrael, who holds sceptical views on the impacts of climate change, carried out what is

believed to be the first field experiment for stratospheric aerosols (Kintisch, 2010). He is also

a science advisor to Vladimir Putin.

In case of emergency break glass

It is not inconceivable that the risk calculus between geoengineering deployment and the

impacts of dangerous climate change will alter. Without upstream research into social,

ethical, and legal implications, and downstream regulation of large-scale field experiments,

there may be less preparation for an emergency and more rogue geoengineers drawn to itsincredible economics (Olson, 2011).


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The Mount Tambora eruption led to what historians refer to as the year without summer in

1816. During one overcast evening that year in Geneva at the Villa Diodati, Mary Shelley

began to conceive Frankenstein. There are arguably two lessons for geoengineering from

her novel. Firstly, there are serious perils to science without regulation. Shelley renders,

however, the creature created by her scientist with unusual sympathy. Tragedy ensues only

when he is rejected by science and society (Shelley, 1994).


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References

Alfred, R., 2009. April 10, 1815: Tambora Explosion Triggers 'Volcanic Winter'. [Online]

Available at: http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2009/04/dayintech_0410

Barrett, S., 2008. The incredible economics of geoengineering. Environmental Resource

Economics, Volume 39, pp. 45-54.

Biello, D., 2010. Is the cure (geoengineering) worse than the disease (global warming)?.

[Online] Available at: http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/2010/07/19/is-the-

cure-geoengineering-worse-than-the-disease-global-warming/

Coleman, E. & Golub, A., 2008. Hacker practice: moral genres and the cultural articulation of

liberalism. Anthropological Theory, Volume 8, pp. 255-277.

ETC Group, 2010. Geopiracy: the case against geoengineering, Ottawa: ETC Group.

Fountain, H., 2012. A Rogue Climate Experiment Outrages. [Online]

Available at: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/19/science/earth/iron-dumping-experiment-in-

pacific-alarms-marine-experts.html?_r=0

Hulme, M., 2009. Why we disagree about climate change. Cambridge: Cambridge University

Press.

Irvine, P., Sriver, R. & Keller, K., 2012. Tension between reducing sea-level rise and global

warming through solar-radiation management. Nature Climate Change, Volume 2, pp. 97-

100.

Kintisch, E., 2010. Hack the planet. [Online]

Available at: http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2010/03/hack-the-planet-excerpt/

Olson, R., 2011. Geoengineering for decisionmakers, Washington D.C.: Woodrow Wilson

Center for International Scholars.

Pongratz, J., Lobell, D., Cao, L. & Caldeira, K., 2012. Crop yields in a geoengineered

climate. Nature Climate Change, Volume 2, pp. 101-105.

Ricke, K., Morgan, M. & Allen, M., 2010. Regional climate response to solar-radiation

management. Nature Geoscience, Volume 3, pp. 537-541.

Royal Society, 2009. Geoengineering the climate, London: Royal Society.

Shelley, M., 1994. Frankenstein or The Modern Prometheus. Oxford: Oxford University

Press.

Specter, M., 2012. The climate fixers. [Online]

Available at: http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2012/05/14/120514fa_fact_specter

Stothers, R., 1984. The great Tambora eruption in 1815 and its aftermath. Science, Volume

224, pp. 1191-1198.

The Economist, 2011. A man-made world. [Online]

Available at: http://www.economist.com/node/18741749/

some science-related strategic challenges - geoengineering excerpt

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