The geoengineering genie should remain firmly stopped up in its bottle until a robust case is made for letting it out, writes Clive Hamilton - and that's something the NRC's new report signally fails to achieve, providing no rationale for deploying the technology, or even experimenting with it.
An essential mistake of the report is the unwillingness to recognise that field experiments that do not change the physical environment can radically change the social and political environment.
The geoengineering genie should remain firmly stopped up in its bottle until a robust case is made for letting it out, writes Clive Hamilton - and that's something the NRC's new report signally fails to achieve, providing no rationale for deploying the technology, or even experimenting with it.
An essential mistake of the report is the unwillingness to recognise that field experiments that do not change the physical environment can radically change the social and political environment.
The publication of a hefty two-volume report on geoengineering by the US National Research Council represents a marked shift in the global debate over how to respond to global warming.
To date, the debate has been about mitigation, with the need for some adaption because of the failure to reduce emissions adequately. The new report, backed by the prestige of the National Academy of Sciences of which the NRC is the working arm, now argues that we should develop a "portfolio of activities" including mitigation, adaptation and climate engineering.
In other words, rather than presenting climate engineering, and especially solar radiation management (rebranded albedo modification), as an extreme response to be avoided if at all possible, the report normalises climate engineering as one approach among others.
Sunset with contrails image via Shutterstock.
Read more at ENN Affiliate the Ecologist.
