the assumption that technology won

Sacha — the nature of future technology is that we don’t currently know it. But we have to make some assumptions about the future and the assumption that technology won’t change is an arbitrary position not supported by the lessons of history or laws of economics.

Ideas like iron fertilization of the ocean is patently ridiculous because there is no way of being certain that extreme and possibly irreversible unintended consequences could arise.

This is why it should be researched. It’s not as though we jump directly to the large scale project first off.

Rather than hugely expensive and/or hugely risky high-tech super projects, why not put in place legislative restrictions on CO2 and a carbon trading scheme then let the market mechanism work its magic?

The post was about technical solutions, putting aside legislative and economic ones. Myself, I prefer carbon taxes to trading schemes, but it’s worth considering all approaches (except possibly giant ice cubes).

We rely on things that don

Ideas like iron fertilization of the ocean is patently ridiculous because there is no way of being certain that extreme and possibly irreversible unintended consequences could arise.

Just 10 minutes playing with Google and you’ll see that known potential unintended consequences include anoxia in the deep sea as bacteria break down the phytoplankton; temporary ocean acidification resulting in the mass death of marine calcifiers eg. coral, shellfish; other nutrients in addition to carbon being permanently removed from the oceanic nutrient cycle as the dead phtoplankton sink and a dozen more possible calamities.

Rather than hugely expensive and/or hugely risky high-tech super projects, why not put in place legislative restrictions on CO2 and a carbon trading scheme then let the market mechanism work its magic?

relying on things that don

Sacha, I have the rich storehouse of technological history to comfort me….

…Am I confident? You bet I am.

Oh Jacques – I hope you’re right – but in saying that technological innovations will solve global warming seems to be relying on things that don’t yet exist, which is dangerous!

Your description of dumping millions of tons of iron into the oceans to grow algae to balance the atmosphere scares the shit out me Jacques.

Like I say, it’s a controversial notion. However the original science is peer-reviewed and from a respectable institute. I think it should considered.

Most people, Graeme Bird included, realise that the earth system is not remotely controllable.

There is a reason the world most powerful computers are deployed to work on weather and climate and can still only make predictions 7 days out with very limited accuracy, it

Or we just wait and hope for magical technological advances.

I am gobsmacked that the second option is even on the table.

The sunshade could be deployed by a total 20 electromagnetic launchers launching a stack of flyers every 5 minutes for 10 years. The electromagnetic launchers would ideally run on hydroelectric power, but even in the worst-case environmental scenario with coal-generated electricity, each ton of carbon used to make electricity would mitigate the effect of 1000 tons of atmospheric carbon.

Once propelled beyond Earth’s atmosphere and gravity with electromagnetic launchers, the flyer stacks would be steered to L-1 orbit by solar-powered ion propulsion, a new method proven in space by the European Space Agency’s SMART-1 moon orbiter and NASA’s Deep Space 1 probe.

“The concept builds on existing technologies,” Angel said. “It seems feasible that it could be developed and deployed in about 25 years at a cost of a few trillion dollars. With care, the solar shade should last about 50 years. So the average cost is about $100 billion a year, or about two-tenths of one percent of the global domestic product.”

See http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2006-11/uoa-ssm110306.php

Who thinks spending a lazy few trillion dollars on a plan that would take at least 25 years to implement and last only 50 years is a smart option? And let’s remember, such plans may not work at all and they may have adverse unintended consequences.

You have embarrassed yourself, mate.

In the 1950s everyone thought that by 2000 we would have androids to do the housework and we’d be zipping around in space like the Jetsons. Never happened.

Cane toads for cane beetles, asbestos for heat resistance, ddt for agriculture- the reality of technological advance doesn’t conform to your sci fi wet-dreaming.

Do we really understand how the biosphere works this well? I look forward to sunny weather on the weekends and the greening of the sahara. Most people, Graeme Bird included, realise that the earth system is not remotely controllable.

The “solutions” you list remind me of the way geeky scientist introduced the Cane Toad to fix the Scarab beetle problem.

Jacques, this is very hopeful. Are you a scientist? I bet that many scientists would this this hope is far from being guaranteed!

Sacha, I have the rich storehouse of technological history to comfort me. More to the point I studied chip design and the basics of semiconductors while doing Computer Science. Intel, AMD, IBM and other large scale fabricators are already designing and specifying devices in nanometres (the new generation chips use 45nm components – that’s only a few hundred atoms across). They are already tackling the manufacture of very small things on a very large scale. Very successfully too, I might add.

Am I confident? You bet I am.

The collision of new technologies and the will to solve our problems with technological or economic retrogression is what will defeat this problem.

Jacques, this is very hopeful. Are you a scientist? I bet that many scientists would this this hope is far from being guaranteed! I certainly hope that technology can dramatically help. But hope is just that.

Nanotechnology is a big have. It’s a term which chemists use to get funding and not much else.

There are very good thermodynamic reasons why you wouldn’t use carbon dioxide as a building block. Plants use it because they don’t have ready sources of high energy carbon available, and because of this, they need sunlight to make the process thermodynamically viable. Humans on the other hand, don’t have this problem. We have ready access to huge amounts of cheap hydrocarbons, which are much better sources of carbon atoms.

The big problem with turning roads into solar panels is that we don’t have any idea about how to do it. I’d be more convinced if you could start quoting the types of materials needed. I have big doubts as to whether or not it would be anywhere close to cost effective.

I would add that we will probably ‘fix’ the perceived problem twice as quickly by doing nothing at all (legislatively) to fix it now and simply let the technogical change you cite, turbocharged by the increasing wealth of the whole world, ‘do it‘ for us.

There could surely be little worse than asking governments to ‘pick winners’ such as (conveniently, always domestically produced) ethanol. Oh, wait, there could be… listening to immensely privileged and relatively wealthy wankers tell the rest of us what sacrifices ought to be imposed on us for our own benefit.

Great post Chester.