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ENVIRONMENT / Climate change
This scientist has a risky plan to cool Earth. There’s growing interest.
David Keith believes that by intentionally releasing sulfur dioxide into the
stratosphere, it would be possible to lower temperatures worldwide, blunting global
warming.
David Keith believes that by intentionally releasing sulfur dioxide into the
stratosphere, it would be possible to lower temperatures worldwide, blunting global
warming. | Mustafa Hussain / The New York Times
By David Gelles
The New York Times
SHARE
Aug 3, 2024

CHICAGO – David Keith was a graduate student in 1991 when a volcano erupted in the
Philippines, sending a cloud of ash toward the edge of space.
Sulfur dioxide released from Mount Pinatubo spread across the stratosphere,
reflecting some of the sun’s energy away from Earth. The result was a drop in
average temperatures in the Northern Hemisphere by roughly 1 degree Fahrenheit in
the year that followed.

Today, Keith cites that event as validation of an idea that has become his life’s
work: He believes that by intentionally releasing sulfur dioxide into the
stratosphere, it would be possible to lower temperatures worldwide.

Such radical interventions are increasingly being taken seriously as the effects of
climate change grow more intense. Global temperatures have hit record highs for 13
months in a row. Scientists expect the heat to keep climbing for decades. The main
driver of the warming, the burning of fossil fuels, continues more or less
unabated.

Against this backdrop, there is growing interest in efforts to intentionally alter

the Earth’s climate, a field known as geoengineering.

Already, major corporations are operating enormous facilities to vacuum up the

carbon dioxide that’s heating up the atmosphere and bury it underground. Some
scientists are performing experiments designed to brighten clouds, another way to
bounce some solar radiation back to space. Others are working on efforts to make
oceans and plants absorb more carbon dioxide.

But of all these ideas, it is stratospheric solar geoengineering that elicits the
greatest hope and the greatest fear.

Radical climate interventions are increasingly being taken seriously as the effects
of global warming grow more intense.
Radical climate interventions are increasingly being taken seriously as the effects
of global warming grow more intense. | REUTERS
Proponents see it as a relatively cheap and fast way to reduce temperatures well
before the world has stopped burning fossil fuels. Harvard University has a solar
geoengineering program that has received grants from Microsoft co-founder Bill
Gates, the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation and the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation.
It’s being studied by the Environmental Defense Fund along with the World Climate
Research Program. The European Union last year said countries should discuss how to
regulate an eventual deployment of the technology.

But many scientists and environmentalists fear that it could result in

unpredictable calamities.

Because it would be used in the stratosphere and not limited to a particular area,
solar geoengineering could affect the whole world, possibly scrambling natural
systems, like creating rain in one arid region while drying out the monsoon season
elsewhere. Opponents worry it would distract from the urgent work of transitioning
away from fossil fuels. They object to intentionally releasing sulfur dioxide, a
pollutant that would eventually move from the stratosphere to ground level, where
it can irritate the skin, eyes, nose and throat and can cause respiratory problems.
And they fear that once begun, a solar geoengineering program would be difficult to
stop.

"The whole notion of spraying sulfur compounds to reflect sunlight is arrogant and
simplistic,” Canadian environmentalist David Suzuki said. "There are unintended
consequences of powerful technologies like these, and we have no idea what they
will be.”

Raymond Pierrehumbert, an atmospheric physicist at the University of Oxford, said

he considered solar geoengineering a grave threat to human civilization.

"It’s not only a bad idea in terms of something that would never be safe to
deploy,” he said. "But even doing research on it is not just a waste of money, but
actively dangerous.”

Keith, a professor in the University of Chicago’s department of geophysical

sciences, countered that the risks posed by solar geoengineering are well
understood, not as severe as portrayed by critics and dwarfed by the potential
benefits.
If the technique slowed the warming of the planet by even just 1 degree Celsius, or
1.8 degrees Fahrenheit, over the next century, Keith said, it could help prevent
millions of heat-related deaths each decade.

Canadian environmentalist David Suzuki.

Canadian environmentalist David Suzuki. "There are unintended consequences of
powerful technologies like these, and we have no idea what they will be,” he said.
| Melissa Renwick / The New York Times
To understand just how contentious Keith’s work can be, consider what happened when
he tried to perform an initial test in preparation for a solar geoengineering
experiment known as Scopex.

Then a professor at Harvard, Keith wanted to release a few pounds of mineral dust
at an altitude of roughly 20 kilometers and track how the dust behaved as it
floated across the sky.

A test was planned in 2018, possibly over Arizona, but Keith couldn’t find a
partner to launch a high-altitude balloon. When details of that plan became public,
a group of Indigenous people objected and issued a manifesto against
geoengineering.

Three years later, Harvard hired the Swedish space corporation to launch a balloon
that would carry the equipment for the test. But local groups once again rose up in
protest.

The Saami Council, an organization representing Indigenous peoples, said it viewed

solar geoengineering "to be the direct opposite of the respect we as Indigenous
Peoples are taught to treat nature with.”

Greta Thunberg, the Swedish climate activist, joined the chorus. "Nature is doing
everything it can,” she said. "It’s screaming at us to back off, to stop — and we
are doing the exact opposite.”

Within months, the experiment was called off.

Opponents of solar geoengineering cite several main risks. They say it could create
a "moral hazard,” mistakenly giving people the impression that it is not necessary
to rapidly reduce fossil fuel emissions.

The second main concern has to do with unintended consequences.

"This is a really dangerous path to go down,” said Beatrice Rindevall, the chair of
the Swedish Society for Nature Conservation, which opposed the experiment. "It
could shock the climate system, could alter hydrological cycles and could
exacerbate extreme weather and climate instability.”

And once solar geoengineering began to cool the planet, stopping the effort
abruptly could result in a sudden rise in temperatures, a phenomenon known as
"termination shock.” The planet could experience "potentially massive temperature
rise in an unprepared world over a matter of five to 10 years, hitting the Earth’s
climate with something that it probably hasn’t seen since the dinosaur-killing
impactor,” Pierrehumbert said.

On top of all this, there are fears about rogue actors using solar geoengineering
and concerns that the technology could be weaponized. Not to mention the fact that
sulfur dioxide can harm human health.

Keith is adamant that those fears are overblown. And while there would be some
additional air pollution, he claims the risk is negligible compared to the
benefits.

In 2006, a mutual acquaintance introduced Keith to Gates, who wanted to learn more
about technologies that might help fight global warming.

"I don’t know whether that stuff will ever get used,” said Gates, a major investor
in climate technology. "I do believe that doing the research and understanding it
makes sense.”

Then in 2009, Keith founded Carbon Engineering, a company that developed a process
for pulling carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. Last year Carbon Engineering was
acquired by Occidental Petroleum for $1.1 billion.

Occidental is now building carbon capture plants. It plans to sell carbon credits
to big companies that want to offset their emissions. Critics say that will only
delay the phaseout of fossil fuels while allowing an oil company to profit.

"Of course I’m uncomfortable about it being sold to an oil company,” Keith said,
adding that he plans to give away most of his profits from the sale of Carbon
Engineering, perhaps to a conservation group.

"I’m more motivated even now to push on solar geo because the rationalist case for
it is looking stronger,” he said. "While there are still lots of strong individual
voices of opposition, there are a lot of people in serious policy positions that
are taking it seriously, and that’s really exciting.”

This article originally appeared in The New York Times © 2024 The New York Times
Company

KEYWORDS
climate change, solar, geoengineering
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