Once upon a time there was a planet on the verge of collapse, suffocated by a climate gone mad. Nations, desperate and helpless, watched their territories burn, drown, crumble under the weight of unstoppable global warming. Until someone whispered a word, a concept, a temptation: "climate engineering". Hack the climate, take the destiny of the Earth into our own hands, tame the fury of mother nature with technology.
A crazy, dangerous, forbidden idea. And yet, damn seductive for many, for too many. Welcome to a not-too-distant future, where climate manipulation could become humanity's last desperate hope. But at what price?
The nightmare of global warming
The world is facing natural disasters of epic proportions as temperatures rise. Records are regularly broken. Fire seasons are more extreme. Hurricane strength is increasing. Rising sea levels are slowly submerging small island nations and coastal areas.
The only known method that can quickly halt this temperature rise, some insiders say, is climate engineering. (Also known as geoengineering, or “sunlight reduction methods,” or “solar climate intervention.”)
This is a series of actions proposed for deliberately alter the climate. These actions include mimicking the cooling effects of large volcanic eruptions placing large quantities of reflective particles in the atmosphere, or making low clouds over the ocean brighter. Both strategies would reflect a small amount of sunlight back into space to cool the planet.
Climate engineering, security risks
One of the biggest concerns for many countries when it comes to climate change is national security. It's not just about wars. The risks to food and energy supplies and water they are matters of national security, as well as climate-induced migration.
Could climate engineering help reduce the national security risks of climate change, or would it make things worse? Answering this question isn't easy, but researchers studying climate change and national security have a sense of the risks that lie ahead.
Extreme evils, extreme attempts
To understand what climate engineering might look like in the future, let's first talk about why a country might want to try it. Since the beginning of the industrial revolution, humans have been putting into the atmosphere approximately 1,74 trillion tons of carbon dioxide, largely by burning fossil fuels. That carbon dioxide traps heat, warming the planet.
One of the most important things we can do is stop putting carbon into the atmosphere. But this will not improve the situation quickly, because carbon remains in the atmosphere for centuries. Reducing emissions will simply prevent things from getting worse.
The temptation of climate engineering
Countries could remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and lock it up, a process called carbon dioxide removal. At the moment, i carbon dioxide removal projects, including tree growth and direct air capture devices, remove from the atmosphere approximately 2 billion tons of carbon dioxide per year.
However, currently humans they release into the atmosphere over 37 billion tons of carbon dioxide per year through the use of fossil fuels and industry. As long as the amount added is greater than the amount removed, droughts, floods, hurricanes, heat waves and sea level rise, among many other consequences of climate change, will continue to worsen.
It could take a long time to get to “net-zero” emissions, the point at which humans do not increase greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere. Climate engineering could help in the meantime.
Who might try climate engineering and how?
Various government research arms are already developing scenarios, examining who might decide to undertake climate engineering and how. Climate engineering is expected to be economical compared to the cost of ending greenhouse gas emissions. But it would still cost billions of dollars and take years to develop and build a fleet of planes to deliver megatons of reflective particles into the stratosphere each year.
However, a single country or a coalition of countries witnessing the harms of climate change could make a cost and geopolitical calculation and decide to begin climate engineering on their own.
This is the so-called "free hitter" problem: A middle-wealth country could unilaterally influence the world's climate.
The risk of international conflicts
The climate does not respect national borders. Therefore, a climate engineering project in one country will likely influence temperature and precipitation in neighboring countries. This could be good or bad for crops, water supplies and flood risk. It could also have widespread unintended consequences.
Once climate engineering is implemented, countries may be more likely to blame climate engineering for extreme events such as hurricanes, floods, and droughts, regardless of the evidence.
Climate engineering could spark conflicts between countries, leading to sanctions and compensation claims. Climate change could leave poorer regions more vulnerable to damage, and climate engineering should not exacerbate that damage. Some countries would benefit from climate engineering and would therefore be more resilient to geopolitical tensions, while others would be harmed and therefore left more vulnerable.
The unknown of side effects
No one has yet conducted large-scale climate engineering, which means much information about its effects is based on climate models. But while these models are great tools for studying the climate system, they are not good at answering questions about geopolitics and conflict.
For now, as you may have understood, there are more questions than answers about climate engineering. It's hard to say whether it would create more conflict or whether it could ease international tensions by reducing climate change. But whatever you believe, international decisions on climate engineering are probably coming soon.
Last month, March 2024, at the United Nations Environment Assembly African countries they asked for a moratorium on climate engineering, urging all precautions. Other nations, including the United States, have pushed for a formal scientific panel that studies the risks and benefits before making any decisions.
Simply put, climate engineering is a technology that cannot be ignored, but more research is needed for policymakers to make informed decisions: the risks are many.
As the planet burns, desperate nations may be tempted to "game" the climate. But will we be ready to face the consequences of this dangerous game? Or will we end up unleashing forces we cannot control? The future of humanity may depend on the answers to these questions. And we're running out of time to find them.
