Geoengineering The Climate An Overview and Update
Geoengineering The Climate An Overview and Update
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REVIEW
The climate change that we are experiencing now is caused by an increase in greenhouse
gases due to human activities, including burning fossil fuels, agriculture and deforestation.
There is now widespread belief that a global warming of greater than 2◦ C above pre-
industrial levels would be dangerous and should therefore be avoided. However, despite
growing concerns over climate change and numerous international attempts to agree
on reductions of global CO2 emissions, these have continued to climb. This has led
some commentators to suggest more radical ‘geoengineering’ alternatives to conventional
mitigation by reductions in CO2 emissions. Geoengineering is deliberate intervention in
the climate system to counteract man-made global warming. There are two main classes
of geoengineering: direct carbon dioxide removal and solar radiation management that
aims to cool the planet by reflecting more sunlight back to space. The findings of the
review of geoengineering carried out by the UK Royal Society in 2009 are summarized
here, including the climate effects, costs, risks and research and governance needs for
various approaches. The possible role of geoengineering in a portfolio of responses to
climate change is discussed, and various recent initiatives to establish good governance
of research activity are reviewed.
Key findings include the following.
One contribution of 12 to a Discussion Meeting Issue ‘Geoengineering: taking control of our planet’s
climate?’.
Some methods of both types would involve release of materials to the environment, either
to the atmosphere or to the oceans, in areas beyond national jurisdiction. The intended
impacts on climate would in any case affect many or all countries, possibly to a variable
extent. There are therefore inherent international implications for deployment of such
geoengineering methods (and possibly also for some forms of research), which need early
and collaborative consideration, before any deployment or large-scale experiments could
be undertaken responsibly.
Keywords: geoengineering; climate change; governance; uncertainty
1. Introduction
It is not yet clear whether, and if so when, it may become necessary to consider
deployment of geoengineering to augment conventional efforts to moderate
climate change by mitigation, and to adapt to its effects. However, global efforts
to reduce emissions have not yet been sufficiently successful to provide confidence
that the reductions needed to avoid dangerous climate change will be achieved.
There is a serious risk that sufficient mitigation actions will not be introduced
in time, despite the fact that the technologies required are both available and
affordable [1]. It is likely that global warming will exceed 2◦ C this century unless
global CO2 emissions are cut by at least 50 per cent by 2050, and by more
thereafter [2]. There is no credible emissions scenario under which global mean
temperature would peak and then start to decline by 2100. Unless future efforts
to reduce greenhouse gas emissions are much more successful than they have been
so far, additional action such as geoengineering may be required should it become
necessary to cool the Earth at some time during this century.
Proposals for geoengineering or climate intervention1 are numerous and diverse,
and for the Royal Society study [3], we deliberately adopted a broad scope in
order to provide a wide-ranging review. There has been much discussion in the
media and elsewhere about possible methods of geoengineering, and there is much
misunderstanding about their feasibility and potential effectiveness and other
impacts. The overall aim of the study was therefore to reduce confusion and
misinformation, and so to enable a well-informed debate among scientists and
engineers, policy-makers and the wider public on this subject.
The working group that undertook the study was composed of 12 members,
mainly scientists and engineers, but also, including a sociologist, a lawyer and an
economist. The members were mainly from the UK, but included one member
from the USA and one from Canada, and the study itself had an international
remit. The working group members were not advocates of geoengineering, and
held a wide range of opinions on the subject, ranging from cautious approval to
serious scepticism.
1 The term geoengineering is widely used, but the terms climate intervention, climate engineering,
Earth system engineering and climate remediation or restoration are preferred by some authors:
all are here regarded as synonymous.
4168 J. G. Shepherd
The terms of reference for the study were to consider, and so far as
possible evaluate, proposed schemes for moderating climate change by means of
geoengineering techniques, and specifically:
— to consider what is known, and what is not known, about the expected
effects, advantages and disadvantages of such schemes;
— to assess their feasibility, efficacy, likely environmental impacts and any
possible unintended consequences; and
— to identify further research requirements, and any specific policy and legal
implications.
The scope adopted included any methods intended to moderate climate change by
deliberate large-scale intervention in the working of the Earth’s natural climate
system, but excluded:
because these are either not regarded as geoengineering per se and/or they have
been extensively considered elsewhere [4].
2. General issues
The methods considered fall into two main classes, which differ greatly in many
respects, including their modes of action, the time scales over which they are
effective, their effects on temperature and on other important aspects of climate,
so that they are generally best considered separately. These classes are:
— carbon dioxide removal (CDR) techniques that address the root cause of
climate change by removing greenhouse gases from the atmosphere and
— solar radiation management (SRM) techniques that attempt to offset the
effects of increased greenhouse gas concentrations by reflecting a small
percentage of the sun’s light and heat back into space.
SRM techniques would take only a few years to have an effect on climate once they
had been deployed, and could be useful if a rapid response is needed, for example,
to avoid reaching a climate threshold. Methods considered in the study include:
The spatial scale of the impact required to ameliorate climate change is global,
and its magnitude is large. To have a practically useful effect on man-made global
warming by an SRM method, one would need to achieve a negative radiative
forcing of a few watts per square metre, and for an effective CDR method,
one would need to remove several billion tonnes of carbon per year from the
atmosphere for many decades.
There are many criteria by which geoengineering proposals need to be
evaluated, and some of these are not easily quantified. For the Royal Society
study [3], we undertook only a preliminary and semi-quantitative evaluation of the
more promising methods according to our judgement of several technical criteria,
namely, their effectiveness, affordability, safety and timeliness. The cost estimates
available are extremely uncertain, and it would be premature to attempt any
detailed cost–benefit analysis at this time.
The study concluded that geoengineering of the Earth’s climate is very likely to
be technically possible. However, the technology to do so is barely formed, and
there are major uncertainties regarding its effectiveness, costs and environmental
impacts. If these uncertainties can be reduced, geoengineering methods could
potentially be useful in the future to augment continuing efforts to mitigate
climate change by reducing emissions. Given these uncertainties, it would be
appropriate to adopt a precautionary approach: and more and better information
will be required to enable potential risks to be assessed, and either avoided or
accepted. Potentially useful methods should therefore be the subject of more
detailed research and analysis, especially on their possible environmental impacts
(as well as on technological and socio-economic aspects).
In most respects, CDR methods would be preferable to SRM methods because
they effectively return the climate system to a state closer to its natural pre-
industrial state, and so involve fewer uncertainties and risks. Of the CDR methods
assessed, none has yet been demonstrated to be effective at an affordable cost,
with acceptable side effects. In addition, removal of CO2 from the atmosphere only
works very slowly to reduce global temperatures (over many decades). If safe and
low-cost methods can be deployed at an appropriate scale, they could eventually
make an important contribution to reducing CO2 concentrations and could
4170 J. G. Shepherd
of the Earth has already been modified on a global scale by climate change,
and geoengineering technologies would further modify it, by design. There are
therefore serious and complex national and international governance issues that
would need to be resolved if geoengineering is ever to become an acceptable
method for moderating climate change (as there are already in implementing
reductions of CO2 emissions).
There are no existing international treaties or bodies whose remit covers all
the potential methods, but some could potentially be handled by the extension
of existing treaties, rather than creating wholly new ones (although this may
not be easy). An example of this is the successful extension of the remit of the
London Convention and Protocol to cover ocean fertilization research. It would
be highly undesirable for geoengineering methods, which involve activities or
effects that extend beyond national boundaries (other than simply the removal
of greenhouse gases from the atmosphere), to be deployed before appropriate
governance mechanisms are in place. Some geoengineering methods could
conceivably be implemented by just one nation acting independently, and some
maybe even by corporations or individuals. The consequences would however
affect all nations and all people, and even though the intended overall effect
may be positive (to ameliorate climate change), neither the intended nor the
unintended side effects are likely to be uniform. There are likely to be both
winners and losers, and any deployment should therefore be subject to robust
governance mechanisms. Nevertheless, there remains potential for unilateral
action by any technologically capable nation or organization. In the case of CDR
methods, this could have only an incremental effect, which for contained methods
(e.g. air capture, but not ocean fertilization) could be regarded as non-threatening
and requiring little governance; at least until such time as it became possible to
reduce the atmospheric CO2 concentration (after which it would be necessary to
reach international agreement on the level to which it should be reduced to, e.g.
350 or 280 ppm or some other level, etc.). However, unilateral action is much
more likely to involve premature deployment of SRM technology in response
to a perceived climate threat, of which loss of Arctic summer sea-ice cover,
perceived impacts on equatorial rainfall systems (monsoons), and Mediterranean
or Amazonian drying are all obvious and plausible candidates. It is not clear what
international mechanisms, if any, would be capable of preventing or managing
such an intervention.
The most appropriate way to create effective governance mechanisms (for both
research and development and deployment) therefore needs to be determined, and
a review of existing bodies, treaties and mechanisms should be initiated as a high
priority.
5. Recent developments
There has been a number of other relevant meetings, publications and other
developments, since the Royal Society report was published in September 2009 [3].
Some of the most significant of these are as follows.
4172 J. G. Shepherd
Geoengineering has received considerable public and media attention in the past
few years, and excites strong opinions, both for and against both its consideration
as a policy option, and research into potential methods. Despite this and the
considerable number of meetings held and studies that have been undertaken,
the volume of actual research and the amount of hard new information that is
becoming available remain small. The uncertainties remain and the conclusions
reached by the Royal Society study [3] remain valid. They may be summarized
as follows.
4174 J. G. Shepherd
While some progress has been made on some issues (as summarized earlier),
in the absence of funding for research at anything like the (rather modest) level
proposed, it is unlikely that the uncertainties will be sufficiently resolved before
the need for some form of geoengineering technology becomes urgent.
References
1 Stern, N. 2007 The economics of climate change: the Stern review. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge
University Press.
2 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). 2007 Climate change 2007: the physical
science basis. In Contribution of Working Group I to the Fourth Assessment Report of the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (eds S. D. Solomon, D. Qin, M. Manning, Z.
Chen, M. Marquie, K. B. Averyt, M. Tignor & H. L. Miller). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge
University Press.
3 Royal Society. 2009 ‘Geoengineering the climate: science, governance and
uncertainty’: Royal Society Policy Document 10/09. See http://royalsociety.org/policy/
publications/2009/geoengineering-climate/.
4 IPCC. 2005 IPCC special report on carbon dioxide capture and storage. Prepared by Working
Group III of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (eds J. T. Houghton, Y. Ding,
D. J. Griggs, M. Nouger, P. J. van der Linden & D. Xiaosu). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge
University Press.
5 Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council. 2010 Climate geoengineering sandpit. See
http://www.epsrc.ac.uk/funding/calls/2010/Pages/climategeoengsandpit.aspx.
6 House of Commons. 2010 Select Committee on Science & Technology report: the regulation
of geoengineering. See http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200910/cmselect/
cmsctech/221/22102.htm.
7 Department for Energy and Climate Change. 2010 Government response to the House of
Commons Science and Technology Committee 5th report of session 2009–10: the regulation
of geoengineering. See http://www.official-documents.gov.uk/document/cm79/7936/7936.pdf.
8 Climate Response Fund. 2010 The Asilomar conference: recommendations on principles for
research into climate engineering techniques. See http://www.climateresponsefund.org/images/
Conference/finalfinalreport.pdf.
9 Natural Environment Research Council. 2010 Report of public dialogue on geoengineering
‘Experiment Earth’. See http://www.nerc.ac.uk/about/consult/geoengineering-dialogue-final-
report.pdf.
10 US House of Representatives. 2010 Committee on Science & Technology, Chairman’s report
Engineering the Climate: Research Needs and Strategies for International Collaboration. See
http://www.whoi.edu/fileserver.do?id=74967&pt=2&p=81828.
11 US Congressional Research Service. 2010 Geoengineering: governance and technology policy.
See http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R41371.pdf.
12 US Government Accountability Office. 2010 Climate change: a coordinated strategy could
focus federal geoengineering research and inform governance efforts. See http://democrats.
science.house.gov/Media/file/Reports/GAO_ClimateChangeandGeoengineering.pdf.
13 Bipartisan Policy Center. 2011 Geoengineering: a national strategic plan for research on
the potential effectiveness, feasibility, and consequences of climate remediation technologies.
See http://www.bipartisanpolicy.org/sites/default/files/BPC%20Climate%20Remediation%20
Final%20Report.pdf.
14 Solar Radiation Management Governance Initiative. 2011 Solar radiation management: the
governance of research. See http://www.srmgi.org/report/.
15 Convention on Biological Diversity. COP 10, Decision X/33. See http://www.cbd.
int/decision/cop/?id=12299.
16 Convention on Biological Diversity. 2011 Report of the Liaison Group meeting on climate-
related geo engineering as it relates to the Convention on Biological Diversity. See
http://www.cbd.int/doc/meetings/cc/lgcrg-eng-01/official/lgcrg-eng-01-05-en.pdf.