Before such field tests are conducted, shouldn't you first repeat the experiment from the Discovery Channel Project Earth program using salt flares? Had the clouds been present, that would have proven that water vapor redistribution within clouds can be be accomplished manually. It would also set an upper bound on what can be achieved as the actual field system wouldn't produce nearly as many salt particles. As for "getting it right first-time," I would think that regardless of the outcome, the experiment has to be repeated numerous times under varying conditions to determine general efficacy. For example, had the Discovery Channel experiment succeeded with clouds present, I would say that the results were encouraging, but not yet conclusive.
----- Original Message ----- From: "John Latham" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "John Nissen" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Cc: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; <geoengineering@googlegroups.com>; <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; "GeorgeMonbiot" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Friday, November 28, 2008 3:49 PM Subject: Re: [geo] Climate restoration and ecosystem recovery - newproposal Hello All, Two points:- 1. I think the plan that John et al are developing is definitely a worthwhile venture. I am inclined towards Ken's version of it. 2. Re the cloud-albedo-enhancement scheme, I think that Stephen's photographic technique, which he describes as part of a field experiment designed to test the idea, is very ingenious. Other parts of the experiment which are crucial include: ground-based measurements (radar and/or lidar), airborne microphysical, meteorological and radiative measurements (some above, below, and within the clouds) and satellite observations.The cost of the experiment would probably be in the 10M-20M range, so it's vital to get it right first-time: which requires meticulous preparation, and some seasoned, world-class scientists (like the ones recently involved in the international marine stratocumulus experiment VOCALS, off Peru, just completed). We have reason to believe that such people would want to be involved in testing our hypothesis & system. Cheers, John. Quoting "John Nissen" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>: > Hi Gregory, > > That would be great. I already have some help from Stephen Salter on > the marine cloud brightening side. What I want to do is mesh this with > the stratospheric aerosol - identify common problems (such deciding and > obtaining optimum particle size) - and show how the techniques might be > used geographically together - focussing on saving the Arctic sea ice. > > I have just been to another climate change meeting - but was > disappointed in the reaction to geoengineering. George Monbiot, who > writes on environment and other issues for the Guardian, said he was > against geoengineering when Andrew Lockley from the audience said it > surely had to be part of the solution. I talked to George afterwards, > and he seems convinced that the medicine could be worse than the > disease, so we shouldn't try it. How can intelligent people miss the > point? If you'd been told you were dying of cancer, wouldn't you welcome > chemotherapy, even with painful side-effects, if it gave you a chance to > live on? > > One of his arguments against albedo engineering was the old chestnut that > it wouldn't stop ocean acidification. No serious scientist suggests you > do geoengineering without emissions reduction in parallel! > > Cheers from Chiswick, > > John Nissen > > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] ; [EMAIL PROTECTED] ; > geoengineering@googlegroups.com > Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED] ; [EMAIL PROTECTED] ; > [EMAIL PROTECTED] ; [EMAIL PROTECTED] ; [EMAIL PROTECTED] ; > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Sent: Thursday, November 27, 2008 7:07 PM > Subject: Re: [geo] Climate restoration and ecosystem recovery - new > proposal > > > John: > > > I'm willing to take part. Lowell Wood has better economic > calculations. I did a brief estimate and found we could aerosol the > Arctic for a few hundred million dollars/year. That's with adequate > prior engineering studies, etc. > > > Support for a real program seems unlikely. Many, like Alan Robock, > apparently oppose any experiments without much more simulation. My > experience with many decades running combined theory/experiment physics > program is that using just one of those is like walking on one leg, > missing the point of the rhythm of science. > > > But...what funding source? Government, of course, is paralyzed. > > > Gregory Benford > > > -----Original Message----- > From: John Nissen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > To: Ken Caldeira <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; geoengineering > <geoengineering@googlegroups.com> > Cc: David Schnare <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; John Latham > <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; Alvia Gaskill <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; > John Gorman <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; Stephen Salter <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; > David Keith <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Sent: Wed, 26 Nov 2008 4:48 am > Subject: [geo] Climate restoration and ecosystem recovery - new proposal > > > > Hi Ken, > > Are you willing to help prepare a project proposal based on a > combination of stratospheric and tropospheric SRM techniques, but not > ruling out other geoengineering? > > I believe that a combined SRM approach would have many advantages, such > as: > 1. reducing risk of one technique failing by itself; > 2. tuning for targetting the Arctic sea ice and other > regions/ecosystems as required; > 3. minimisation of any serious side-effects; > 4. minimisation of cost (subject to above). > > Making the project broader than just SRM would have the additional > benefits: > 5. encouraging integration of other geo-scale technology; > 6. encouraging integration of local technology/engineering for > particular regions/ecosystems, esp to save the Arctic sea ice; > 7. engaging environmentalists, bio-engineers and people from other > disciplines. > > This needs to be a20"all hands on deck" proposal. Who else could help > in its preparation? > > Our number one priority must be to cool the Arctic. I've just heard > rumour of a new report suggesting the Arctic sea ice could go in 3-7 > years. And massive methane release could start at any time. > > Cheers from Chiswick, > > John > > P.S. It seems I'm not the first to suggest a Manhattan Project with > geoengineering: > http://www.metatronics.net/lit/geo2.html > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: Ken Caldeira > To: John Nissen > Cc: David Schnare ; John Latham ; Alvia Gaskill > Sent: Wednesday, November 26, 2008 5:38 AM > Subject: Re: the science and technology of climate cooling ??? > > > Isn't 'remediation' closer to the intended meaning than 'restoration'? > > Remediation: Efforts to counteract some or all of the effects of > pollution after it has been released into an environment. > > Restoration: The process of bringing an object back to its original > state > > > ___________________________________________________ > Ken Caldeira > > Carnegie Institution Dept of Global Ecology > 260 Panama Street, Stanford, CA 94305 USA > > [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED] > http://dge.stanford.edu/DGE/CIWDGE/labs/caldeiralab > +1 650 704 7212; fax: +1 650 462 5968 > > > > > On Tue, Nov 25, 2008 at 4:18 PM, John Nissen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > wrote: > > > Hi Ken, > > 1. Don't we actually want something suggesting good value? Don't > we want people to say "why wasn't this done ages ago, because it's so > obviously a good thing?"? > 2. We are restoring climate, not climate parameters. > 3. My point about "restoration" is that it gives useful leeway - it > begs the questions "towards what state/date?" and "how far". In the > case of the Sahara, there was flourishing agriculture at one time, so > one might like to restore the climate to allow agriculture back. In > most cases one would aim to restore a region or ecosystem part-way or > all-way to some pre-industrial state when life was flourishing. Indeed, > perhaps one should consider "ecosystem restoration" or "ecosystem > recovery" rather than "climate restoration". One of the great potential > benefits of geoengineering is in reducing species extinctions - we have > estimates of 30-50% extinctions with 2 degrees C of warming. The Arctic > ocean is a very significant ecosystem, which is in desperate need of > recovery, not only for animals like polar bears, but also for marine > life. > > "Improvement" has the disadvantage that some climates may have been > improved by global warming, for some people. For example the Arctic is > improved for oil exploration by sea ice retreat. And "improvement" is > rather more subjective than "restoration". > > But shouldn't we talking about a joint project? This could be for > submission to the Royal Society by Dec 11th, to give us a deadline and > incentive. Ken, John, Stephen, would you be game for a project proposal > combining stratospheric and tropospheric techniques? Who else could we > bring in? Alvia, could you advise? For example, could/should Alan > Robock be persuaded/invited? > > Cheers, > > John (to bed as past midnight here) > 20 > > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: Ken Caldeira > To: John Nissen > Cc: David Schnare ; John Latham ; Stephen Salter > Sent: Tuesday, November2025, 2008 5:34 PM > Subject: Re: the science and technology of climate cooling ??? > > > My problem with 'climate restoration' is threefold: > > 1. It is too obviously value laden, so it will never be adopted by > people who are both for and against this work. > > 2. We are not restoring the climate system's longwave and > shortwave fluxes to any earlier state. We are partially offsetting a > change in longwave fluxes with a change in short wave fluxes. The > scientific climate community will not see this as a restoration, even if > certain fields are more similar to the earlier state. > > 3. I do not agree that the goal is 'restoration'. I think the goal > is something closer to 'improvement'. (If climate change were to make > the Sahel moister, would we want to restore them back to crippling > droughts?) > > > ___________________________________________________ > Ken Caldeira > > Carnegie Institution Dept of Global Ecology > 260 Panama Street, Stanford, CA 94305 USA > > [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED] > http://dge.stanford.edu/DGE/CIWDGE/labs/caldeiralab > +1 650 704 7212; fax: +1 650 462 5968 > > > > > On Tue, Nov 25, 2008 at 9:20 AM, John Nissen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > wrote: > > > Dear David, > > I proposed that we refer to "climate restoration" rather than > "climate cooling", as I believe that should be our objective in using > some of the proposed geoengineering techniques. But you are concerned > by side-effects. > > The side-effects of the proposed climate restoration techniques, > using stratospheric aerosols and marine cloud brightening, are well > researched because we can study the effects=2 0 of volcanoes (like > Pinatubo) and contrails from ships respectively. It turns out that both > techniques are relatively benign - and benefits (including the > protection of both terrestrial and oceanic carbon sinks, which threaten > to decline due to global warming) vastly outweigh the negative side > effects (such as a small amount of ozone depletion and acid rain in the > case of sulphate aerosols). Neither technique is life threatening. > Furthermore neither technique is expensive - we are talking of a few > billion dollars per annum at most. On the other hand, without > geoengineering, the cost of adaptation to global warming, even just the > global warming in the pipeline, is enormous - and millions of lives > would be affected. > > It seems that the media are determined to poke fun at > geoengineering, but they are producing a lot of disinformation which > distracts the policy makers from the task at hand, i.e. to save > ourselves from getting caught in a spiral of global warming and sea > level rise, which would most likely follow from 20 loss of sea ice or > massive methane release in the Arctic region. > > However, if it is a scientific advisor to the government who > denigrates geoengineering [1] [2], then I am concerned that they may not > be giving good advice to policy makers, which would be a breach of duty > and moral obligation. > > I challenge anyone to come up with a strong argument why we > should not deploy geoengineering, when this appears the only way to > guard against the risks of Arctic sea ice disappearance and massive > methane release, either of which could happen in the next few years. > > Surely geoengineering has to be top priority for government, > although it should be done in conjunction with mitigation efforts. > > Kind regards, > > John > > John Nissen > Chiswick, London W4 > > [snip] > > > > > > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ > Tis the season to save your money! 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