I agree completely with Anna-Maria that these are all serious potential issues (i.e., the potential for SRM to be enticing, and the potential for moral hazard), and I absolutely agree that Lili and HBF have important perspectives. I just think it would help the communication more if people were more clear about what they meant... as well as not muddying the waters with stuff that is highly misleading, as that simply distracts from the more challenging questions.
doug From: Anna-Maria Hubert [mailto:annamaria.hub...@ucalgary.ca] Sent: Saturday, March 9, 2019 12:13 PM To: s.sal...@ed.ac.uk; f...@boell.de; vorst...@boell.de; i...@boell.de; geoengineering <geoengineering@googlegroups.com>; carbondioxideremo...@googlegroups.com; Douglas MacMartin <dgm...@cornell.edu> Subject: Re: [geo] Heinrich Boell evidence to UNEP Greetings all I think Lili's piece raises some important issues and I suspect that her concerns reflect her longstanding experience working in environmental advocacy and politics. It's important to distinguish that while SRM "ought not" stand in as an alternative to mitigation and adaptation it does not mean that politics will not take that trajectory in the future despite not being in accordance with prudent scientific advice (Why are we even in this mess despite the fact that the scientific evidence continues to pile up?). Indeed I participated in a meeting of an international treaty body where an major oil producing state was arguing that geoengineering should not be restricted, because such limitations would impair their right to develop and ability exploit their sovereign national resources in oil and gas. One should not be naive about how enticing SRM may be to those actors who have an interest in maintaining a business as usual scenario and the influence these actors have over climate politics. Legally, the relationship between SRM and mitigation and adaptation is somewhat ambiguous. Also, though more subtle, there are also "moral hazard" issues that arise in relation to the development of CDR vis a vis more conventional mitigation and adaptation. All this to say that she offers a valid perspective that should be given some weight in the discussion of the development and governance of the science. Have a great weekend, Anna-Maria Anna-Maria Hubert Assistant Professor, Faculty of Law, University of Calgary Associate Fellow, Institute for Science, Innovation and Society (InSIS), University of Oxford MFH 3344, 2500 University Drive NW, Calgary, AB Canada T2N 1N4 T: 403.220.8762<tel:403.220.8762> | M: 587.586.3045<tel:587.586.3045> annamaria.hub...@ucalgary.ca<https://mail.ucalgary.ca/owa/14.3.266.1/scripts/premium/redir.aspx?SURL=JkKyJFCGUmOHPwnojHKF8mM2XVqQBlfBA_O8D5z0lPrEMxg9MX_TCG0AYQBpAGwAdABvADoAYQBuAG4AYQBtAGEAcgBpAGEALgBoAHUAYgBlAHIAdABAAHUAYwBhAGwAZwBhAHIAeQAuAGMAYQA.&URL=mailto%3aannamaria.hubert%40ucalgary.ca> www.law.ucalgary.ca<http://www.law.ucalgary.ca/> | www.insis.ox.ac.uk/people/associate-fellows/anna-maria-hubert<http://www.insis.ox.ac.uk/people/associate-fellows/anna-maria-hubert> ________________________________ From: geoengineering@googlegroups.com<mailto:geoengineering@googlegroups.com> <geoengineering@googlegroups.com<mailto:geoengineering@googlegroups.com>> on behalf of Douglas MacMartin <dgm...@cornell.edu<mailto:dgm...@cornell.edu>> Sent: March 9, 2019 6:46 AM To: s.sal...@ed.ac.uk<mailto:s.sal...@ed.ac.uk>; f...@boell.de<mailto:f...@boell.de>; vorst...@boell.de<mailto:vorst...@boell.de>; i...@boell.de<mailto:i...@boell.de>; geoengineering; carbondioxideremo...@googlegroups.com<mailto:carbondioxideremo...@googlegroups.com> Subject: RE: [geo] Heinrich Boell evidence to UNEP Hi Lili, I'll also make a couple of comments... mainly, I think it would be helpful if you disambiguate concerns relative to CDR vs SRM, and indeed between different methods of CDR (where it is also unclear what falls into your personal definition of geoengineering, since planting a tree is different from BECCS which is different from DAC, etc.). Many if not all of your concerns are only relevant to some form of geoengineering, but not others. E.g., clear that large-scale BECCS has the potential to be in conflict with SDGs, but both research and common sense would suggest that SRM is unlikely to be in conflict (and while more research is clearly necessary, one's prior would be the opposite UNLESS you're assuming that the only context in which SRM is being suggested is as an alternative rather than supplement to mitigation - and if that's your assumption, then you ought to make that clear that that is the only context in which your concerns arise, otherwise you have the potential to confuse debate rather than advance it, and I'm sure that isn't your intention). One could go on... e.g., you are of course quite well aware that the fossil fuel industry has not had any "long and ongoing influence" on anything related to SRM, nor significantly related to CDR either (though clearly for CCS itself, which generally isn't lumped under the not-very-helpful geoengineering category). Again, a case where some disambiguation would be valuable to be clear that you are referring only to CCS and not to anything else. And here: http://sdg.iisd.org/commentary/guest-articles/geoengineering-at-unea-4-why-the-sdgs-require-a-governance-debate-based-on-precaution-rights-and-fairness/ you refer to the potential for some geoengineering technologies to be "weaponized", I think it would be helpful if you indicated which you are referring to, as I've paid attention to the field for more than a decade and I don't know what you might be referring to here, that is certainly not true with any form of CDR, nor possible with stratospheric aerosol geoengineering. Of course everyone agrees on accelerating the energy transition - it's simply that many of us are concerned that we don't have 100% guarantee that that will happen fast enough, and I, at least, am not prepared to gamble the future of the planet on that... doug From: geoengineering@googlegroups.com<mailto:geoengineering@googlegroups.com> [mailto:geoengineering@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Stephen Salter Sent: Friday, March 8, 2019 1:07 PM To: f...@boell.de<mailto:f...@boell.de>; vorst...@boell.de<mailto:vorst...@boell.de>; i...@boell.de<mailto:i...@boell.de>; geoengineering <geoengineering@googlegroups.com<mailto:geoengineering@googlegroups.com>>; carbondioxideremo...@googlegroups.com<mailto:carbondioxideremo...@googlegroups.com> Subject: [geo] Heinrich Boell evidence to UNEP Lili Fuhr, Head of International Policy, Heinrich Boëll Foundation. Dear Dr Fuhr In your evidence to the UN Environment Assembly at http://ceassessment.org/geoengineering-on-the-agenda-at-the-united-nations-environment-assembly/ you express concern about the effect of geoengineering on hydrological patterns. These are certainly being affected by the present increases of atmospheric CO2 concentration. Future predictions for unbridled CO2 increases are grim. Hydrological patterns are largely set by sea surface temperatures which are rising. The initial effect of marine cloud brightening is to put sea surface temperatures back to where they used to be with some control of where, how much and when. It does this by changing the size distribution of drops in marine clouds. It uses very small amounts of a medicinally benign material which is already present in much larger quantities in a much wider range of sizes. It uses carbon-free energy from the wind. The resulting hydrological effects can be seen from Stjern et al. at figure S4 of https://www.atmos-chem-phys.net/18/621/2018/acp-18-621-2018-supplement.pdf This is the median result of marine cloud brightening from nine leading climate models. The concentration of condensation nuclei was increased by 50% in regions of low altitude cloud. This is less than used for many computer climate models but a more intelligent way to use the method than in experiments mainly aimed at model comparison. The blue green regions show small but useful increases in many drought stricken regions. Reductions of 1% are smaller than natural variations and would be quite hard to detect. The largest reductions are over the sea. [cid:image001.jpg@01D4D6AB.0D6017A0] I agree that marine cloud brightening can affect precipitation but suggest that this is like saying that turning the steering wheel of a road vehicle changes the direction of travel, usually an attractive feature. We know that in many places there are large seasonal variations in all meteorological parameters between summer and winter. It is unlikely that marine cloud brightening would have exactly the same effect whenever and wherever it was done. This means that we should be able to pick beneficial times and places according to the phase of monsoons, El Niño events and even day-to-day meteorological observations. Please let me know if you would like to see a paper about a way to use climate models to show how these could be chosen. I also agree that powerful majorities should be sensitive to the needs of weaker minorities and I hope that, with proper scientific advice we can have benefits widely spread. We can also provide compensation in the form of desalination plant for negative results. Few people would vote for stronger hurricanes, bleached coral, less Arctic ice or higher sea levels. Please let me know if you would be able to check calculations about the amount of spray that would be needed for these activities. I suggest that the opposition to research on geoengineering is on a par to the opposition to anaesthetics for women in child-birth (overcome by Queen Victoria) and vaccination against smallpox (overcome by Tsarina Catherine). People working on the hardware for geoengineering hope that it will not be needed but, if it was used, that it could be phased out as CO2 reductions are achieved. However we do want to have it available to buy time for these reductions. Please ask yourself if your actions are reducing the time available for reducing CO2. Stephen Salter -- Emeritus Professor of Engineering Design. School of Engineering, University of Edinburgh, Mayfield Road, Edinburgh EH9 3DW, Scotland s.sal...@ed.ac.uk<mailto:s.sal...@ed.ac.uk>, Tel +44 (0)131 650 5704, Cell 07795 203 195, WWW.homepages.ed.ac.uk/shs<http://WWW.homepages.ed.ac.uk/shs>, YouTube Jamie Taylor Power for Change -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "geoengineering" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to geoengineering+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com<mailto:geoengineering+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com>. To post to this group, send email to geoengineering@googlegroups.com<mailto:geoengineering@googlegroups.com>. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/geoengineering. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "geoengineering" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to geoengineering+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com<mailto:geoengineering+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com>. To post to this group, send email to geoengineering@googlegroups.com<mailto:geoengineering@googlegroups.com>. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/geoengineering. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "geoengineering" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to geoengineering+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to geoengineering@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/geoengineering. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
