Injecting sulfur dioxide into the atmosphere to counter global warming

From what a read a major worry is that once you stop the earth will play catch up in regards to warming.

> It seems credible as a way to slow global warming, but there will be side effects (as there has to be with such significant modification of our environment) that are hard to predict, and probably some of those side effects could be harmful.

I think it's certain that some of the side-effects will be harmful, and it's largely a question of magnitude. Because sulfur dioxide has a limited lifetime in the atmosphere, however, it can be tested safely(1) at scale. From the article:

The data from the Mount Pinatubo eruption tells us that sulfur dioxide in the stratosphere can cause cooling comparable to the global warming we've seen so far. But it tells us something else as well: The effects of stratospheric sulfur dioxide have a limited lifetime, on the order of just a couple of years. This is bad in the sense that to be useful, the injection program has to be sustained. But it is good -- very, very good -- in the sense that it reduces risk. The program could be scaled up, the impact could be measured, and, if the side-effects are too serious, it can be scaled back down again very rapidly. This greatly reduces the risk of the undertaking.

(1) The side-effects shouldn't be any more harmful that what we've already lived through with the Mount Pinatubo eruption.

Let me say a little more to give you a taste of the book. Morton opens the Introduction with two questions:

(1) Do you believe the risks of climate change merit serious action aimed at lessening them?

(2) Do you think that reducing an industrial economy's carbon-dioxide emissions to near zero is very hard?

I'll quote snippets:

To judge by what they say, and by what policies they support, most people in favour of action on climate change are in the Yes/No camp: they want to act on the risks; they don't think that getting off fossil fuels is a terribly hard problem. [...] Most of those against action on climate are in the No/Yes camp: they don't think climate is very much of a worry; but they do think that getting off fossil fuels is very difficult, even impossible. [...] Neither of these approaches works for people like me in the Yes/Yes camp.

[Added in edit] Morton goes on to support both positions. The argument for (1) is not that climate disaster is inevitable on our current course, but that the risk is too great to ignore. The argument for (2) is more involved; he lays out numbers showing how little progress has been made and pointing out how billions of people still have little or no access to energy at all. As their standard of living rises to what we in the rich world would consider the poverty level, they will inevitably burn more carbon.

I didn't cover it in the blog post, but the amount of sulfur dioxide needed is less than what we're already emitting into the lower atmosphere.

From Wikipedia[1]:

According to the United States Environmental Protection Agency, the amount of sulfur dioxide released in the U.S. per year was:

  Year 	SO2
  1970 	31,161,000 short tons (28.3 Mt)
  1980 	25,905,000 short tons (23.5 Mt)
  1990 	23,678,000 short tons (21.5 Mt)
  1996 	18,859,000 short tons (17.1 Mt)
  1997 	19,363,000 short tons (17.6 Mt)
  1998 	19,491,000 short tons (17.7 Mt)
  1999 	18,867,000 short tons (17.1 Mt)

also[1]:

As of 2006, China was the world's largest sulfur dioxide polluter, with 2005 emissions estimated to be 25,490,000 short tons (23.1 Mt).

Presumably we can reduce sulfur dioxide pollution in the lower atmosphere enough to completely offset any that we're releasing into the stratosphere. Is that better or worse? I don't know. But it would seem like right now the Mountain pine beetle is a much greater threat to trees than acid rain is.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sulfur_dioxide#As_an_air_pollu...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mountain_pine_beetle#Current_o...

The rate of mixing between the stratosphere, where the sulfur aerosols would be placed, and the troposphere, where we live, is relatively low. The half-life of these aerosols in the stratosphere is on the order of months -- short enough, as Curtis points out, to limit the risk of any such experiment, but long enough that the quantities required are small compared to the amount of sulfur we are already putting into the troposphere.

No, the article doesn't mention ocean acidification. Yes, that's a big deal. I'm personally concerned that it's much more dangerous than sea level rise. However, the article does acknowledge that there are big limits to what stratospheric sulfur injection can do:

Stratospheric sulfur dioxide injection is not a panacea. But what it can do is buy us time. ... It can buy us time to deploy large scale climate engineering projects that do remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere...

I didn't discuss other climate engineering proposals because I was trying to keep the post short.

Baking Soda?

We'll just dump chemicals everywhere.

What is the equivalent solution to use in the oceans?

That's never going to happen. Americans will never give up their trucks. The Chinese won't give up their coal fired power plants. Developing nations won't give up slash and burn forestry programs. Why? Because we're all motivated by greed. Instead I think the solution is to make pollution expensive: some have proposed a carbon tax as one way of dealing with this. Perhaps there are other ways involving behavioral economics or something that could also be attempted.

Wouldn't it be better if people in the Middle East would just get along? While we're dreaming of things that are out of reach for the time being.

Find a way to monetize not polluting and get everyone to sign onto it, and that may have a chance.

Otherwise, it's not happening.

That would be nice, but from what we have heard from scientists, we are past the loping of no return and guaranteed massive extinctions.

Are you suggesting the solution is a Sacred Engine running on... uhhh... magic and small children, I guess?

(I get it, you're implying that the release of some "cooling compound" might cause an ice age. I'm just not convinced that a 2+ hours long string of plot holes and terrible acting can teach us anything.)

Referring to your bio info.

"People will downvote a throwaway account much more aggressively than a non-throwaway. Liberating, but a little disappointing."

You're meant to use it briefly and then, you know, throw it away. The clue is in the name! You've had your account for 1077 days, that's hardly temporary. All your account is is anonymous, not temporary.

Actually the cost of the Iraq war is 2 trillion. I think that is 2e12 usd!

And these days you can deploy utility solar for $1.5 a watt.

For 2e12 USD you'd get 1.5e12 watts. That's 1500GW solar generation capacity.

Talk about a missed opportunity.

Wikipedia says the US uses about 5e9 MWh electricity per year.

How close is 1500GW solar generation from 5e9 MWh?

Anyone know? (realizing that we'd need batteries too at some point)