This photo taken on May 11, 2022 shows Shivaram, a villager walking across the bottom of a dry cracked pond on a hot summer day in Bandai village, Pali district. – Every day, dozens of villagers, mostly women and children, carry blue plastic cans and metal pots waiting for a special train to bring precious water to those who are suffering from the heat. hot in the desert state of Rajasthan of India.
Prakash Singh | afp | beautiful pictures
Scientists from Africa, Asia and South America are receiving a new $900,000 grant to study the effects of reflected sunlight on cooling the Earth and mitigating its effects. global warming. Money comes from Open Charitya joint venture funded primarily by Billionaire Dustin Moskovitzco-founder of Facebook And postureand his wife, Cari Tuna.
Sunlight reflection involves the release of aerosols such as sulfur dioxide high in the atmosphere to reflect the sun’s rays back into space, temporarily mitigating global warming. (It is sometimes called solar irradiance correction or solar geoengineering.)
This idea has been around for decades, but it is being taken more seriously as the effects of climate change become more apparent. Although volcanic eruptions have demonstrated that the technique can work, there are also significant risks, including ozone layer damage, acid rain and increased respiratory illness.
On Tuesday, the nonprofit research organization Degree Initiative and the United Nations World Academy of Sciences announced they are distributing more than $900,000 to scientists across Africa, Asia and South America to study solar radiation regulation in a program called “Degree Model Foundation.” The Degree Initiative has been funded by a variety of funders over the years, but the largest is Open Charity and all of the $900,000 disbursements announced Tuesday came from that team, the co-founder Andy Parker told CNBC.
The funds will go to 81 scientists in Benin, Brazil, Cameroon, Chile, Ghana, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Mali, Nigeria, Pakistan, South Africa, Thailand and Uganda working on 15 modeling projects. solar geoengineering.
Less bad options, such as chemotherapy
Reflection of sunlight is gaining more attention as scientists begin to suggest that its negative effects may not be as bad as those of future climate change. The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy is coordinate a five-year research plan into solar geoengineering and in January, the Review report of the UN-backed Montreal Protocol every four years The first includes a chapter dealing with aerosol injection into the stratosphere.
“Like any other sensitive person, when I first heard about the idea of sunshade, I thought it was a terrible idea. Over time, that view didn’t really change it. It was a bad idea,” Parker told CNBC. . “But it could be less horrible than not using it and allowing temperatures to continue to rise if we don’t cut emissions enough.”
I liken this decision to chemotherapy. Chemotherapy for cancer is also a terrible idea. It is very dangerous. Frustrating. That is the risk. And no one should consider doing that unless they fear that the alternative could be worse. And so it applies to solar geoengineering.
Andy Parker
CEO of The Degrees Initiative
Reflecting sunlight is not the solution to climate change or global warming. It’s a relatively fast and inexpensive way to temporarily cool the Earth. We know it works: In the next 15 months Mount Pinatubo eruption in the Philippines in 1991global average temperature is about 1 degree F lower, according to NASA. Release of sulfur dioxide into the stratosphere from retrofitted aircraft would essentially mimic how a volcano releases large amounts of aerosols into the atmosphere.
“It’s not an exciting idea. It’s not a fun thing to do. But it’s potentially important, it can be very, very useful, it can be catastrophic,” Stone said. with CNBC.
“I liken this decision to chemotherapy. Chemotherapy to treat cancer is also a terrible idea. It’s very dangerous. It’s uncomfortable. It’s very risky. And no one can consider doing it unless it’s not. they fear the alternative could be worse. And so it’s solar geoengineering,” Stone said.
Prior to the launch of The Degrees Initiative, Rock lead the production of a 98-page report on geoengineering for the Royal SocietyONE independent science institute in the United Kingdom, and has done research at Harvard and the Potsdam Institute for Advanced Sustainability.
A giant volcanic mushroom cloud exploded at an altitude of about 20 kilometers from Mount Pinatubo above the nearly abandoned US Clark Air Force Base, on June 12, 1991, followed by an explosion. other stronger. The eruption of Mount Pinatubo on June 15, 1991 was the second largest volcanic eruption of the twentieth century.
Arlan Naeg | afp | beautiful pictures
Ensure the countries most at risk have a voice
One of Stone’s goals with the Degrees Initiative, he told CNBC, is to ensure that scientists from developing countries in the southern hemisphere participate in international conversations about reflexology. sunlight.
“If it can work well to reduce the effects of climate change, then they will gain the most because they are on the front lines of global warming,” said Stone. “On the other hand, if it’s all wrong and there are nasty side effects, or perhaps if it’s rejected early, when it could help, then developing countries will lose the most.”
But without philanthropic donations, solar geoengineering research and decisions would mostly be delivered to regions of the world that can afford it, such as North America, the European Union, and North America. Europe and Japan, Stone said.
The $900,000 announced Tuesday is the second round of funding of its kind. In 2018, The Degrees Modeling Fund allocated $900,000 to 11 projects in Argentina, Bangladesh, Benin, Indonesia, Iran, Côte d’Ivoire, Jamaica, Kenya, Philippines and South Africa.
Stone told CNBC that this is funded up to $75,000, of which $60,000 is for salaries and $15,000 for tools a local research team will need. Stone said each scientific team should submit their own proposal in the grant application. But overall, each team’s task is to use computer models to predict the weather and impacts in their local area with and without reflections of sunlight.
“By comparing the two, they can begin to generate evidence of the impact of solar irradiance regulation on things of local importance,” said Stone.
The scientists received funding from the Degree Model Foundation at a recent research planning workshop for old and new groups in Istanbul.
Image courtesy of Andy Stone, CEO of The Degrees Initiative.
Studying the water cycle in the La Plata . basin
Ines Camilloni, professor at the University of Buenos Aires, has received two Degree Initiative grants and is also being funded by the Argentine government. With the grant, Camilloni is investigating how solar irradiation adjustments will impact the hydroclimatology of the La Plata basin, the fifth largest water basin in the world, covering parts of Argentina, Bolivia, and Brazil. , Paraguay and Uruguay, she told CNBC.
“Much of the economic activity in the basin depends on water availability, including agriculture, river navigation, and hydroelectric power generation, and therefore any change in the water cycle of the basin will be sectors can have a significant impact on each country’s economy,” Camilloni said. CNBC.
Professor Inés Camilloni speaks at the Paris Peace Forum 2022.
Courtesy of The Degrees Initiative
Camilloni says her research to date has shown that reflecting sunlight can be helpful for some areas of the La Plata basin, but especially harmful for others. Large rivers that power hydroelectric dams can have higher flows and increase energy production, which balances out a greater risk of flooding.
In Buenos Aires, awareness of the reflection of sunlight has increased over the past few years and it arouses strong emotions.
“The range of sensations that the change in solar radiation produces ranges from skepticism to fear. Everyone thinks it’s controversial,” Camilloni told CNBC.
Clear communication is important, because even the study’s proponents don’t see it as a climate change silver bullet.
“This is not someone’s own Plan A for how you deal with climate risks, and no matter what happens, we have to cut our emissions,” Stone told CNBC. “But people are finally starting to seriously start addressing the question: What are we going to do if we don’t do enough to cut emissions, if they prove not to be enough to avoid very dangerous climate change?” ? What are our choices? And that makes people regret, but necessarily think about things like changes in solar radiation.”
