The only people seriously considering using nuclear weapons to put lots of particulate matter into the stratosphere live in the tribal areas of Pakistan. Alan Robock showed what happens if India and Pakistan play nuclear ping pong with their meager arsenals. The particulate matter carried into the stratosphere absorbs enough solar energy to heat the stratosphere to the point where reactions that destroy ozone are maximized. The net result is that everyone and everything on the surface of the Earth is killed by UV radiation. Now you wouldn't want that, would you Andrew? Your organization is called Friends of the Earth, isn't it, although the acronym FOE is a little disturbing.
I've looked at the delivery system issue (see the group files for some of what I've written) and concluded that airplanes and balloons could be used. To get precursor gas to circulate globally, it must be released above 53,000 ft, the boundary between the tropical tropopause and the stratosphere. In fact, due to the fall rates of aerosol, it should be released at above 65,000 ft to guarantee at least a one-year residence time in order to make it practical. The B-52, the KC-135 and other large subsonic aircraft cannot fly this high, their ceilings right at around 50,000 ft. To fly as high as would be necessary and carry enough payload to make it worthwhile would require supersonic aircraft. I settled on the F-15c with a ceiling of around 65,000 and the ability to carry about 8 tons of payload of which half could be the gas. You are correct about the balloons in that using hydrogen as the lifting gas instead of helium doubles the lifting capacity. Using H2S instead of SO2 doubles the precursor quantity that can be carried again as well. So balloons containing hydrogen and H2S within the envelope of the balloon could deliver the gas to the stratosphere in the quantities required and to much higher altitudes as well, up to 120,000 ft. The technology to inflate and recover payloads from large football stadium sized stratospheric balloons exists today and has been used since the 1940's to deliver payloads of up to 8000 lbs to 120,000 ft and recover them. The real issue about the delivery systems is whether or not the gas will form the proper sized aerosol using the existing water vapor in the stratosphere. This will requre field tests to determine its feasibility as well as whether gas can be released from tanks quickly enough to vaporize in the time that the planes can spend in flight at these altitudes, probably about an hour. Balloon residue can be addressed through a collection program and I doubt the residue would come close to that already floating in the middle of the Pacific from land based plastic waste. Alan Robock's statement in his AMS slides that "billions of weather balloons would be required" is only accurate if weather balloons were used. High altitude stratospheric balloons are not weather balloons. ----- Original Message ----- From: "Andrew Lockley" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Cc: <geoengineering@googlegroups.com> Sent: Monday, December 08, 2008 6:14 AM Subject: [geo] Re: delivering aerosols As they are just converted old bombers you could easily convert a different bomber to do the job. B52s are an obvious choice as there are loads lying about and they are very large, reducing the costs. I think they fly very high. A 2008/12/8 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>: > These planes cannot reach the sub-stratosphere at all. > Gregory > > Has anyone looked at using firefighting planes to deliver aerosol > particles? > > > -----Original Message----- > From: Andrew Lockley <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > To: geoengineering <geoengineering@googlegroups.com> > Sent: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 5:46 pm > Subject: [geo] delivering aerosols > > Has anyone looked at using firefighting planes to deliver aerosol > particles? These are designed to spray powder. There are a lot of > them about in Northern latitudes, and for much of the year they really > don't do a lot. > > I've seen several other methods, all of which have disadvantages: > 1) Space lift - still scifi > 2) Balloons - could work, but would have to be hydrogen, not helium > due to the volumes needed. Unless the balloons are programmed to > deflate and float back down, there will be a lot of 'litter'. To get > a decent payload, a very large flammable balloon would be needed. > 3) artillery - possibly useful, but may be a lot more polluting, > expensive and energy intensive than a plane. > > > > > ________________________________ > Listen to 350+ music, sports, & news radio stations – including songs for > the holidays – FREE while you browse. Start Listening Now! --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "geoengineering" group. To post to this group, send email to geoengineering@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/geoengineering?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
