I just realized that I had sent my evaluation criteria only to Andrew personally, and not to the group, hence my confusion as to why people responded to a message that didn't appear to be in the archive. Apologies for my confusion. To give everyone a clearer overview of the evaluation criteria that I used, here's the post again. As said, I encourage others to suggest additions and changes.
======= SCIENCE ======= - EXISTING STUDIES - Are relevant studies available? Has there been any peer-review? - FURTHER STUDY - What further studies and modeling are required? - EFFECTIVENESS - How effective will the proposal be in reducing global warming? - TIMESCALE - How long will it take to see results? - CONCERNS - What are possible climate risks, side-effects, dangers? =========== ENGINEERING =========== - METHODS - How can it be done? Have specific methods been proposed? - TECHNICAL PROBLEMS - Could the project run into technical problems? - TECHNOLOGIES - Does the project require development of new technologies? - TESTING - Has any testing been done? At what scale? ========== ECONOMICS ========== - COST - Are there estimates as to what (each of the various stages of) implementations would cost? - FINANCING - How could the project be financed? Is there any backing for the project? - RESOURCES - Will there be access to the various resources needed to make it work? - IMPACT - What will be the economic impact? Who will profit from the project? ======= POLITICS ======= - APPROVAL - What kind of approvals are needed to go ahead? - SUBSIDIES - Are subsidies required for impact studies, feasibility studies or for specific parts of the project? - POLICY - How does the project fit in with specific policies, e.g. offset policies, emissions trading or feebates? - LEGAL - Does it require new laws or amendment of existing laws? Can legal challenges be expected? - DIPLOMACY - Would the project require international negotiations between nations? - ADMINISTRATION - From where will the project be administered? =============== SOCIAL & MEDICAL =============== - SUPPORT - Is there public support for, concern about or resistance against the project? - CONSULTATION - Who will benefit, who could be harmed? Has the public been consulted? - CONTROL - What level of policing, supervision and security is needed? What monitoring is needed? - MEDICAL - Would the project pose safety and health concerns? - CULTURAL - Does the project offend some people in some way? ============ ENVIRONMENT ============ - IMPACT STUDY - Has an environmental impact assessment been done? Are further studies required? - MAINTENANCE - Is any monitoring, maintenance or restoration required, to prevent environmental damage? These points could give some indication as to how hard it will be to implement with a proposed project. Projects could be scored on each point by asking whether this point will raise any difficulties for the respective project. A high score would indicate that there can be expected to be little or no difficulty on this point for the project, while a low score would indicate that the project can be expected to have difficulty on this point. Each point could be given a specific weighting, resulting in overall score for each of the projects. The higher the overall score, the more the project should be of interest to members of this group. A high overall score should indicate that there is sufficient confidence that the project is safe, effective, feasible, viable, etc, with little or no concern, risk or danger that things could go wrong or that a proposal could cause damage or harm in some way. Importantly however, this should not be seen as a race where only one winner is selected. It is prudent to encourage diversity in approach and to continue to study multiple ideas and suggestions in parallel. Cheers! Sam Carana ===================== On Dec 24, 4:39 am, "Andrew Lockley" <[email protected]> wrote: > I didn't have any formal criteria, and I'd be pleased to be guided by > anyone who can do a proper comparative paper. > > If by the 'British Competition' you mean the IMechE, they already > announced the results and I posted it to the list. I think it was > only new schemes though. > > A > > 2008/12/23 David Schnare <[email protected]>: > > > Andrew: > > > Any attempt to pick winners and losers in geoengineering will be viewed as > > highly suspect unless first there is a robust discussion of ranking > > criteria. Indeed, you have not disclosed your own criteria, much less the > > criteria used by others upon whom you have relied. > > > Why don't we think about waiting for the British effort to pick winners and > > losers, examine the criteria they used and start from there. Until then, > > it's just one man's opinion against another, and that is neither good > > science or good policy. > > > David > > > On Tue, Dec 23, 2008 at 4:31 AM, Andrew Lockley <[email protected]> > > wrote: > > >> Thanks, I hope others with opinions about this and other categories > >> will put their views forward. > > >> I'm concerned by the use of sulphur in this way. It caused terrible > >> damage to the forests of Europe in the 70s and 80s. At this time it > >> was apparently difficult to establish exactly which sources were > >> causing the problem. How can we ensure that this does not happen > >> again? > > >> Furthermore, I understand that tropospheric soot is also very > >> significant, and that some have proposed using 'dirty burn' in ships > >> and aircraft to promote cooling. Smoke from rainforest fires in SE > >> Asia is apparently sufficient to promote regional cooling. Should > >> this go on the IN list? > > >> A > > >> 2008/12/23 Mike MacCracken <[email protected]>: > >> > Dear Andrew-- > > >> > Although not done intentionally (well, in many cases we have chosen not > >> > to > >> > use the technology that would maximally limit emissions), we are > >> > already, > >> > quite fortunately, creating a significant cooling influence with > >> > tropospheric sulfate aerosols. While there are negative side effects, > >> > comparing those against the impacts this cooling presently alleviates > >> > (resulting from about the 0.5 C cooling influence) has not been done, > >> > but > >> > might not be clear-cut. > > >> > In that there is no overwhelming negative influence of the tropospheric > >> > sulfate aerosols, one could well imagine increasing their amount, at > >> > least > >> > to generate additional sulfate aerosols in regions where ecological > >> > impacts > >> > are likely to be minimal. So, increasing tropospheric sulfur dioxide > >> > emissions from the elevated stacks of coal-fired power plants or by some > >> > other means of lofting the sulfur dioxide to above the boundary layer > >> > (where > >> > its lifetime is long enough to allow conversion to sulfate aerosol) > >> > would > >> > seem to be an option to be included in the IN category. Indeed, there > >> > may be > >> > adverse impacts in terms of deposition and human health, but it may well > >> > be > >> > possible to manage the emissions to that they occur only for > >> > trajectories > >> > that take the sulfates out over the oceans or to other locations where > >> > deposition would not be problematic. > > >> > In fact, given the apparently increasing SO2 emissions from the new > >> > coal-fired power plants in China (as evidenced by the high sulfate > >> > levels > >> > shown in the figure in the IPCC WG I report), this approach to limiting > >> > warming may already be having some effect--indeed, maybe, as in the mid > >> > 20th > >> > century, sulfates may be what seems to be somewhat slowing the warming > >> > over > >> > the past decade. > > >> > Mike MacCracken > > >> > On 12/22/08 8:37 PM, "Andrew Lockley" <[email protected]> wrote: > > >> >> Can anyone else help me 'rank' the technologies? Just because people > >> >> talk about a tech lots doesn't mean it's actually any good! I'm > >> >> getting the impression that the following are basically in/out > > >> >> IN > >> >> Sea water spraying > >> >> Sulphur stratospheric seeding > >> >> Ocean fertilisation with iron/urea > >> >> White roofs (nice but not very effective) > > >> >> DON'T KNOW > >> >> Limestone powder into the sea > >> >> Fake plastic trees > >> >> Biochar > >> >> Removing HCl from oceans > > >> >> OUT > >> >> Nuclear bombs > >> >> Space mirrors > >> >> Shiny balloons > >> >> Sea albedo from litter/pykrete > >> >> Low level soot and sulphur burning > > >> >> This is obviously just a list based on my bar stool expertise. If > >> >> anyone with more knowledge could help that would be appreciated. Any > >> >> references to an objective ranking system that I can put in the wiki > >> >> would be appreciated. > > >> >> A > > > -- > > David W. Schnare > > Center for Environmental Stewardship --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "geoengineering" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] 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 -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
