“Relatively recent” as in at least 4 years ago... the question posed in the 
title seems straightforward to answer, since it’s been done already a number of 
times!


MacMartin, D. G., Kravitz, B., Keith, D. W., and Jarvis, A., “Dynamics of the 
coupled human-climate system resulting from closed-loop control of solar 
geoengineering”, Climate Dynamics, 43(1-2): 243-258, 2014. (doi: 
10.1007/s00382-013-1822-9<http://www.springerlink.com/openurl.asp?genre=article&id=doi:10.1007/s00382-013-1822-9>)
And about a dozen other papers.

(I should read the posted paper, though, before commenting on anything other 
than the inappropriateness of the title.)

From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] 
On Behalf Of Andrew Lockley
Sent: Saturday, August 25, 2018 5:48 PM
To: geoengineering <[email protected]>
Cc: [email protected]
Subject: [geo] Can We Use Linear Response Theory to Assess Geoengineering 
Strategies?

Poster's note: a primer on linear response theory is available at 
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linear_response_function - I hope that the 
corresponding author will be available to join the group and post a plain 
English summary. The application of control theory to geoengineering is IMO an 
important advance, and apparently a relatively recent one.

http://scholar.google.com/scholar_url?url=https://www.earth-syst-dynam-discuss.net/esd-2018-30/esd-2018-30-AC1-supplement.pdf&hl=en&sa=X&d=8709275723963611654&scisig=AAGBfm1hG13oxCRJ0QzTgJdX4Jg-35qpxg&nossl=1&oi=scholaralrt&hist=tDjNe6QAAAAJ:15126857386591841230:AAGBfm3hgOHpwz-gQp1d_Wc583FiI4qafA

Can We Use Linear Response Theory to Assess Geoengineering
Strategies?

Tamás Bódai1,2, Valerio Lucarini1,2,3, and Frank Lunkeit3
1Centre for the Mathematics of Planet Earth, University of Reading, UK
2Department of Mathematics and Statistics, University of Reading, UK
3CEN, Meteorological Institute, University of Hamburg, Germany
Correspondence: T. Bódai ([email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>)

Abstract. Geoengineering can control only some variables but not others, 
resulting in side-effects. We investigate in an
intermediate-complexity climate model the applicability of linear response 
theory to assessing a geoengineering method. The
application of response theory for the assessment methodology that we are 
proposing is two-fold. First, as a new ap-
proach, (I) we wish to assess only the best possible geoengineering scenario 
for any given circumstances. This requires
5 solving the following inverse problem. A given rise in carbon dioxide 
concentration [CO2] would result in a global climate
change with respect to an appropriate ensemble average of the surface air 
temperature ∆h[Ts]i. We are looking for a suit-
able modulation of solar forcing which can cancel out the said global change – 
the only case that we will analyse here –
or modulate it in some other desired fashion. It is rather straightforward to 
predict this solar forcing, considering an infinite
time period, by linear response theory in frequency-domain as: fs(ω) = 
(∆h[Ts]i(ω)−χg(ω)fg(ω))/χs(ω), where the χ’s are
10 linear susceptibilities; and we will spell out an iterative procedure 
suitable for numerical implementation that applies to finite
time periods too. Second, (II) to quantify side-effects using response theory, 
the response with respect to uncontreolled
observables, such as regional averages hTsi, must of course be approximately 
linear.
We find that under geoengineering in the sense of (I), i.e. the combined 
greenhouse and required solar forcing, the response
∆h[Ts]i asymptotically is actually not zero. This turns out to be not due to 
nonlinearity of the response under geoengi-
15 neering, but that the linear susceptibilities χ are not determined 
correctly. The error is in fact due to a significant quadratic
nonlinearity of the response under system identification achieved by a forced 
experiment. This nonlinear contribution can be
easily removed, which results in much better estimates of the linear 
susceptibility, and, in turn, in a five-fold reduction in
∆h[Ts]i under geoengineering. This correction improves dramatically the 
agreement of the spatial patterns of the pre-
dicted linear and true model responses (that are actually consistent with the 
findings of previous studies). However, (II)
20 due to the nonlinearity of the response with respect to local quantities, 
e.g. hTsi, even under goengineering, the linear
prediction is still erroneous. We find that in the examined model 
nonlinearities are stronger for precipitation compared
to surface air temperature.
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