You can check the full pdf here: https://cdn.cfr.org/sites/default/files/report_pdf/Patrick-CSR93-web.pdf
INTRODUCTION The growing likelihood that the world will fail to meet the Paris Climate Agreement’s temperature target and cross critical tipping points in the earth system, thus catalyzing devastating consequences for humanity, necessitates a broader portfolio of strategies to manage climate risk. This portfolio currently includes three main approaches: emissions reductions, carbon dioxide removal (CDR), and adaptation. Given the quickening pace and growing magnitude of the climate emergency, the United States and other countries should consider adding a fourth approach: sunlight reflection, which entails reflecting a small percentage of sunlight back into space to counteract its warming effect on greenhouse gases (GHGs). The potential value of sunlight reflection—also known as solar geoengineering and solar climate intervention (SCI)—is high. It offers a technologically plausible, potentially rapid, and relatively inexpensive way to slow or even reverse the rise in global temperatures caused by climate change, possibly reducing the hazards associated with dramatic warming while nations and international bodies make steady progress on the massive, protracted tasks of decarbonizing the world economy and stabilizing (and ultimately reducing) atmospheric GHG concentrations. It thus deserves genuine consideration by policymakers as another arrow in the quiver of climate risk–management strategies, alongside and supplementary to emissions cuts, CDR, and adaptation. Indeed, given the stakes, it would be irresponsible for national leaders not to evaluate the viability and possible consequences of SCI. Nevertheless, critics have raised several practical objections to and ethical qualms about the prospect of sunlight reflection. While these concerns merit scrutiny and assessment, danger is always relative. Potential risks need to be evaluated and weighed not in isolation but in the context of the known hazards that humanity is already courting by continuing to pump vast quantities of GHGs into the atmosphere. The question is how the anticipated threats to human safety and well-being posed by climate change compare with those presented by climate change plus sunlight reflection. In other words, would the world be worse or better off were it to add sunlight reflection to its mix of climate responses? Unfortunately, the world is not yet in a position to answer that question, given critical basic knowledge gaps about the potential efficacy and repercussions of such interventions and a paucity of norms or rules governing the intentional manipulation of Earth’s climate system. Indeed, governments have been reluctant even to discuss the issue openly. This situation is untenable; to confront a future of dramatic warming, humanity needs to consider all its options. Concomitantly, sunlight reflection involves techniques that carry risks of unintended consequences—dangers that could be magnified by uncoordinated and independent development and use. Governments thus need a vastly improved scientific understanding of the feasibility and effects of sunlight reflection to make informed and responsible choices regarding its application. They also need an anticipatory international framework to govern any deployment decision, so that they do not find themselves scrambling and divided without agreed rules and procedures in some future moment of crisis. With these imperatives in mind, the United States should do two things. First, it should launch a robust transdisciplinary national program on the science of sunlight reflection, grounded in international cooperation, to facilitate evidence-based decision-making. The White House should coordinate this government-wide research effort, working with Congress to expand the authorities and funding of relevant U.S. agencies and with foreign partners to create an open, collaborative research environment. Second, the United States should simultaneously catalyze collaborative international governance arrangements so that nations can jointly assess the desirability of sunlight reflection and take collective decisions on its future (non)deployment. No such multilateral framework currently exists, increasing the risk that countries, individually or in small groups, could someday take unilateral actions with global consequences. The time for such investments in research and rules is now, while the science of sunlight reflection remains relatively speculative and its governance immature, even as the perils of climate change quicken and intensify. Em terça-feira, 3 de maio de 2022 às 15:35:24 UTC-3, Geoeng Info escreveu: > https://www.cfr.org/report/reflecting-sunlight-reduce-climate-risk > > Reflecting Sunlight to Reduce Climate Risk > > Priorities for Research and International Cooperation > > Reflecting sunlight should be considered a potential stopgap for rising > global temperatures, argues Stewart M. Patrick. > > “For too long, the topic of sunlight reflection has been a third rail of > climate change discourse, limiting both basic research and diplomatic > discussion. That situation is starting to change as the devastating > implications of a fast-warming planet become impossible to ignore,” asserts > Senior Fellow Stewart M. Patrick > <https://www.cfr.org/expert/stewart-m-patrick> in a new Council Special > Report, *Reflecting Sunlight to Reduce Climate Risk: Priorities for > Research and International Cooperation*. > > Sunlight reflection, also known as solar geoengineering, involves > reflecting sunlight back into space to reduce rising temperatures on Earth. > The simplest and most cost-effective methods are either dispersing aerosols > in the stratosphere (mimicking the effects of volcanic eruptions that have > periodically blocked sunlight and cooled the planet) or using ocean salt > crystals to make low-lying clouds brighter and more reflective—a process > called marine cloud brightening. > > Patrick—senior fellow in global governance and director of the > International Institutions and Global Governance program at the Council on > Foreign Relations—warns that “the long-predicted climate emergency is now,” > and “the approaches currently being pursued to prevent catastrophic warming > and mute its implications are not being enacted fast enough.” > > There are three main approaches to managing risks from the changing > climate: reducing emissions; removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere; > and adapting to build resilience and minimize the effects of a warming > planet. Patrick finds that “although efforts to decarbonize have begun in > many countries, global emissions continue to rise. The shift to renewable > energy . . . is happening far too slowly to prevent significant warming by > midcentury, and adaptation has its own limitations.” > > Patrick argues there is a fourth “potentially fast-acting, low-cost, and > high-leverage way to limit increasing global temperatures and their > attendant effects. That method is sunlight reflection.” According to > Patrick, it would be “a stopgap strategy to ‘shave the peak’ of anticipated > warming and its effects, buying time for more durable solutions” such as > emissions reduction, decarbonization, and adaptation to progress and scale > up. > > The author acknowledges that sunlight reflection is untested, > under-researched, and involves the use of techniques that are susceptible > to human error and unintended consequences. At best, it would be an > imperfect and partial response to climate change. Nevertheless, he says, > its risks and possibilities should be investigated, analyzed, and weighed > against the known dangers of climate change, given the escalating threat to > both social and natural systems posed by rising temperatures. > > To this end, the author calls for the creation of a well-funded and > effectively organized U.S. national research program, grounded in close > international cooperation, to carefully consider the deployment of sunlight > reflection as a tool in the climate change arsenal. > > He further recommends the United States strive for international agreement > on the norms and rules that govern any actual application of sunlight > reflection techniques. Without strong international cooperation, he warns, > there is a growing danger that individual governments may take matters into > their own hands, with potentially negative geopolitical consequences. > > “It would be vastly preferable for the world to make progress on the > science of sunlight reflection and to discuss its national and > international governance openly today, so that policymakers are prepared to > make informed decisions on its potential deployment tomorrow, rather than > being forced to act out of ignorance on the fly when all other options have > failed,” Patrick concludes. > > Professors: To request an exam copy, contact [email protected]. Please > include your university and course name. > > Bookstores: To order bulk copies, please contact Ingram. Visit > https://ipage.ingramcontent.com, call 800.937.8200 <(800)%20937-8200>, or > email [email protected]. 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