RE: [geo] Re: Why geoengineering has immediate appeal to China (Guradian)
Hamilton's response does not exclude the possibility that he and Edney Symons are referring to two different meanings of geoengineering, namely earth and civil engineering versus climate engineering. Considering that my daily Google Scholar alert on the keyword geoengineering returns a dozen publications from China on the latter, I believe this is likely the case. - Jesse L. Reynolds, M.S. PhD Candidate European and International Public Law Tilburg Sustainability Center Tilburg University, The Netherlands email: j.l.reyno...@uvt.nl http://www.tilburguniversity.edu/webwijs/show/?uid=j.l.reynolds http://twitter.com/geoengpolicy From: geoengineering@googlegroups.com [geoengineering@googlegroups.com] on behalf of Joshua Horton [joshuahorton...@gmail.com] Sent: Monday, April 01, 2013 4:47 PM To: geoengineering@googlegroups.com Subject: Fwd: [geo] Re: Why geoengineering has immediate appeal to China (Guradian) Passing along for Clive, whose message got bounced - I'll respond when I get a chance. Josh Sent from my iPhone Begin forwarded message: From: Clive Hamilton m...@clivehamilton.commailto:m...@clivehamilton.com Date: April 1, 2013, 6:17:13 AM EDT To: joshuahorton...@gmail.commailto:joshuahorton...@gmail.com Cc: geoengineering@googlegroups.commailto:geoengineering@googlegroups.com, bstah...@gmail.commailto:bstah...@gmail.com, Andrew Lockley andrew.lock...@gmail.commailto:andrew.lock...@gmail.com, f...@nimblebooks.commailto:f...@nimblebooks.com Subject: Re: [geo] Re: Why geoengineering has immediate appeal to China (Guradian) Dear All Kingsley Edney and Jonathan Symons have written the definitive paper on geoengineering in China. They are Sinologists and have researched the question in great detail, as their paper shows. I was sent an early draft and it framed my understanding of the issue. Since then I have been in close contact with these two scholars, not least in asking them to read carefully and correct any mistakes or misinterpretations in my article that appeared in the Guardian. The claims I made about geoengineering research in China are not in any way contradicted by the quotes provided by Josh or Fred, as they seem to imply. Indeed, it would be odd for Kingsley and Jonathan to both make the quoted statements and approve the article I had in the Guardian if they felt there was any contradiction. The fact is that China has included geoengineering among its Earth science research priorities, and I don't understand why some participants in this group are going out of their way to downplay this fact. In some unscripted comments I made in an earlier television interview I erred in exaggerating the degree of priority being given to geoengineering research in China. That is now corrected in the Guardian piece. Soon after my television comment Jason Blackstock emailed me saying I had got it completely wrong, that he is very well connected with Chinese scientists and officials, and that he is quite certain that there is no official endorsement of geoengineering in China. Those who think otherwise, he wrote, have mistranslated the relevant Chinese word. He has since conceded that Kingsley and Jonathan are right in their interpretation and in the facts regarding official inclusion of geoengineering, which ought to be no surprise since they know a lot more about China than he does. Clive On 1 April 2013 00:57, Josh Horton joshuahorton...@gmail.commailto:joshuahorton...@gmail.com wrote: Even more to the point, see this (http://www.scribd.com/doc/131811730/China-and-the-blunt-temptations-of-geoengineering-the-role-of-solar-radiation-management-in-China’s-strategic-response-to-climate-change) current draft article on China and geoengineering: Some Western scholars have expressed concern that China may already be working on unilateral research and implementation of SRM. Although we cannot discount this possibility, we have found no evidence supporting this contention in published Chinese literature or our discussions with Chinese scientists. In fact, consideration of SRM currently seems to be confined to epistemic communities that are deeply cautious about the possible downsides of deliberate intervention into natural systems. (p. 28) Josh On Wednesday, March 27, 2013 8:58:33 PM UTC-4, Fred Zimmerman wrote: Before we go too far on this China priorities meme let me suggest that we make it a practice of the list to always cite Jason Blackstock's very persuasive post of 11/26/2012 https://groups.google.com/d/msg/geoengineering/wKAas01rdDA/h2eZpjmvviAJ the money quote of which is this from Kingsley Edney: So geoengineering and global change is one important research direction among a total of more than 50 that are listed in the field of earth science alone. Once we consider all the other categories of scientific research it seems quite possible that, as Blackstock claims
Re: [geo] Re: Why geoengineering has immediate appeal to China (Guradian)
Even more to the point, see this (http://www.scribd.com/doc/131811730/China-and-the-blunt-temptations-of-geoengineering-the-role-of-solar-radiation-management-in-China’s-strategic-response-to-climate-change) current draft article on China and geoengineering: Some Western scholars have expressed concern that China may already be working on unilateral research and implementation of SRM. Although we cannot discount this possibility, we have found no evidence supporting this contention in published Chinese literature or our discussions with Chinese scientists. In fact, consideration of SRM currently seems to be confined to epistemic communities that are deeply cautious about the possible downsides of deliberate intervention into natural systems. (p. 28) Josh On Wednesday, March 27, 2013 8:58:33 PM UTC-4, Fred Zimmerman wrote: Before we go too far on this China priorities meme let me suggest that we make it a practice of the list to always cite Jason Blackstock's very persuasive post of 11/26/2012 https://groups.google.com/d/msg/geoengineering/wKAas01rdDA/h2eZpjmvviAJ the money quote of which is this from Kingsley Edney: So geoengineering and global change is one important research direction among a total of more than 50 that are listed in the field of earth science alone. Once we consider all the other categories of scientific research it seems quite possible that, as Blackstock claims, geoengineering would not make the top 100. If we focus solely on the narrower category of solar radiation management then there is no evidence to claim that SRM is a priority at this stage. Fred On Wed, Mar 27, 2013 at 7:23 PM, Bill Stahl bsta...@gmail.comjavascript: wrote: The comments I have on this excellent article are: 1, China is popularly used as an example of a country that will go it's own way on climate issues (and on anything else). This is natural- especially for an Australian like Hamilton! - but it's also true of Canada (as is sometimes overlooked in the battle over the Keystone pipeline). Rather than give up its tar sands it might be willing to be the first to take the plunge into geoengineering. And, unlike China, it has plenty of Arctic territory to give it both acute awareness of permafrost melting and easy entree into high-latitude SRM to cool the Arctic. Given the pace of Arctic melting that issue will be forced long, long before 2035, and because the directly affected zone is so much smaller than that of global SRM the governance barriers are lower (though still high). Canada is then at least as good a candidate for 'first adopter' as China. 2. That would not directly help China but Hamilton's description suggests that China's interests would lead it to support Canada (or any other high-latitude plunge-taker) to give itself more options later. 3. Hamilton's hypothetical 2035 scenario describes an interaction between China and the U.S. as one between two isolated states, as if the US would have available a practical option of shooting down planes. But there is no conceivable scenario in which only one country wants to do SRM, and none in which only one opposes it. Let's assume that a large number of low-lying countries (Pacific island states in particular) are ready to cool the Arctic Greenland, as soon as possible - starting next Thursday afternoon if they can. These 10 or 20 states are shopping around for a larger state or states with the political and technical muscle to implement it - China and Canada, since we've already mentioned them. A slew of mid-size players sign on for various reasons, leading to a coalition of 30 countries of varying size, location, wealth motives. Those opposed or undecided will not be invited, as Caldeira et all described in a recent game theory paper. At the risk of being flippant, let's say they give themselves a noble-sounding title - Alliance for Something or Other Virtuous With a Snappy Acronym - and they pick as their figurehead someone who can persuasively don the mantle of righteousness. The leader of an endangered atoll state would do nicely, even if some relatively 'unsympathetic' country such as China is the real muscle. What will stop them? Surely not some moratorium voted out of a UN committee room a decade or two before. Shooting down planes? Imagine some nation's networks interrupting their regular programming for a Presidential announcement: I have today authorized our armed forces to take action against Fiji, China, Malaysia, American Samoa, Mongolia, Zanzibar, Finland, The Seychelles and ... oh to hell with it, *lots* of others. Although I'm unsympathetic to those who oppose any geoengineering research as starting down a slippery slope to full deployment, I have to admit they have a point. On Saturday, March 23, 2013 6:26:35 PM UTC-6, andrewjlockley wrote: http://www.guardian.co.uk/**environment/2013/mar/22/**
Re: [geo] Re: Why geoengineering has immediate appeal to China (Guradian)
Before we go too far on this China priorities meme let me suggest that we make it a practice of the list to always cite Jason Blackstock's very persuasive post of 11/26/2012 https://groups.google.com/d/msg/geoengineering/wKAas01rdDA/h2eZpjmvviAJ the money quote of which is this from Kingsley Edney: So geoengineering and global change is one important research direction among a total of more than 50 that are listed in the field of earth science alone. Once we consider all the other categories of scientific research it seems quite possible that, as Blackstock claims, geoengineering would not make the top 100. If we focus solely on the narrower category of solar radiation management then there is no evidence to claim that SRM is a priority at this stage. Fred On Wed, Mar 27, 2013 at 7:23 PM, Bill Stahl bstah...@gmail.com wrote: The comments I have on this excellent article are: 1, China is popularly used as an example of a country that will go it's own way on climate issues (and on anything else). This is natural- especially for an Australian like Hamilton! - but it's also true of Canada (as is sometimes overlooked in the battle over the Keystone pipeline). Rather than give up its tar sands it might be willing to be the first to take the plunge into geoengineering. And, unlike China, it has plenty of Arctic territory to give it both acute awareness of permafrost melting and easy entree into high-latitude SRM to cool the Arctic. Given the pace of Arctic melting that issue will be forced long, long before 2035, and because the directly affected zone is so much smaller than that of global SRM the governance barriers are lower (though still high). Canada is then at least as good a candidate for 'first adopter' as China. 2. That would not directly help China but Hamilton's description suggests that China's interests would lead it to support Canada (or any other high-latitude plunge-taker) to give itself more options later. 3. Hamilton's hypothetical 2035 scenario describes an interaction between China and the U.S. as one between two isolated states, as if the US would have available a practical option of shooting down planes. But there is no conceivable scenario in which only one country wants to do SRM, and none in which only one opposes it. Let's assume that a large number of low-lying countries (Pacific island states in particular) are ready to cool the Arctic Greenland, as soon as possible - starting next Thursday afternoon if they can. These 10 or 20 states are shopping around for a larger state or states with the political and technical muscle to implement it - China and Canada, since we've already mentioned them. A slew of mid-size players sign on for various reasons, leading to a coalition of 30 countries of varying size, location, wealth motives. Those opposed or undecided will not be invited, as Caldeira et all described in a recent game theory paper. At the risk of being flippant, let's say they give themselves a noble-sounding title - Alliance for Something or Other Virtuous With a Snappy Acronym - and they pick as their figurehead someone who can persuasively don the mantle of righteousness. The leader of an endangered atoll state would do nicely, even if some relatively 'unsympathetic' country such as China is the real muscle. What will stop them? Surely not some moratorium voted out of a UN committee room a decade or two before. Shooting down planes? Imagine some nation's networks interrupting their regular programming for a Presidential announcement: I have today authorized our armed forces to take action against Fiji, China, Malaysia, American Samoa, Mongolia, Zanzibar, Finland, The Seychelles and ... oh to hell with it, *lots* of others. Although I'm unsympathetic to those who oppose any geoengineering research as starting down a slippery slope to full deployment, I have to admit they have a point. On Saturday, March 23, 2013 6:26:35 PM UTC-6, andrewjlockley wrote: http://www.guardian.co.uk/**environment/2013/mar/22/** geoengineering-china-climate-**changehttp://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2013/mar/22/geoengineering-china-climate-change Why geoengineering has immediate appeal to China Beijing wants to cut emissions without hindering growth and avert a revolt from a population under extreme climate stress Clive Hamilton professor of public ethics at Charles Sturt University in Canberra Friday 22 March 2013 14.01 GMT The political dilemma over geoengineering – deliberate, large-scale intervention in the climate system designed to counter global warming or offset some of its effects – will perhaps be most acute in China. In December, the country listed geoengineering among its Earth science research priorities, in a marked shift in the international climate change landscape noticed by China specialists Kingsley Edney and Jonathan Symons. On the one hand, China's rapid economic growth has seen a huge
