Can we really combat climate change?

Combat Climate Change

Reversing the effects of climate change has been a hot topic for some time now. Much of the focus has been on taking steps to slowly chip away at the globe's rising temperature by reducing the among of carbon in the atmosphere, using such technology as wind and solar power.

However, the last decade has seen significant advances in the kind of technology that takes a more proactive approach to climate change by actually trying to control the weather.

Climate engineering is not new, but only recently has it become a genuine possibility. But more importantly this technology has development alongside the sentiment that more drastic action must be taken if we are to cool our warming earth.

Engineering the climate

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have been one of the pioneering forces behind the issue, claiming that we are already engineering the climate unintentionally so why not try and do it on purpose. MIT associate professor of environmental policy and symposium participant Judith Layzer says, "[Geoengineering] involves taking action, inventing gizmos, and using them ideally to abate some of the warming that is expected to happen from global climate change."

But for every person in favor of the idea there are an equal number in opposition. Jim Fleming, a professor of science, technology and society at Colby College in Maine, argues, "I believe humans have been intervening on purpose for much longer than people will admit.

"So one of the lessons of climate engineering, I think, is that some climate engineers insist they're the first generation to purpose this deliberate manipulation...I think history says otherwise."

Controversial and dangerous

Trying to engineer the earth's climate is highly controversial. Ideas such as creating artificial cloud cover - or modifying clouds to reflect light back into space - and pumping sulfates into the atmosphere to block the sun's rays and cool temperatures, similar to what happens in volcanic eruptions, could be extremely dangerous.

Geoengineering is just a single component of the huge climate change machinery, but it is easily the most controversial. Tinkering with the planet is dangerous and extremely expensive.

Anyway, who has the right to decide what the 'ideal' temperature of the earth should be? A questions that is likely to increase already fraught tensions between states such as US, Russia and China. There are also questions of liability. If, for example, South Asia experiences an unusual drought during cyclone season after geoengineering begins, who gets blamed? Who gets sued? Would all strange weather patterns be blamed on geoengineering?

There are too many questions to which climate engineering has yet to answer.

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