14 DAY TRIAL // As appealing as some might find the idea to use geoengineering to keep climate change and global warming in check, it appears that, when it comes to limiting these phenomena, there is just one solution: curbing greenhouse gas emissions.
In a new report, a team of researchers details that, although geoengineering holds some promise, drastically reducing emissions is key to slowing climate change and global warming.
Writing in the latest issue of the journal Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment, the specialists do however argue that climate engineering could, together with a drop in global greenhouse gas emissions, help save the planet.
“We found that climate engineering doesn't offer a perfect option. The perfect option is reducing emissions,” explains study leader Daniela Cusack, as cited by Phys Org.
“We have to cut down the amount of emissions we're putting into the atmosphere if, in the future, we want to have anything like the Earth we have now,” the researcher goes on to argue.
While looking into various means to limit climate change and global warming, Daniela Cusack and her colleagues found that just five strategies could, if implemented properly, help put a leash on these phenomena.
As detailed in said paper, these strategies are reducing emissions, sequestering carbon both on land and in the ocean, storing liquefied carbon dioxide in the underground, adding to the Earth's cold cover, and solar reflection.
Still, it appears that, of these five strategies, none holds as much promise as reducing emissions by promoting clean fuels and energy efficiency does. More so given the fact that technology is already advanced enough to allow such measures to be implemented.
“We have the technology, and we know how to do it,” explains Daniela Cusack with the University of California, Los Angeles. Furthermore, “It's just that there doesn't seem to be political support for reducing emissions.”
It is estimated that, by pushing for energy efficiency and promoting the use of clean fuels, the world could reduce yearly carbon emissions by as much as 7 gigatons. Limiting forest destruction and planting new trees, on the other hand, would save an annual 1.3 gigatons of carbon.
When it comes to carbon capture and storage, the researchers estimate that this strategy could help put about 1 gigaton of carbon in the underground on a yearly basis. However, should this carbon somehow escape, the results would be devastating.
Lastly, the scientists behind this investigation argue that, although they might sound good on paper, solar reflection and increasing our planet's cloud cover are too risky to implement due to the fact that there is no way of telling how these two strategies might alter global climate patterns.