That’s right, bubbles in space. The thinking is based on two areas of concern. One is that no matter how much we try to reduce or even eliminate greenhouse gas emissions in the future, the damage we’ve already done from over a century of advanced industrialization has already set Earth’s climate trajectory in the wrong direction. It could be so bad that even if we completely stopped all greenhouse gas emissions tomorrow, we would have to live with the severe effects of climate change for decades and even centuries, including continued sea level rise, more extreme weather events , and disturbances in food producing areas. Another way to deal with the problem is to sequester or remove carbon, or somehow limit the amount of sunlight reaching the Earth’s surface, for example by releasing aerosols into the atmosphere. The MIT team argues that this is generally a bad idea because our climate system is so complex and dynamic that introducing artificial agents into the atmosphere itself cannot be reversed. Remove all ads on Universe Today Join our Patreon for just $3! Get the ad-free experience of a lifetime That’s why they think about space. The idea is to grow a raft of thin, bubble-like films. These films will reflect or absorb a fraction of the sunlight that reaches Earth, literally blocking it. The team argues that if the amount of sunlight reaching Earth was reduced by just 1.5%, we could completely eliminate the effects of all greenhouse gas emissions. I’m personally quite skeptical about this idea. First, the team has not yet formulated exactly what these bubbles will be made of and how they will be sent to the target location, which is near the first LaGrange point of the Earth-Sun system. They will need to maintain the stability of the raft by balancing the gravitational forces of the Earth, the Sun, and also possibly the other planets. They will also have to deal with radiation pressure from the Sun itself, not to mention the constant shower of solar wind and micrometeoroids. To block even one percent of the Sun’s output would require a raft thousands of miles wide, making it the largest structure we’ve ever put into space. So there’s just a little bit of an engineering challenge to make this thing work. And while the MIT researchers claim that this space approach is fully reversible, that’s only in a certain sense. Yes, if we decide the raft is a bad idea or doesn’t do what we hoped it would, we could just let it free float or dismantle it. But Earth’s climate is a complex system with many complex feedback loops built into it that we don’t fully understand. What would be the total effects of blocking out the Sun’s light by one and a half percent for years, decades, and centuries? What effect would it have on the biosphere or the level of cloud cover or the evaporation of the oceans or a thousand other factors? Do we really believe we have the technical and intellectual ability to do this right? Finally, developing a solution that reduces the amount of sunlight hitting the Earth does nothing to address the underlying issue, which is that we are seriously damaging the Earth’s climate and biosphere. If we have cover – pun intended – to do what we want, then why should we stop polluting or emitting greenhouse gases if we can just add more bubbles to the raft? We need to address these fundamental problems, not just map them. The team admits there is a lot more work to be done, but I wouldn’t be surprised if after years of work the reality of the complexity of this proposed solution…bursts their bubble.
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