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A Startup's Bid to Dim the Sun

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Re: A Startup's Bid to Dim the Sun

#21

Post by squigz »

seanhunter wrote: post #12
firsttome wrote: post #9

I still think a slew of independent satellites is the best idea. Worst case, just send up a shuttle and sweep them all up. You can’t undo a volcanic explosion.

> Worst case, just send up a shuttle and sweep them all up. Not necessarily. All the junk could kickstart Kessler Syndrome[1] and make earth’s orbit completely impossible to traverse. Then when you want to sweep them up, your shuttle would just get shredded by debris. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kessler_syndrome

> However, even a catastrophic Kessler scenario at LEO would pose minimal risk for launches continuing past LEO, or satellites travelling at medium Earth orbit (MEO) or geosynchronous orbit (GEO). The catastrophic scenarios predict an increase in the number of collisions per year, as opposed to a physically impassable barrier to space exploration that occurs in higher orbits.

Kessler Syndrome has always struck me as a problem that, should it become an actual issue, we should be able to solve. There is even mention of a couple potential solutions on the Wikipedia page.

Re: A Startup's Bid to Dim the Sun

#24

Post by goku12 »

inglor_cz wrote: post #18
goku12 wrote: post #16

Volcanic sulfuric acid in the upper atmosphere is not the only known factor that can reduce global average temperatures. Another well known phenomenon is that during the ice ages, the sprawling white ice sheets tended to reflect a lot of the solar radiation back into space, causing a positive feedback loop that cooled the planet down even further. The fundamental idea here in both cases, is that the global warming is…

"You know, may be convince everyone that dumping so much CO2 into the atmosphere is not a good idea? " Compared to this, a planet-wide engineering project might be less absurd and more doable. Even the EU is under strong internal pressure to water down its decarbonization project, because local effects have proven too inconvenient to voters. Green vote has gone down all across Europe, and that translates to reduced p…

> because local effects have proven too inconvenient to voters.

I don't think you need a reminder that their inconvenience is about to get a whole lot worse. When I said they should convince everyone, I meant the voters too. A renewed awareness campaign at this point is not such a bad idea. It's definitely not as costly as the fantasies as these people are proposing.

Re: A Startup's Bid to Dim the Sun

#25

Post by helsinki8 »

cyber_kinetist wrote: post #15

If you really want to read how horrible and scary the idea of geo-engineering can get, read these two papers: https://brill.com/view/journals/hima/30/4/article-p3_1.xml?l... https://brill.com/view/journals/hima/31/1/article-p3_1.xml?l... It's a wild read, that not only explains how this idea is technically horrible - he also analyzes the social and psychological effects this would have on humanity, and it's harrowing…

If you want to read how horrible and scary the status quo is, just look at any scientific projection of current trends in 10 or 50 years.

> corporations and governments will just rely on this instead of also reducing CO2 emissions

They already rely on people wanting cheap gasoline and cheap beef and high profits to the companies that give generous political donations. So, no change in actual behavior.

Geo-engineering is already happening and has been for decades. It's just been as a side effect of industry. Doing a little bit of intentional work to counteract that is a reasonable response. Hoping that tomorrow everyone wakes up and decides to do the right thing about emissions is a fantasy.

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