Geo-Engineering and Other Technology Stuff

I used to brag to myself that I held anarcho-primitivist / tribalist ideals, and that the only way for humanity to pull itself out of the many messes we've made is to abandon our societies and revert to hunter-gatherer, tribal cultures (the ultimate community!), or, at the least, experience a large-scale move away from globalization. I recall sneering to myself when having a conversation with a classmate early on in the year who suggested that technology was the answer.

However, in the course of this academic year, I've been moving progressively away from this ideal to a more practical viewpoint. This has been mainly inspired by my increased consumption of news material and blogs, which tend to focus on interesting technological innovations. I suppose my continual surprise over the sheer creativity of some inventions has really been giving me hope that a combination of these could quite possibly allow us to continue on a fairly "painless" path (relatively speaking), compared to the alternatives.

See, for example this green design competition of some neat gadgets:

http://www.core77.com/greenergadgets/index.php

I not only refer to gadgets, however, but also large-scale innovations that could completely change the entire dynamic of our current problems. For example, my physicist friend recently informed me of a new attempt at a fusion generator, which, if successful and implemented, could completely solve our energy situation (I really wish people would talk about fusion more, it seems like such a brilliant solution to invest in).

http://www.popsci.com/scitech/article/2008-12/machine-might-save-world


Now, obviously, any new technology has many-a-hurdle to overcome and always takes longer to implement than expected, but there is still reason to be optimistic rather than pessimistic - mainly because its really the only avenue we can hope to achieve. (I doubt any except the most ardent and narrow-minded activist seriously thinks that all 6.7 billion of us will simultaneously agree to dismantle our society.)

However, just because its the only practical option, this does not mean we should support every new idea that may or may not work. My discussion in this case will center on an issue I've seen several articles on lately: "geo-engineering" - the use of technological techniques on a global scale to tinker with certain aspects of the environment.

My discussion info is drawn from these links:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/4641586/Can-geo-engineering-rebuild-the-planet.html

http://climateprogress.org/2009/02/12/geoengineering-bad-idea-iron-fertilization/

http://climateprogress.org/2009/02/17/so-much-for-geoengineering-2-ocean-dead-zones-to-expand-remain-for-thousands-of-years/

The premise of geo-engineering sounds good on paper: time is short and things like changing consumer habits and implementing clean energy take a longer time than we have in order to mitigate or avoid the effects of climate change, so in addition to those, we also need an immediate, short-term solution that could either prevent the warming caused by our GHG emissions or remove large amounts of these emissions quickly. Some very creative solutions have been proposed, such as fertilizing large areas of the ocean with iron (in order to stimulate algal blooms that would take up CO2), injecting sulfur into the atmosphere to reflect sunlight, placing vertical pipes into the ocean to transfer deep, cold water to the surface (cooling the surface would decrease the rate of global temperature increase), or launching trillions of transparent discs into space (which would act as lenses to reflect sunlight).

Cool. Great stuff right? Makes everything so much easier knowing that we don't have to give up our lifestyles in order to save the world, right?

Well, its unfortunately never as simple as that. While some of these types of projects may indeed be somewhat useful, many respected researchers in the field take a very strong view against these projects. See, for example, Bill Becker's blog posting on the matter - the 2nd link, above. I rather like his eloquence and so will quote him extensively:

* Geo-engineering is the practice of messing around with global life-support systems we don’t understand. If we did understand them, we might not be in the pickle we’re in today. Or at least it would be a greener pickle.
* Geo-engineering is a relatively new field based on the outdated and repeatedly discredited assumption that we humans are smart enough and wise enough to rule over the rest of the biosphere. Rather than applied engineering, we might call it “applied conceit”.
* Contrariwise and at the same time, geo-engineering is a symptom of our growing skepticism that we are able to stop climate change with rational solutions such as energy efficiency, renewable energy, carbon pricing and behavioral changes. In other words, interest in geo-engineering is rooted in the idea that although we’re too stupid to do the simple things that would slow climate change, we’re smart enough to do the improbable things.
* Geo-engineering is one outgrowth of our apparent learning disability about the law of unintended consequences. That law would be unleashed full-force once we started manipulating the oceans and atmosphere to create what one environmentalist calls “the Frankenplanet”. Geo-engineering is like a grownup version of whack-a-mole, where hammering down one problem causes others to pop up, to our great surprise.

He also uses the example of Biosphere 2, which you may recall as the project in the 90's that attempted to create a livable environment in a sealed enclosure, only to fail miserably on both attempts. This is the recurring theme towards anti-geo-engineering sentiments: how do we know that these "solutions" won't just make things worse, due to some factor we didn't consider or understand? The other argument stream, as Becker discusses, is an ethical one:

But what bothers me most about geo-engineering is this: It provides an excuse to avoid a profoundly important teachable moment. Climate change is painful proof positive that we are connected with and dependent upon the rest of the natural world. It tells us that our time as outlaws is over; we have reached the limits of the planet’s capacity to tolerate abuse. Global climate change calls for an evolutionary shift in consciousness first, and technology second. And the technology we need is eco-engineering, not geo-engineering.

If we deny this moment and fail to “institutionalize” the revelation of connectedness in our science, engineering, policies and behaviors, we will have demonstrated for all time that 1) we are the ultimate invasive species, and 2) we are not the most intelligent species, and 3) when it comes to our own survival, we have no more willpower than lemmings.

The man knows how to make a point, and while I'm sure that both him and I and everyone else would be thrilled if a practical, completely understood and effective geo-engineering solution was created, the current fact of the matter is that there isn't one, which raises the question of / leads to Becker's final point of funding. As we all know from economics, scarcity is a fact that we have to deal with when making decisions. How can we get the most bang for our buck? This thus comes back to my original point, which was that while I have a newfound support for technology, some investments are better than others.

From what I've seen, it seems like geo-engineering could well become a fiasco like that of corn-based ethanol, only on a much larger scale. I feel that we'd be much better off investing our funds in the "rational solutions", even though they may be more painful. As Becker says:

If the federal government had a Deputy Assistant Secretary for Ecological Literacy, Interspecies Liaison and Intergenerational Morality, and if I were that person, and if the geo-engineering industry came to me for billions of dollars to fund its “emergency response strategy to cooling an overheated planet”, I would respond as follows:

To qualify for these funds, you must first demonstrate that you have learned to understand “the accumulated evolutionary wisdom” (the Economist’s phrase) in natural systems. Until you can produce a fiber as strong as a spider’s silk, for example, you have not shown that you are better engineers than nature.

Come back when you can show us how to protect our coastlines as well as natural systems once did and to prevent flooding as well as riverine ecosystems did before we destroyed them.

Come back when you have learned to build a levee that doesn’t fail and when we’ve shown a sufficient attention span to keep our bridges from falling down. The geo-engineering projects you envision will require diligence forever, a level of commitment we have not yet demonstrated.

Come see me when you have created buildings that produce more energy than they use, cities that do not sprawl, and power plants that don’t pollute. Show us the engineering solution to lifting the world’s people out of poverty without bankrupting our natural capital.

Come back when you have stopped trying to be god-like and you have learned to be child-like, filled with wonder and curiosity at the natural world and anxious to learn what billions of years of evolution can teach us. Come back when you have the humility to acknowledge that your true laboratory is not in a building, but in the biosphere itself.

We don’t have to be Luddites to draw the line at geo-engineering. There has never been a more urgent need, or more fertile ground, for intelligent invention. But for both moral and pragmatic reasons, invention must help us fulfill our potential as residents of the natural world, rather than striving to “live” apart from it.