[extropy-chat] Climate skepticism patterns

[Eugen Leitl]

On Wed, Jun 07, 2006 at 06:27:57PM -0700, "Hal Finney" wrote:

> Teller's paper actually describes two mitigation schemes, one involving
> putting stuff in the stratosphere, and the other a more ambitious plan

Arguably with airbreathing hydrogen engines to power aerospace of
the near future there will be lots of water ice in the stratosphere
by side effect. Truly spectacular clouds.

> to station material at the Earth-Sun L1 point.  This is a semi-stable
> orbital point approximately a million miles towards the Sun from the
> Earth.  Teller et al calculate that only 3000 tons of smart material
> located at L1 would diffract away enough sunlight from Earth to eliminate
> global warming.  Of course it will be some time before we can put or
> manipulate this much material in space.

It would be easier to launch material from Luna, using linear motors.
Launching 3 kT (assuming, it's enough -- smart materials sounds
rather sketchy to me) to L1 by means of chemical rockets is a cure
worse than the disease (some 1-3 k launches required, assuming some
20 M$/launch that's a lot of money which is better invested in
renewables).
 
-- 
Eugen* Leitl <a href="http://leitl.org">leitl</a> http://leitl.org
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