Chief Scientist Launches Occasional Paper Series. (April 11, 2012)

The Office of the Chief Scientist has inaugurated the first of what it has termed its "Occasional Paper Series".

Issue No.1, April 2012 is Geoengineering by Tristan Reekie, Research School of Chemistry, the Australian National University; Intern, Office of the Chief Scientist and Will Howard: Office of the Chief Scientist.

The four page assessment opens with: "Geoengineering is a controversial strategy to tackle global warming. It has recently attracted the interest of scientists and policy-makers around the world as we continue to rely on fossil fuels like coal and oil for energy, with limited cuts to global greenhouse gas emissions... This paper provides an overview of the science behind some of the better-studied geoengineering strategies."

Specifically it discusses various methods of CO₂ removal and solar radiation management, mainly through sulphate aerosols.

The authors conclude that while geoengineering is a "possible approach to combat global warming" it would not mitigate all the effects of increasing green-house gas emissions and quotes from the Royal Society's report: "all of the geoengineering methods assessed have major uncertainties in their likely costs, effectiveness or associated risks and are unlikely to be ready for deployment in the short to medium term," as well as The US Task Force on Climate Remediation Research which has "not recommended deployment of climate remediation technologies, because far more research is needed to understand the potential impacts, risks, and costs associated with specific technologies."