Climate 411

Why EDF is exploring marine carbon dioxide removal

By Kristin Kleisner and Mattias Cape / Published: September 25, 2024


The oceans are a massive carbon sink. Researchers, companies and governments are exploring whether we can engineer coastal and ocean systems to store even more carbon. But while the ocean presents us with great possibilities, it’s also a complex system where human interventions can impact everything from the ecological (species’ interactions or the habitats they depend on) to the socio-economic (food systems or economic livelihoods).  

EDF has a track record of coordinating collaborative research on natural carbon storage systems in the ocean to understand both their role in carbon sequestration and their potential to generate ecological and socio-economic benefits, as well as any associated risks.  

We’re now taking a similarly holistic approach to exploring the potential of technical approaches to marine carbon dioxide removal (or, mCDR). Our aim: to identify the areas with the greatest potential to accelerate innovation with minimal risks to people and nature.  

mCDR: different methods to increase carbon sinks 

Marine CDR is a manmade intervention in the marine environment that changes the biology, chemistry or physics of the surface ocean resulting in the net removal of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. A few ideas have been suggested based on existing knowledge of ocean science. For example:  

  • Using fertilizers like iron sprinkled in the water in large quantities could encourage the growth of phytoplankton, microscopic marine plants, that, by sinking or being consumed, could facilitate the movement of carbon to the deep sea.  
  • Releasing minerals into surface waters that amplifies the slow natural weathering of rocks like limestone or basalt could help boost ocean’s alkalinity and increase carbon sequestration rates in the ocean.  
  • Pumping surface water to deeper depths could take carbon dioxide the ocean has absorbed from the atmosphere and mimic the natural process of phytoplankton sinking when they die.  

While these innovations seem promising, changing natural processes can result in a host of hard-to-determine impacts. For example, scientists don’t yet know whether artificial fertilization and growth could result in carbon export to the deep ocean. Therefore, we need to be cautious and examine not only the efficacy of carbon removal, but also impacts on marine life and human health. There are also complex ethical considerations associated with undertaking many of these approaches, from economic costs to impacts on livelihoods and food security across both short and long timescales. It’s critical to understand the risks as well as who will benefit, and who will bear the costs as decisions to continue research or deployment are being made.   

Why it’s time to examine mCDR’s efficacy and impacts 

It’s clear that holding warming below 2 degrees Celsius through emissions reductions and the energy transition alone will be difficult. We see a potential role for mCDR in contributing to stabilizing the climate and reaching net zero goals in the long term, which requires gaining a better understanding of benefits and risks in the short term. More and more organizations are working on mCDR, in large part driven by significant interest in the voluntary carbon market. And while funding is currently focused on evaluating the efficacy of carbon removal, we lack a solid scientific basis upon which to make reasonable decisions.  

A strong scientific foundation is critical to speeding and scaling CDR solutions. But speeding and scaling down the wrong path can ultimately reduce confidence in entire solution pathways, as well as lead to environmental harms. EDF wants to help to establish, guardrails, governance and policies to help develop a responsible research program that would allow thoughtful consideration of the full scope of both climate and ecological and socio-economic implications of mCDR development.   

EDF applies a systems perspective in examining climate solutions, with mCDR fitting within our existing and complementary efforts related to natural climate solutions, emissions reductions, carbon markets and solar geoengineering methods. We also have a long track record of working with academe, industry, governments, other NGOs, community groups and other civil society organizations to provide society with the understandings required to make science-based decisions.   

While EDF is not supporting widespread deployment of mCDR methods at this time, we are engaging in the following ways: 

  • Assessing research needs, contributing to research, advocating for research code of conduct, and supporting the development of rigorous standards for assessing the safety of any research in this space.  
  • Examining permitting and regulatory needs to help inform recommendations and policies.  
  • Developing effective engagement strategies with communities and interested parties around mCDR research. 
  • Creating a holistic framework to evaluate different benefits, risks and tradeoffs of different types of mCDR.  
  • Advocating for the developing of a robust federal research initiative on marine CDR 

Emissions reduction remains EDF’s number one priority and primary focus. However, as we work to address near term warming and with it limit some of the most worrisome impacts of climate change that we’re already experiencing, we need to research new technologies that show promise. Instead of jumping into mCDR with a Gold Rush mentality, it’s critical to develop an evaluative framework for looking at the impacts of these new technologies across the multiple dimensions that affect the environment and people’s wellbeing and engage civil society in the process. 

Also posted in News, Oceans, Science / Authors: , / Comments are closed

Why it’s time to explore the potential impacts of Solar Radiation Modification

By Lisa Dilling / Published: July 8, 2024

Photo: Pezibear

The impacts from climate change will continue to escalate in the years ahead, and a growing number of scientists, philanthropies and companies have become interested in strategies to lower global temperatures more quickly. One of the options is reflecting some sunlight back into space.  

Because the consequences of Solar Radiation Modification (SRM), as it’s called, are hard to project, further study is critical before any action is seriously considered.  

While driving the transition to clean energy sources and rapidly reducing climate pollution remain EDF’s major foci, we also need to understand the implications of trying to directly influence earth’s temperature through this technology. That’s why EDF is embarking on an ambitious research program to learn more about SRM and its potential impacts. It is critical that decision makers and the public have a better understanding of the potential implications of deploying SRM before it is seriously considered.  

This work does not mean EDF supports deployment of SRM or other geoengineering strategies. However, these ideas may be increasingly considered in the next few decades, so it’s essential we understand the potential impacts. We need solid scientific information that’s accessible to decision makers in all countries to form the basis of future decisions about the use of this technology. 

Read More »

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A Significant Milestone for Opening Up the Discussion About Geoengineering

By Steven Hamburg / Published: February 10, 2015

Geoengineering is the deliberate large-scale manipulation of the Earth’s climate system to counteract the impact that pollutants are having on our climate. The proposals sound like the stuff of science fiction – spraying particles in the upper atmosphere to deflect some sunlight, for instance – and EDF’s experts have been following the topic with concern.

Most of the focus on climate change has been about transitioning our economy to clean, renewable energy – removing the cause of the malady. But some are worried that won’t happen fast enough and that a more radical intervention may be necessary. Indeed, a 2014 report from the International Panel on Climate Change indicated that the world may require some form of climate engineering in order to stay within a hoped for two-degree limit to global temperature rise. But these proposals raise a serious risk of unintended consequences.

Geoengineering is in the news because of the release of a new report from the National Academy of Sciences. It’s the first study commissioned by the U.S. government that explains our current understanding of the science, ethics, and governance issues presented by geoengineering technologies. I was a member of the panel that drafted the NAS report, and its release is also meaningful for me — and for my colleagues here at EDF — because of our involvement with the Solar Radiation Management Governance Initiative (SRMGI).

Specifically, NAS was asked to conduct a technical evaluation of a limited number of proposed geoengineering techniques, including albedo modification and carbon dioxide removal. The new report comments on the potential impacts of these technologies.

What is Albedo Modification?

Albedo modification (AM), also known as “solar radiation management,” describes a controversial set of theoretical proposals for cooling the Earth by reflecting a small amount of inbound solar energy back into space.

These techniques have attracted attention because they could — in theory — reduce global temperatures quickly and relatively cheaply. BUT – these techniques would have unknown adverse impacts.

The new NAS report makes clear that AM is not an alternative to deep reductions in carbon pollution.

AM does not address ocean acidification and other non-temperature-related climate change impacts. It can at most serve as a temporary tool to reduce temperatures while lowering the atmospheric burden of greenhouse gases.

AM technologies have potentially serious and uncertain environmental, political, and social risks. The distribution and balance of benefits and risks are currently unknown.

AM research will require governance mechanisms to ensure that if research is undertaken, it is done transparently, safely, and with international agreement.

Unlike the NAS report just released, EDF has not called for small-scale AM research. We are in favor of accelerated discussion and development of a governance framework that would cover any potential geoengineering research.  

Why should research governance involve a global conversation?

The scientific, ethical, political, and social implications of AM research could be global. That means discussions about AM research governance should be global as well. To date, however, most discussions on the governance of AM research have taken place in developed countries — even though people in developing countries are those most vulnerable, both to climate change and to any potential efforts to respond to it.

In recognition of that fact, the Royal Society, EDF and TWAS (The World Academy of Sciences) launched SRMGI in 2010. SRMGI is an international NGO-driven initiative to expand international discussions on AM, particularly to developing countries.

SRMGI promotes early and sustained dialogue among diverse stakeholders around the world, informed by the best available science, in order to increase the chances of any AM research, should it be undertaken, being managed responsibly, transparently, and cooperatively.

The new NAS report offers an important opportunity to expand that dialogue.

It’s critical that we aim for transnational cooperation and information exchange on climate engineering research governance. That’s because even low-risk climate engineering research presents controversy.

AM’s potentially cheap deployment and quick effect on global temperatures could lead to the rapid and unilateral development of AM research programs, which could engender international tension and conflict.

Furthermore, deployment of AM would not benefit all populations equally.

And, while discussions about geoengineering are necessary, they cannot be considered as a substitute for reducing carbon pollution. The billions of tons of carbon pollution we put into our atmosphere every year are causing dangerous changes to our climate, and we must rapidly and consistently reduce that pollution. No climate engineering technology we can conceive of could keep up with the impacts of rapidly accelerating emissions.

What Comes Next?

The new NAS report should spur the U.S. and other governments to take the governance challenges of research into AM technologies seriously. An important next step is to foster wider international dialogue, including developing countries, on how to responsibly manage AM research.

It’s a dialogue that we at SRMGI, and at EDF, welcome. And the new NAS report is a welcome contribution to this dialogue.

Also posted in Greenhouse Gas Emissions, News, Partners for Change, Science / Comments are closed

Young professionals tackle Solar Radiation Management research governance

By Alex Hanafi / Published: November 20, 2014

This post was written by EDF’s Alex Hanafi and Cassandra Brunette.

What do 45 young environmental leaders from around the world have to say about the governance of emerging climate engineering technologies?

The Solar Radiation Management Governance Initiative (SRMGI) and EDF teamed up with the University of California, Berkeley to ask that question at a recent workshop.

It’s a question that has important implications for the future governance of solar geoengineering research. Also known as “solar radiation management” (or “SRM”), emerging solar geoengineering technologies are designed to cool the Earth by blocking or reflecting some of the sun’s energy back into space.

These techniques could — in theory — stop global warming quickly and relatively cheaply. However, they have potentially serious and uncertain environmental, political, and social implications. At present, few international governance mechanisms exist to ensure that SRM research would be transparent, safe, and internationally acceptable.

Our workshop was part of the Beahrs Environmental Leadership Program (ELP) at Berkeley. Participants explored the science, ethics, and governance of SRM research through a series of interactive discussions and participatory exercises.

This year’s 45 participants hailed from 33 different countries, with the overwhelming majority from developing nations. Participants were encouraged to brainstorm and share ideas about the potential role of their home countries in research governance.

Attendees expressed a wide range of opinions on SRM:

  • Some suggested SRM could provide a technological solution to some of the temperature-related impacts of climate change.
  • Others maintained that the root causes of anthropogenic climate change should be addressed before exploring SRM any further.
  • The majority of participants called for SRM research transparency, and inclusivity in global discussions about possible governance structures for SRM research.

The diversity of participants, all convened in one location, made an ideal fit with SRMGI’s mission to develop informed international dialogue on SRM research governance. SRMGI’s goal is to bring currently underrepresented voices, particularly from developing nations, into an informed conversation about how to responsibly manage SRM research.

SRM’s potentially cheap deployment and quick effect on global temperatures could lead to the rapid and unilateral development of SRM programs, potentially provoking international tension and mistrust. Multi-stakeholder dialogue and international cooperation is critical to ensure that research into SRM is governed responsibly and transparently.

While SRMGI has hosted workshops in the United Kingdom, China, India, Pakistan, and Africa, this was SRMGI’s first event in the United States.

Stay tuned for more — SRMGI is preparing a report that will provide more details on the workshop’s agenda, interactive activities, and outcomes.

In the meantime, read more about SRMGI’s work here.

Also posted in Science / Comments are closed

IPCC mention of geoengineering, though brief, opens window for discussion

By Alex Hanafi / Published: October 30, 2013

The IPCC’s latest report includes a brief mention of geoengineering — a range of techniques for reducing global warming through intervention in the planet’s climate system. (Photo credit: NASA)

(Originally posted yesterday on EDF’s Climate Talks blog)

Just a few weeks ago, the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released the first piece of their fifth crucial report on global warming – and it confirms that our climate is changing. Key messages from the report include:

  • Warming of the climate is unequivocal
  • Human influence on the climate system is clear, and the evidence for human influence has only increased since the last IPCC report
  • Further changes in temperature, precipitation, weather extremes, and sea level are imminent

In short, humans are causing dramatic climate change—and we’re already witnessing the effects. Oceans are warming and acidifying. Weather patterns are more extreme and destructive. Land-based ice is declining—and leading to rising sea levels.

None of this should be surprising to those following the science of climate change. What has generated surprise amongst some, however, is the IPCC’s brief mention of the science of geoengineering, tucked into the last paragraph of the IPCC’s 36-page “Summary for Policymakers.”

Understanding the science of geoengineering

As communities and policymakers around the world face the risks presented by a rapidly changing climate, interest in the topic of “geoengineering” is growing.

Geoengineering refers to a range of techniques for reducing global warming through intervention in the planet’s climate system, by removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere (carbon dioxide removal, or CDR) or by reflecting away a small percentage of inbound sunlight (solar radiation management, or SRM).

Some of these ideas have been proposed by scientists concerned about the lack of political progress in curbing the continued growth in global carbon emissions, and who are looking for other possibilities for addressing climate change if we can’t get emissions under control soon.

With the risks and impacts of rising temperatures already being felt, the fact that SRM would likely be cheap to deploy and fast-acting means that it has attracted particular attention as one possible short-term response to climate change.

The world’s governments tasked the IPCC with investigating these emerging technologies in its new report, and the IPCC summary rightly sounds a cautionary note on their potential utility, warning:

Limited evidence precludes a comprehensive quantitative assessment of both Solar Radiation Management (SRM) and Carbon Dioxide Removal (CDR) and their impact on the climate system…

Modelling indicates that SRM methods, if realizable, have the potential to substantially offset a global temperature rise, but they would also modify the global water cycle, and would not reduce ocean acidification. If SRM were terminated for any reason, there is high confidence that global surface temperatures would rise very rapidly to values consistent with the greenhouse gas forcing. CDR and SRM methods carry side effects and long-term consequences on a global scale.

So what does this mean? Three things are clear from the IPCC’s brief analysis:

  1. CDR and SRM might have benefits for the climate system, but they also carry risks, and at this stage it is unknown what the balance of benefits and risks may be.
  2. The overall effects of SRM for regional and global weather patterns are likely to be uncertain, unpredictable, and broadly distributed across countries. As with climate change itself, there would most likely be winners and losers if SRM technologies were to be used.
  3. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, SRM does not provide an alternative to reducing greenhouse gas emissions, since it does not address the rising emissions that are the root cause of ocean acidification and other non-temperature related climate change impacts.

This last point is particularly important. The most that could be expected from SRM would be to serve as a short-term tool to manage some temperature-related climate risks, if efforts to reduce global greenhouse gas emissions prove too slow to prevent severe disruption of the earth’s climate.

In that case, we need to understand what intervention options exist and the implications of deploying them. In other words, ignorance is our enemy.

Need for inclusive and adaptive governance of solar radiation management research

While much of the limited research on solar radiation management has taken place in the developed world – a trend likely to continue for the foreseeable future – the ethical, political, and social implications of SRM research are necessarily global. Discussions about governance of research should be as well.

But a transparent and transnationally agreed system of governance of SRM research (including norms, best practices, regulations and laws) does not currently exist. With knowledge of the complex technical, ethical, and political implications of SRM currently limited, an effective research governance framework will be difficult to achieve until we undertake a broad conversation among a diversity of stakeholders.

Recognizing these needs, The Royal Society, Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), and TWAS (The World Academy of Sciences) launched in 2010 an international NGO-driven initiative to explore how SRM research could be governed. SRMGI is neither for nor against SRM. Instead, it aims to foster inclusive, interdisciplinary, and international discussion on SRM research and governance.

SRMGI’s activities are founded on a simple idea: that early and sustained dialogue among diverse stakeholders around the world, informed by the best available science, will increase the chances of SRM research being handled responsibly, equitably, and cooperatively.

Connecting dialogues across borders

A key goal is to include people in developing countries vulnerable to climate change and typically marginalized in discussions about emerging science and technology issues, to explore their views on SRM, and connect them in a transnational conversation about possible research governance regimes.

This month, for example, saw the launch of a report by the African Academy of Sciences and SRMGI describing the results from a series of three SRM research governance workshops held in Africa in 2012 and 2013. Convened in Senegal, South Africa, and Ethiopia, the workshops attracted more than 100 participants – including scientists, policymakers, journalists and academics – from 21 African nations to explore African perspectives on SRM governance.

To build the capacity for an informed global dialogue on geoengineering governance, a critical mass of well-informed individuals in communities throughout the world must be developed, and they must talk to each other, as well as to their own networks. An expanding spiral of distinct, but linked outreach processes could help build the cooperative bridges needed to manage potential international conflicts, and will help ensure that if SRM technologies develop, they do so cooperatively and transparently, not unilaterally.

The way forward

No one can predict how SRM research will develop or whether these strategies for managing the short-term implications of climate risk will be helpful or harmful, but early cooperation and transnational, interdisciplinary dialogue on geoengineering research governance will help the global community make informed decisions.

With SRM research in its infancy, but interest in the topic growing, the IPCC report reminds us that now is the time to establish the norms and governance mechanisms that ensure that where research does proceed, it is safe, ethical, and subject to appropriate public oversight and independent evaluation.

It’s worth remembering that the IPCC devoted only one paragraph of its 36-page summary report to geoengineering. So while discussion about geoengineering technologies and governance is necessary, the key message from the IPCC must not be lost: it’s time to recognize that the billions of tons of carbon pollution we put in our atmosphere every year are causing dangerous changes to our climate, and work together to find the best ways to reduce that pollution.

Also posted in Greenhouse Gas Emissions, News, Science / Comments are closed

Geoengineering: Ignore Economics and Governance at Your Peril

By Gernot Wagner / Published: October 31, 2012

How serious is global warming? Here’s one indication: the first rogue entrepreneurs have begun testing the waters on geoengineering, as Naomi Klein laments in her must-read New York Times op-ed.

Sadly, Klein misses two important points.

First, it’s not a question of if but when humanity will be compelled to use geoengineering, unless we change course on our climate policies (or lack thereof). Second, all of this calls for more research and a clear, comprehensive governance effort on the part of governments and serious scientists – not a ban of geoengineering that we cannot and will not adhere to. (See point number one.)

Saying that we ought not to tinker with the planet on a grand scale – by attempting to create an artificial sun shield, for example – won’t make it so. Humanity got into this mess thanks to what economists call the “free rider” effect. All seven billion of us are free riders on the planet, contributing to global warming in various ways but paying nothing toward the damage it causes. No wonder it’s so hard to pass a sensible cap or tax on carbon pollution. Who wants to pay for something that they’re used to doing for free – never mind that it comes at great cost to those around them?

It gets worse: Turns out the same economic forces pushing us to do too little on the pollution front are pushing us toward a quick, cheap fix – a plan B.

Enter the Strangelovian world of geoengineering – tinkering with the whole planet. It comes in two distinct flavors:

  • Sucking carbon out of the atmosphere;
  • Creating an artificial sun shield for the planet.

The first involves reversing some of the same processes that cause global warming in the first place. Instead of taking fossil fuels out of the ground and burning them, we would now take carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere and bury it under ground. That sounds expensive, and it is. Estimates range from $40 to $200 and more per ton of carbon dioxide – trillions of dollars to solve the problem.

That brings us to the second scary flavor — which David Keith, a leading thinker on geoengineering, calls “chemotherapy” for the planet. The direct price tag to create an artificial sun shield: pennies per ton of carbon dioxide. It’s the kind of intervention an island nation, or a billionaire greenfinger, could pay for.

You can see where economics enters the picture. The first form of geoengineering won’t happen unless we place a serious price on carbon pollution. The second may be too cheap to resist.

In a recent Foreign Policy essay, Harvard’s Martin Weitzman and I called the forces pushing us toward quick and dirty climate modification “free driving.” Crude attempts to, say, inject sulfur particles into the atmosphere to counter the carbon dioxide that’s already there would be so cheap it might as well be free. We are talking tens or hundreds of millions of dollars a year. That’s orders of magnitude cheaper than tackling the root cause of the problem.

Given the climate path we are on, it’s only a matter of time before this “free driver” effect takes hold. Imagine a country badly hit by adverse climate changes: India’s crops are wilting; China’s rivers are drying up. Millions of people are suffering. What government, under such circumstances, would not feel justified in taking drastic action, even in defiance of world opinion?

Once we reach that tipping point, there won’t be time to reverse warming by pursuing collective strategies to move the world onto a more sustainable growth path. Instead, speed will be of the essence, which will mean trying untested and largely hypothetical techniques like mimicking volcanoes and putting sulfur particles in the stratosphere to create an artificial shield from the sun.

That artificial sunscreen may well cool the earth. But what else might it do? Floods somewhere, droughts in other places, and a host of unknown and largely unknowable effects in between. That’s the scary prospect. And we’d be experimenting on a planetary scale, in warp speed.

That all leads to the second key point: we ought to do research in geoengineering, and do so guided by sensible governance principles adhered to be all. We cannot let research get ahead of public opinion and government oversight. The geoengineering governance initiative convened by the British Royal Society, the Academy of Sciences for the Developing World, and the Environmental Defense Fund is a necessary first step in the right direction.

Is there any hope in this doomsday scenario? Absolutely. Country after country is following the trend set by the European Union to institute a cap or price on carbon pollution. Australia, New Zealand, South Korea, and also California are already – or will soon be – limiting their carbon pollution. India has a dollar-a-ton coal tax. China is experimenting with seven regional cap-and-trade systems.

None of these is sufficient by itself. But let’s hope this trend expands –fast – to include the really big emitters like the whole of China and the U.S., Brazil, Indonesia, and others. Remember, the question is not if the “free driver” effect will kick in as the world warms. It’s when.

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