Space Ring Could Combat Global Warming 955
telstar writes "Though the debate continues around global warming, a new proposal suggests building an artificial space ring around the Earth to block the light of the sun and bring a balance to solar radiation, cloud cover, and heat-trapping greenhouse gases. The ring could be comprised of particles which would scatter the sunlight, or be built by an interconnected ring of spaceships aligned to block the light. The former proposal is estimated to cost anywhere from $6 trillion to $200 trillion dollars, while the spaceship solution would run approximately $500 billion. Halo fans rejoice."
obligatory... (Score:5, Funny)
Debate?!? (Score:5, Insightful)
What an excellent opening sentence. The problem is, which debate is he referring to? Is he talking some real scientific debate? Or maybe a politically motivated debate based on non-science in which the powers that be try to confuse the public into believing there is no scientific consensus, with the goal being to maintain the status quo and avoid angering the energy lobby.
Because, scientifically, there is no real debate anymore over whether or not man is impacting the climate and causing global warming.
Re:Debate?!? (Score:5, Informative)
Your statement is true. The debate is over how much man in impacting climate change. The Earth has been through many, many periods in its history where it was warmer than it is today. This was before cars or factories. It managed to cool itself down.
There is still much debate about global warming in scientific circles. There is much less debate in the media.
Re:Debate?!? (Score:4, Interesting)
Most people aren't really worried about the Earth. They're worried about the inhabitants. Mass extinctions usually accompany planetary wide climate change.
Re:Debate?!? (Score:5, Funny)
Are we using them to make the ring? (Score:5, Funny)
It didn't happen last time (Score:3, Insightful)
Then it cooled off some time later, and the colony was all but abandoned.
The fun part is, the humans didn't go extinct, the gulf stream didn't reverse, ocean fauna didn't all float belly-up because of melting glaciers being sweet water, etc.
Basically that's what gets me pissed off about this _political_ "waah, we're all DOOMED if you do
fight the planet (Score:3, Funny)
After all, don't you like tropical islands? A working gulf stream?
What if we could alter the amount of solar radiation received and tailor it to our needs to make more of the planet inhabitable and comfortable.
More than that with a ship ring, we could get all the annoying people to crew the ring (or at least serve prison sentences on it).
Re:It didn't happen last time (Score:5, Informative)
There is loads of data of many different kinds. Many of them (like oxygen isotope rations in polar ice) measure average sea-surface temperature globally.
Your statement about satellite data is just plain wrong. Some cloud temperatures are lowering, but surface temperatres are rising.
The CO2 cycle is roughly 200 GTonnes in (before 1900 or so) a balanced cycle, about half in the sea, half on land. Humanity now releases roughly 9 GT/yr, and the increase in atmospheric CO2 suggests that roughly none of this extra 9 GT is being absorbed anywhere, so the cycles seem to be slow to regulate themselves.
Many of your other statements are simply wrong. See, for instance, the National Academy of Sciences report.
Re:It didn't happen last time (Score:5, Informative)
Greenland was not a farm country in the Viking age. The name was chosen to convince others to join the colony; it was a PR trick (that didn't work). Rember, Iceland was called Iceland by the vikings, not a sign of this region of the earth was very hot a 1000 years ago. Actually we are in the warmest periode in 10 000 years it seems, since the ice on Kilimanjaro for instance has not been as reduced as it now for the last 10 000 years. It is true that when the dinosaures roamed, Svalbard which is north of Iceland, was inhabitated by creates that needed warm weather. But that is millions of years ago.
Another misleading name by the vikings that settled the North American continent, is that Newfound land was called Vin-land (which means something like fertile land). (Some vikings settled in Newfound land but left for unknown reasons, the saga mention that the settlers there had problems with the native population. ) It is anyway not know what happened to the small colony of vikings that settled on Greenland. Some think that they had a bad winter and died. There is no historical account of the colony returning to Iceland or Norway. Another theory is that the vikings there joined the eskimos (or whatever they are called more politically correct) and became a part of their gene pool in a matter of speak.
Kilimanjaro (Score:3, Informative)
Actually, the evidence suggests that the lack of ice on Kilmanjaro has less to do with global warming and more to do with deforestation--because the forests at the base of
Re:It didn't happen last time (Score:4, Informative)
Enuit. Eskimo is a racial slur that means fish eater. It's analogous to nigger.
Re:It didn't happen last time (Score:4, Interesting)
Inuit has a nice ring too, it's not cumbersome like the 'African-American' conjunction is.
Re:It didn't happen last time (Score:3, Interesting)
Actually, what amases me about the political debate, is that a lot of the people who claim climate sciencists don't know what they are talking about and more research is needed before even doing the slightest initative that might help prevent global warming getting worse, are usually exactly the the same people that says
Re:Debate?!? (Score:3, Insightful)
But (apart from the occasional meteor strike) this happened slowly.
We are now talking about change in terms of decades, not millenia.
Also, just because the Earth was much warmer naturally, does not mean we would like to live in those conditions. We have build our cities and farms and industries in conditions which have been stable for thousands of years or more. Even minor shifts in temperature, rainfall
Re:Debate?!? (Score:3, Insightful)
Isotope ratios in ice cores and rocks.
During the times of the vikings in Labrador they used to be able to grow grapes. They found grape seeds in the settlements. Try growing grapes now in Labrador. Not a chance!
These were localised changes (like the 'mini ice age' in Europe). There was only minor impact on sea levels. We are now talking about global changes.
Lets be frank, there have been multiple mass extinctions. And many of these happen in the wink of
Re:Debate?!? (Score:5, Insightful)
Awesome. Have you a link to a paper in a reputable journal that discusses this finding? Who was it that finally, conclusively, proved this?
Re:Debate?!? (Score:4, Insightful)
Probably the same guy that modded him informative...
Seriously, everytime I see a study that "proves" one thing, someone else comes out and "proves" the opposite. And then that gets rebutted. And so on until it resembles an old Breck commercial except with uglier people in white lab coats. As far as I can tell, everyone is still bickering at about the same level as they were 10 yrs ago.
Fair and balanced (Score:4, Insightful)
On the other hand you have something called a study with none of the above features (except the authors often have a TLA in something, though maybe not anything to do with atmospherics or even physics).
But the press thrives on conflict, so it reports both studies as being by 'noted scientists' or maybe one was a fictional tale by some guy who wrote alot of SCIENCE (fiction).
Most folks have no idea what 'falsifiable', 'peer review', or 'reproducible' have to do with anything important like the price of gas, so they believe the press when it tells them that the different 'studies' represent two sides of the issue (fair and balanced).
And with enough money on both sides to support new 'studies' the debate could well go on until every last icecube in Greenland turns into liquid oxygen dihydride.
Then the big controversy will be whether to build giant seawalls around the coastal cities or to run screaming for higher ground.
And you can bet the press will present that story with two nicely balanced sides, as well.
Re:Fair and balanced (Score:3, Funny)
}It's possible that fuel cells will reverse "global warming". With more water vapour in there air, one can only assume there will be more cloud cover. Before too long there will be people screaming that fuel cells are going to bring the new ice age.
Re:Debate?!? (Score:4, Interesting)
I find the resistance to taking even the slightest measure a little ridiculous. Much like evolution, no one has definitively proved anything. Also like evolution, the basic mechanics are of global warming are understood and the theory has been sitting around 100+ years waiting for someone to poke holes in it (GW was first posulated in 1890) [wikipedia.org]. No one has.
In simpliest terms: There is no doubt adding large amounts of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere will tend to raise temperatures. There is no doubt that we are adding large amounts of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere. There is no doubt that temperatures are rising. Q.E.D.
Re:Debate?!? (Score:3, Interesting)
If you come around the corner of a building and someone is there, pointing a gun at you (or at least in your direction), do you stand there arguing with your freind as to if the gun is a gun, if it's loaded, if it's really intended to kill you? Or, did you take the nescessary action to go back around the corner, out of the line of fire of that gunman?
Stupidest analogy ever.
We don't know if there's a clear and present danger, like a gun. We definitely don't know enough to justify a 'fix' that could be
Re:EVER HEAR OF ICE AGES??? (Score:3, Informative)
It is to do with changes in orbits circularity and axis tilt.
The fact is that is does, and the last time I checked there were no cars around thousands of years ago during the last warming cycle.
The problem is not change, it is fast change. Current warming is occuring on a timescale of decades, not millenia.
As recently proven (look it up yourself), every time a volcano goes off it produces more green house g
well... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:well... (Score:2)
Posting from the People's Republic of Fantasia ... (Score:5, Interesting)
That might even take the pressure off the environment, as you could probably shut down most of the world's coal-fired power stations.
Re:Posting from the People's Republic of Fantasia (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Posting from the People's Republic of Fantasia (Score:4, Interesting)
That was examined in considerable detail a few decades ago, with an eye to preventing exactly that scenario (along with things like microwave-cooked birds falling out of the sky ready to eat). A fine solution was found:
First: Pick a frequency that, unlike the band used in microwave ovens, is NOT readily absorbed by the water composing most obstructions or potentially damagable natural structures (clouds, birds, cows, plants) or by other materials found in lifeforms. (There are some fine bands for this in the milimeter wavelengths.)
Second: Put up a "rectenna" site (antennas with microwave semiconductors - "Crystal sets of Inconcevable Power" to quote a pardoy of Doc Smith). This covers tens or hundreds of acres, and catches essentially all of the energy while letting most of the sunlight through. (You can graze cattle under it if it's not at Fort Stinkin' Desert - and even there it won't bother the lifeforms beneath it once the constructin is done.) Even if the beam were pure heat it would only be a large-single-digit multiple of the amount of sunlight shining on the area on a clear day, and it's nearly all caught by the rectenna.
Third: Transmit a "pilot carrier" from an antenna in the middle of the array to synchronize the transmitters spread out across the broad structure of your solar collectors (or across a number of them).
The result is a "synthetic aperture" antenna of large size, tightly focussing the return power on the receiving rectenna site. If the pilot signal is lost the beam immediately defocusses - within milliseconds - as the syncronization is lost, with most of the energy missing the entire planet and the rest being orders of magnitude weaker than a distant radar site. (Ditto for the energy from an individual transmitter that loses sync - it stops being combined with the rest of the beam and turns into a much smaller microwave beacon.)
From synchronous orbit the earth is a small fraction of the visible sky, and any target on it is not visible to the naked eye. If the energy from the beam were all visible light and defocussed you'd have a hard time spotting it in daylight.
You could do the same pilot beam hack with laser light. But why bother? Lasers are less efficient, more more would be absorbed by the atmosphere, and less converted to useful power at the output. Even with the tech available in the '70s you could get 85% or better from DC in at the satellites to power to the grid on Earth.
Construction costs would be comparable to those of an earthbound plant. Then fuel is free for the life of the plant and there's no waste to dump (except the plant itself if you ever decommission it, or any burned-out parts).
Semiconductors on the ground. Vacuum transmitting tubes in orbit. (Vacuum tubes are EASY in orbit, and very efficient. B-) )
Re:Posting from the People's Republic of Fantasia (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Posting from the People's Republic of Fantasia (Score:5, Interesting)
Personally, I'd like to have the huge space-bound solar collector with microwave transmitter, but in a place where it doesn't reduce the sunlight on earth. If we clean up our act with emissions we should have plenty of breathing room and not have to block out the sun just yet. And sunlight is useful for so many things.
Re:Posting from the People's Republic of Fantasia (Score:5, Insightful)
It has been suggested by people not bothering to do the math that the change in albedo from the solar cells themselves would cause warming, but we've already paved twice that area.
Biofuels are relatively inefficient compared to solar cells, but fairly simple as well and carbon net-neutral. Biofuels and solar hydrogen could meet our mobile and nightime needs easily.
We can live as we do, with all the juice and cars and whatnot, so long as we do not too grossly expand our population, in a closed loop, steady state system. We could live quite comfortably if we overturned the Ford coup of the 1920s and reversed the graft-based decision to build roads and the 1950's military decision to build suburbs. With a predominantly urban population moving by train (or working close to home/at home) we could buy the solar cells with a few year's oil expenditures.
Unfortunately Solar doesn't have the profit margin of oil, so there's no political/industrial interest. There's $10 trillion worth of oil in Iraq we took ownership of for a mere $1 trillion in military expenditures (at the current burn rate, given the time it will take to pump it out). The usual profit sharing (if we chose to share with the Defeated People) is 50/50, meaning at least 5:1 profit on that adventure for the country as a whole, but since Haliburton is actually getting paid for their efforts (and then some) and the profit will accrue directly to the oil companies and not back to We the People, it's an amazingly shrewd business deal, the greatest heist in the history of mankind: $10 trillion. Almost the entire US gross domestic product for a year.
Nobody building solar factories is going to see that kind of profit, and without it they can't compete in the congressional auction. Laws aren't bought flat rate, they're sold to the highest bidder and no industry can outbid the oil industry.
It would be far cheaper to convert the global energy economy to solar (as a combination of solar-thermal, solar-electric, and solar-biofuel with the only other long-term viable power source as a backup--breeder nuclear, which (not ignoring the very real waste problem) is the only other energy source we have that can meaningfully contribute to our long term power needs) than to build a great space ring. The low range costs are small compared to the current value of the known oil reserves (roughly $80 trillion, proven plus mid-range USGS unproven estimates at $40/bbl).
It's technically easy to solve, but politically impossible.
Re:Posting from the People's Republic of Fantasia (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Posting from the People's Republic of Fantasia (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Posting from the People's Republic of Fantasia (Score:3, Informative)
Re:well... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:well... (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, how about... jet engines are not 'clean burning' by a long shot. Yes, the hot exhaust causes condensation. However, depending on air conditions, that condensed moisture can either: be reabsorbed into the air from whence it came as humidity very quickly, or very slowly. If it is not absorbed then it simply keeps clinging to the tiny specks of carbon and other particulate matter in the exhaust, becoming -- you guessed it -- directly-seeded cirrus clouds.
Why do you find them higher than commercial jetliners go? Because they RISE, being much hotter than the frigid air around them.
Why do you find them over areas where there is no commercial air traffic? Why do they spread out and fan out?
Please, focus your energy on more realistic conspiracies. There are plenty of very possible ones happening right now. While you're dreaming of "chemtrails" the republocrats are stealing your country out from under your nose.
Ahh. (Score:5, Funny)
natural light (Score:3, Funny)
Of course, linux users are as chipper as ever due to the fact that they never seen natural light to begin with so they aren't as affected.
(As someone with seasonal affective disorder, I see this as a death sentence)
Re:natural light (Score:5, Funny)
YOU stop having sex BECAUSE it is too DARK??? Hmmm... You are such a minority!
Paul B.
P.S. Lucky you to get that stunning nimpho supermodel as your GF!
Re:natural light (Score:5, Funny)
One Ring... (Score:5, Funny)
So... why a ring? (Score:5, Interesting)
We know how well solar eclipses work... why not just a permanent 'dimming'?
Re:So... why a ring? (Score:5, Informative)
Stationkeeping under these circumstances is very difficult. There are plenty of other concerns... heat rejection, debris, etc.
It was a good idea, but not feasible... at least not as feasible as the ring idea.
Re:stationkeeping and solar radiation (Score:3, Informative)
Actually, I was a student of one of the primary engineers of the SOHO orbit. She discussed it in class, and showed us the orbits and the fuel estimates etc. I assure you that we DO NOT have the ability to model a large number of objects around L1. We certainly could create this capability, but you are talking worse-than-realtime calculation times in our c
Um. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Um. (Score:3, Interesting)
Wouldn't it be cheaper and easier to just have a sane debate about how we treat our back-yard?
Oh bother, go ahead. Do whatever you want. I'
Re:Um. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Um. (Score:3, Insightful)
Like what?
Solar Power? Solar is not efficient enough to surve the needs of the world, nor does it solve the problem of what to do when the sun goes down. Sure you can use batteries and charge them but then you need both more power overall and to do something with the batteries, and last I checked, batteries weren't high on the list of environmmentaly friendly products, especialy those rechar
Re:Um. (Score:3, Funny)
You claim that my use of the term "modest proposal" is unfounded. Of course, I never did say that it was the intention of the originator of the idea to use space rings to create a modest proposal. What I did say is that the article acts like a Modest Proposal,
Re:Um. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Um. (Score:3, Insightful)
Oh, and why aren't there any diesel hybrids?
Re:Um. (Score:3, Insightful)
Wouldn't it be cheaper, easier, and more effective to, I don't know, build energy systems that don't release carbon? Just a thought.
Sure. Solar Power Satellites. Large arrays of solar cells assembled in earth orbit and the energy beamed to earth via microwave. And no, it will not be a "death ray". The beam footprint would be miles across with a power density a mere fraction of sunlight. See Geoffrey Landis papers [sff.net] and The SSP Monitor [wronkiewicz.net], or do a google.
What the fuck? (Score:3, Insightful)
Of the 6 trillion, why not spend the$ 3 trillion on environmentally safe energy (fusion plants, geothermal, solar panels in the deserts) and spend $3 trillion to buy off all the oil megacorporations.
Besides, moving the earth further away from the Sun is a much more hair brained idea, so why not do that?
Re:What the fuck? (Score:3, Funny)
Your other ideas were hopeless, but this... this might get you some funding.
Solar Cells (Score:3, Insightful)
Solar Power! (Score:4, Interesting)
Let's do the numbers! (Score:5, Funny)
Now, let's orbit these solar cells at 500 km altitude, i.e. a diameter of 13,756.3 km or circumference of 43,217 km. The article doesn't say how wide the ring should be, but to block 1.6% of the sunlight to a circle 12,756.3 km in diameter would require a strip about 160 km wide. That's 6.9 million square kilometers of solar cells in the full ring.
Now the silicon wafer in a solar cell [wikipedia.org] is really quite thin, typically around 300 microns thick, so that's only 2.074 cubic kilometers of silicon all up. Density is 2330 kg/m3 [webelements.com], so that's 4,833 megatonnes of silicon required, or about 0.0000005% of the earth's resources. I think we have enough.
Of course, the energy required to manufacture that sort of area of solar cells would be pretty high, but think of the returns. The earth receives about 1370 W/m2 [rutgers.edu] in orbit, so multiply that by the area of cells facing the sun (2.04 million square km), and you get about 2.8 billion MW of incident radiation :-) Let's say these cells aren't particularly efficient, maybe 10%, plus transmission losses of another 70%, and you still have 84 million MW of usable energy, all day, every day.
Now, in 1997 we used 380 quadrillion BTUs [ecoworld.org], globally, or about 111 quadrillion watt-hours. That's an average consumption of 12 million MW, comfortably within our budget for some time. An energy-producing system with a capacity of 7 times the entire global requirements is worth quite a bit.
There's only one downside to this - if we divert all this energy down to earth & use it, it all ends up as heat in the end, which completely nullifies the original purpose of the ring (if you remember) of preventing global warming! D'oh!
Re:Let's do the numbers! (Score:3, Informative)
Giving up. (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Giving up. (Score:2)
Re:Giving up. (Score:3, Funny)
It'll even give us an extra week in each year. We will call it "Robot Party Week"
Been done before... (Score:2)
Tm
$6-200 Trillion? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:$6-200 Trillion? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:$6-200 Trillion? (Score:3, Informative)
That said, with out government and CEOs working together, they'd probably siphon all of the money out of the country into the hands of some country who doesn't care much for us... who would then proceed to nuke us into a sheet of glass.
Re:$6-200 Trillion? (Score:3, Funny)
I have it from a super-reliable source (George "Dubya" Bush) that there is no such thing as global warming. It is all a knee jerk, radical left wing fantasy designed to throttle the American economy (says he).
On the very miniscule chance that "Dubya" is wrong, what exactly is wrong with global warming, anyway? The neo-Con(artists) always look at the silver lining in that dark cloud - a longer growing season, less need for winter heating, new opportunities for real estate development
Re:$6-200 Trillion? (Score:4, Funny)
Cool! Then we can have oil *forever!*
$500 billion? (Score:4, Interesting)
Honestly, how much would it cost to require an SUV to get 30+ MPG instead of 15?
Re:$500 billion? (Score:5, Funny)
It would actually costs less than an SUV, you'd just have to dump half the steel to cut weight, which would reduce its size significantly. I propose we call the result the "carr." Or something like that. I don't know. I'll leave that to marketing, but I'm gonna get my company on top of this. We'll make a fortune.
Re:$500 billion? (Score:2)
If you really want to talk about vehicles that get bad mileage target Jeeps and minivans--minivans are worse than SUVs.
Re:$500 billion? (Score:2)
Something like, you need a special license to drive an SUV/pickup truck/huge ass car. Or some sort of permit is required... 90% of the SUV's, trucks and other large cars I see on the road are carrying a single person (aka the driver) with absolutely nothing else. Not hauling lumber, not full of supplies, hell, not even full of groceries...
Why have an SUV that can get 30MPG when you could have a much smaller car that sea
Re:$500 billion? (Score:3, Informative)
For one oil lobbiests have modified our tax code where an American can get an SUV or truck free of charge if they are a business owner in tax refunds. So why not?
Second its because they can. They can afford to do so and are unaware that the rest of us pay for higher gas prices due to lack of supply while the rich like the comfort and safety of a big vehicle.
Re:$500 billion? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:$500 billion? (Score:3, Insightful)
I guess thats what happens when you let oil companies fund election campaigns.
Futurama (Score:3, Funny)
Really? (Score:2)
Allready done?????? (Score:2, Interesting)
More realistically (Score:2)
I vote for Titan, so we can study it up close, and maybe mine it for methane and whatnot.
Re:More realistically (Score:2)
There Can Be Only One (Score:2)
Maybe something practical would be a good idea (Score:2)
A quick way to do this would be a system to match people who need to get somewhere with cars going there anyway. An ad hoc cab system. A feedback system should get rid of the creeps that made it though some sort of screening process.
Cheap, fast, technically possible, low impact and large results. It's impossible, of course. It would involve the cooperation of citizens.
Energy Input (Score:2)
The southern & equatorial nations will love th (Score:2)
It's an interesting solution but seems to place some burdens (e.g., ecological changes) on countries that are not the alleged cause of the p
Four Words (Score:2)
Oh Great... (Score:2)
I'm curious (Score:2)
If there's any chance... (Score:3, Insightful)
"If there's even the tiniest chance that global warming is NOT happening, then this would be an extremely foolish thing to implement, as it could trigger the next ice age..."
c.f. Niven's "Fallen Angels"
The Onion Called (Score:5, Funny)
yeah...sure (Score:3, Insightful)
$200 Trillion? (Score:3, Interesting)
$200 trillion (2.0 x 10e14 dollars), or even $1 trillion, is a big chunk of change to go spending on something we don't even know would fix the problem. What if it's not enough? How much money do you dump down the hole (or in this case, throw into the air) before you start thinking about alternate solutions?
How much seawater could you pump into the central Sahara for $1 trillion? Make a giant salt marsh the size of say, Texas. Still plenty of desert left over, don't worry. But how much cooler would that make the globe? Don't even use 4-degree Celsius water from the Atlantic, but get 20C water from the Red Sea. It'll fill back up.
Or, maybe we could just accept the changes in climate as the natural order of things (even if they're our fault - we're natural, too). If the oceans rise, move to higher ground.
Screw Halo! (Score:3, Funny)
For those who don't remember, the sport-utility robots (Bender included) get on a single island and blow fuel from their exhausts (read: asses) to propel the Earth away from the sun.
That episode freakin' ruled.
Sheesh (Score:3, Insightful)
this sounds like a dumb idea. (Score:3, Insightful)
this sounds like a dumb idea, here's one of my own (Score:5, Funny)
Uh-oh, I'll bet it's not...
have everyone on the planet plant at least one tree.
This could be going in the right direction...
trees would help cool the earth.
Yes, okay, and now for the science...
because they hold more water.
... Okay, not what I was expecting, but let's go with it...
trees also help water evaporate so there will be more rain.
But, I thought we were storing water, not helping it evaporate? There must be some logical reasoning behind this...
more rain = cooler weather.
Oh. Dear. God.
Estimate (Score:4, Insightful)
I mean, sure, if you're off by a couple million then it's not a big deal in the scheme of things but has there ever been a more "pulled out of our ass" estimate ever?
Sounds like saying "We don't know but it'll be lots!"
New and FABULOUS science (Score:3, Insightful)
Look at it this way... You've got $6 trillion to $500 trillion dollars burning a hole in your "save the earth" pocket. Dontcha think that maybe, just maybe you could put that money to better use by throwing it at something that doesn't require lobbing multiton roman candles into orbit? I mean $500 trillion . You honestly can't think of an industry or two here on the ground you could revolutionize overnight, let alone in the time it'd take to assemble THIS project?
Speaking of that, what sort of time frame are we talking? Any mention of such is amazingly absent. And we haven't EVEN gotten into the fact that the scientific community is still deeply divided on the exact cause of global warrming. Everything from man's impact to the natural warming and cooling cycles of the earth come into play. Hell, there are even published scientifc reports that say the Sun is hotter than previously measured. We still don't have a conclusive clue and these people want to throw a reflective tarp over a portion of the earth. What is the damn environmental impact of THAT? What happens to the plant and animal life UNDER it? Not as much heat or sun, that's for sure. Draw your own conclusions.
I'm sorry, but this is a prime example of what happens when people who think they're smart smoke crack. They find implausible and extrodinairy ways to waste our money.
Suppose... (Score:3, Interesting)
Fine. Now you are blocking the sun on bunch of other countries that A) didn't pay for it B) don't want you to block their sun.
This thing would be way TOO big not to block unwanted countries.
If my math is correct, For each 8 tons of gold (or similar material that you can make very thin) you can create a ring of 1m wide, 10nm thick around the earth. (I did the math for "just above sealevel", or about where the spaceshuttle flies).
This 8 ton ring would block
Re:What about afterwards? (Score:2)
Re:Nothing's impossible! (Score:2)
Re:200trillion can do a lot of things... (Score:5, Insightful)
I think you meant to write "finding a way to eliminate dependence on foreign oil."
In other words, let's start using the energy we get from the sun to meet our current needs.
It's unbelievable that someone would suggest that we should restrict future energy delivery from the sun just so that we can keep on consuming energy stores from the past (oil) and pollute our sky with the smoke. Pure laziness. It's like a teenager cleaning his room by hauling his dirty laundry out of the house and burying it, wasting all the effort he ought to be using to just clean the clothes. Not that I've ever done this.