Posted on 06/03/2006 7:12:46 PM PDT by DaveLoneRanger
It may be hard to imagine the world getting so hot that scientists and engineers would design a fleet of 55,000 mirrors, each bigger than Manhattan, and send them into space to deflect sunlight away from Earth.
Or that they would mimic a major volcanic eruption in order to cool the melting Arctic, shooting dust and other particles into the upper atmosphere where they would scatter the sun's light away from Earth.
Using geoengineering, the large-scale manipulation of the environment, to combat global warming has been proposed by scientists like Lowell Wood at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California.
He argues that simulating a volcanic winter -- the cooling that follows major volcanic eruptions like Mount Pinatubo in 1991 -- is the most practical approach to managing global warming.
(Excerpt) Read more at theglobeandmail.com ...
Mimicking a volcano by shooting particles that scatter light into the upper atmosphere could damage the ozone layer.
Well DUH. They harp at us for years about driving SUVs, and then we come back at them by saying volcanos pollute more than our SUVs do, and then they say "well, let's use a volcano to cool the globe!"
Then we're reminded of stories like this:
Blocking sunshine with aerosol may help avoid global warming
Burning Fossil Fuels Has A Measurable Cooling Effect On The Climate
Using mirrors in space would cause the sun's light to flicker.
See: To Cool the Earth, Plan Would Pull a Shade (Glass shield in space will save earth) for an alternate yet similarly brilliant plan!
Overall, this sounds like a dangerous idea, even if it will never go anywhere. Tinkering with earth's climate to fix a problem no one is certain we are responsible for, and some aren't even sure exists is too extreme.
I guess they aren't expecting such as increased volcanic dust on top of increased meteor hits of significant sizes . . . .and probably increased wind storms . . .
But some of us are.
I'm in favor of launching large, city sized solar power generators into space and using them to help regulate the output of solar energy that reaches the planet.
Aside from the power generated that can be beamed to various orbital and possibly lunar facilities, it is probably a good idea to plan for sudden changes in the suns output. Also, building these mirrors/solar arrays would cost a great deal of money, require an increase in the space budget, and probably require lunar or asteroid mining, and an orbital manufacturing plant to complete the project.
The only problem is that one can't trust any government to actually complete such a project. So the issue is moot.
I can get along just fine with their warming BS, they should start thinking about how to warm it up when the new ice age arrives (as soon as no one will listing to global warming), it might be a lot harder than trying to cool it down.
I'm in favor of launching large cities into space. Anything with more than a million within the city limits.
Hey! It's a start! It sounds like somebody has figured out that the sun might have something to do with "global warming."
So when it gets too cold, they turn the mirror around and warm thing up again, right?
It is all a sinister plot.
They SAY that they are going to build it to 'save the world'... but what they are really going to do is build a giant space umbrella and cut off all the direct sunlight over America unless we pay them ONE JILLION DOLLARS.
They got that idea from watching the Simpsons, after that shark with laser beams thing didn't work out for them.
/s
Fry: This snow is beautiful. I'm glad global warming never happened.
Leela: Actually, it did. But thank God nuclear winter canceled it out.
The solar shade sounds like it would be more feasible than the volcano. Using the proper materials to manufacture it, you could turn it off if you wanted.
I'm not sure of the total population, but can we launch San Francisco first? If that works, then NYC second?
Why not have low orbit venetian blinds.
Fair enough. We city slickers are already happily ignoring the rural areas of the country, so it probably wouldn't make too much of a difference to us either way.
:P
Do we let the liberal urban areas take air with them?
No, of course not. What would be the point? It's not like they'd be returning.
>>He argues that simulating a volcanic winter -- the cooling that follows major volcanic eruptions like Mount Pinatubo in 1991 -- is the most practical approach to managing global warming<<
Yep, physicists have a way to cool the earth but people aren't going to like it.
Can't we just send the scientists and engineers to the sun?
I say we take the mirrors and accidently point them all at a couple of cities in Saudi Arabia for a day or two.
Make all the people of the earth wear white clothing and mirrors on their hats.
After which they would all be known as "mad scientists," much to their glee.
If this don't work, maybe we could try the Coyote-and-Road-Runner Slingshot maneuver.
Excellent. I'd hate to think we'd be polluting space with their unholy outgassing.
LOL!!
So leaving a hand mirror laying out in the back yard won't help?What if I get my whole neighborhood to do this?
Anything to chase away eeeeevvil Global Warming.
So, the sunlight hits the mirrors, and countless photons are re-directed. But wait a moment, Newton's laws are not suspended in orbit. If Cosmic rays and light hit the mirrors, there has to be an equal, but opposite reaction. What is going to hold those mirrors in place? Why won't the Mirrors simply become a solar sail, and fly off into space?
Oh good grief...if anyone is going to bugger things up it will be a bunch of arrogant pencil necks thinking they're going to save the world. I worked with a doctoral student in forestry that actually wanted to install incendiary bombs on crown level platforms throughout the nation's forests. In that way, he thought (or not), satellite information could be used to predict optimal conditions to ignite crown fires and, thus, implement and guide controlled burns.
Uh huh.
This fellow is going to work in government saving the earth like many of these mirror folks. Be afraid. Be very afraid.
I'd guess the solar wind (ions and other real particles with rest mass) will cause the array to do as you say -- that's how solar sails work. OTOH, photons have no rest mass, and will reflect without a problem if the surface doesn't absorb them. If it -does- absorb them, they will probably be re-radiated as heat or something.
What are the odds the scientists end up destroying us all trying to put an end to global warming?
Hey! We could all donate our tinfoil hats....
I suspect the orbital mechanics of such a scheme would be a nightmare, too...
Somehow, I don't think this is anything like a serious proposal. It does give a few scientists on the government dole something to do with their time, though.
It's hard to imagine scientists admitting the true cause of global warming!
I understand the root of your comment, but you're not completely accurate in that. Despite having no mass, photons of light nevertheless have energy and momentum, and when that momentum is changed by bouncing off the mirror, the mirror is accelerated. The effect has been well known for at least a century, and an early sci-fi writer (heinlein?) had at least one book based on solar sail spacecraft. NASA has toyed with the concept and done some experiments considering large scale solar sail aircraft.
Two excerpts from: http://science.howstuffworks.com/solar-sail.htm
"The reflective nature of the sails is key. As photons (light particles) bounce off the reflective material, they gently push the sail along by transferring momentum to the sail. Because there are so many photons from sunlight, and because they are constantly hitting the sail, there is a constant pressure (force per unit area) exerted on the sail that produces a constant acceleration of the spacecraft. Although the force on a solar-sail spacecraft is less than a conventional chemical rocket, such as the space shuttle, the solar-sail spacecraft constantly accelerates over time and achieves a greater velocity."
"A solar sail-powered spacecraft does not need traditional propellant for power, because its propellant is sunlight and the sun is its engine. Light is composed of electromagnetic radiation that exerts force on objects it comes in contact with. NASA researchers have found that at 1 astronomical unit (AU), which is the distance from the sun to Earth, equal to 93 million miles (150 million km), sunlight can produce about 1.4 kilowatts (kw) of power. If you take 1.4 kw and divide it by the speed of light, you would find that the force exerted by the sun is about 9 newtons (N)/square mile (i.e., 2 lb/km2 or .78 lb/mi2). In comparison, a space shuttle main engine can produce 1.67 million N of force during liftoff and 2.1 million N of thrust in a vacuum. Eventually, however, the continuous force of the sunlight on a solar sail could propel a spacecraft to speeds five times faster than traditional rockets."
"John Bennett of the Sierra Club of Canada wondered if it wouldn't be easier to reduce our use of fossil fuels."
No, dunbass, that would not be "easier" and it's not going to happen. Go tell it to the Chinese.
If all Sierra Club (Capitalism hating) members would quite driving, that might help. You first, John...
Ah... here are a couple early sci-fi books books with solar sails spacecraft:
"Sunjammer" by Arthur C. Clarke (1964) in "Boys Life" magazine: I even recall reading this article/story there. (Now renamed "Wind from the Sun")
"The Mote in God's Eye" (1975) by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle.
Both of these are excellent reads.
I was thinking the same thing; but then reality hit me. True, Photons have a zero rest mass (stop them and you see their mass is truly zero); however remember that little grade school science project? The one with the glass 'light-bulb' with the vane with 4 little squares on it? One side is white, the other is black. Apply a light source, and this glass encased vane will spin - no magnetics, no motor, the photons are absorbed by the black side of the paper, thus causing the silly thing to spin. It's called a Crookes radiometer. That orbiting mirror is going to start moving.
Heh! Those are just plain old jet contrails - water vapor. Get your head out of the conspiracy bucket.
I'm going to put some out tomorrow. Do you think those mirrored gazing balls would count??
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