Environmental scientists are excited about ideas for reducing carbon in the atmosphere through geo-engineering. Anchor Lisa Mullins has details.
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LISA MULLINS: Now, if even Dr. Lee's dream comes true and we are able to run the world on energy from the sun, we've still got a big problem with the carbon that's already been added to the atmosphere. David Keith is an environmental scientist at the University of Calgary. He says conservation and new energy technologies will help, but we may also have to resort to a controversial strategy to get ourselves out of our global warming fix: geo-engineering.
DAVID KEITH: Even if we cut emissions instantly, there would still have enough CO2 in the atmosphere to cause a problem, and we need to think about how to manage the risks of that CO2 in the atmosphere. Geo-engineering is something we do to the climate system that changes the link between human actions and the impact of CO2.
MULLINS: Keith recently spoke to the Royal Geographic Society in London. He says there are currently two main geo-engineering ideas. The first is to cool the earth by shielding some sunlight. One way to do that might be to blow something like a cloud of sulphur into the air.
KEITH: There is no scientific doubt that if you put aerosols in the upper atmosphere, it will get colder. There's lots of doubt about how well that will or won't compensate for CO2s in the air or about what all the various side effects will be, but there's no doubt that it will get colder.
MULLINS: The other idea is to actually suck C02 out of the air, directly or with perhaps new biomaterials. These new ideas haven't been tested as yet, and as David Keith points out, bioengineering could have another negative result. It could reduce political pressure for actual cuts in emissions.
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