geo wrote:

Robert Tulip wrote:. . . .The background issue here, which is still not acknowledged by the climate action movement, is that emission reduction is marginal to climate safety. Decarbonising the economy is far too small, slow, costly, risky and divisive to be a primary effective strategy against the catastrophic scale and speed of the looming climate apocalypse.

I see decarbonizing as a baby step to acknowledging that something needs to be done.

The trouble is, decarbonising has become a diversion from the discussion required of the scale of the problem. Decarbonising has a physical limit of removal of about 15 Gigatons of carbon per year, and a practical limit in recent times that is negative, with emission rates growing. I think it is unrealistic to expect emission efficiencies to deliver more than about three GTC per year, which as a main strategy would just continue the remorseless trajectory to catastrophic collapse.
Meanwhile, carbon removal has potential to scale up rapidly to 100 GTC/y. Just at the 80/20 Pareto ratio, we should expect carbon removal to deliver 80% of the climate solution with 20% of the effort, and the converse for emission reduction, 20% of the solution with 80% of the effort. So the task is to shift focus to the most efficient solution and promote public debate about the strategic rationale for climate investment.

geo wrote:There will always be those ahead of the eight ball, and those who are behind it. We need to reach critical mass before we can collectively take meaningful action.

This ‘critical mass’ concept here may not be so important, just in terms of popular opinion. The US government could work with oil companies to mobilise large scale profitable investment in carbon removal, but that may not be a climate solution welcomed by a critical mass of environmental activists.

geo wrote: But how bad will things have to get before we embrace something like Dr. David Keith's wizard proposal? Also say goodbye to the stars, because dimming the sun will also dim the faint light from the stars. Perhaps not a catastrophic loss in itself, but just one of many concessions we would have to make to maintain our dominion of the planet. We would likely need many other wizard fixes as well.

Albedo enhancement is an emergency response, as proposed by Keith. My view on a good solution to help stop the Arctic from melting is pumping sea water onto the ice, as could possibly be done using the methods in my winning 2015 MIT water-energy nexus tidal pump proposal.
More broadly, the vast heat entering the world ocean, at the rate of about four Hiroshima bombs of energy per second, has a powerful melting effect. The wizardry needed is to convert this excess energy to work.

geo wrote: Also, there is no way Trump will ever take action to combat climate change. He has worked very hard to weaken environmental laws and transform the GOP into a pro-corporation party at all costs. In this area, at least, he has been quite consistent.

This is why Trump needs a Nixon in China moment, to see that geoengineering offers a climate solution that can be delivered in cooperation with fossil fuel industries in a way that the Republican base can accept. I doubt he could be re-elected without It is possible to be pro-corporation and pro-environment. But Trump’s latest idiocy in removing water regulation illustrates a dangerous record of insanity.

I'm of the opinion currently that the problem won't be solved without the world going on war footing. The task is so pervasive as to defy anything but the type of actions that occur during imminent threats such as an attempted invasion. When the Jerrys were prowling the coast of New Jersey in the 40s, the country got the message, and there was no arguing over which approach to take to prosecute the war. All approaches had to be taken, from collecting tin cans and newspaper to converting lawnmower factories to munitions plants. Wizard or prophet, it didn't matter. There was no silver bullet to be discovered. Wizard approaches to climate I think suffer from the silver bullet delusion: we can go about our business with just a nip and tuck to the planetary system--there. Wizardry needs to focus on less radical and irreversible solutions, such as making carbon capture and sequestration more feasible economically.

I recognize that it's hard for me, emotionally, to agree with some geoengineering proposals. Yet emotions shouldn't be dismissed, or seen as some minor obstacle that people will just get over once they realize they're in a life or death situation. People will, in fact, continue to lean emotionally toward certain values despite the threat of death or destruction. Just thinking about geo's remark that "dimming the sun will also dim the faint light from the stars," causes me to pivot away from such a solution to warming. Maybe the sight of the stars is too precious to lose, come what may. An irrational choice can't always be called a wrong one.

Referring to Robert's speculation that Trump might back geoengineering in his SOTU speech, he didn't. He didn't mention climate change at all in pledging U.S. involvement in the Trillion Tree Initiative. I guess this is a vaguely prophet-like measure by him, done to "protect the environment." It amounts to sending a message that there's no cause for immediate concern. Good article on the TTI on the Verge site.
https://www.theverge.com/2020/1/31/2111 ... m-campaign