Global warming may be temporarily stopped if we place dust into the atmosphere. Is this being considered?

Question

I heard a scientist say that we could temporarily stop global warming immediately if we shoot dust into the atmosphere. He said that the eruption of Mt. Pinatubo on 1991 placed a lot of dust in the air, which partially blocked out the sun over a large area, which in turn caused the average temperature of the earth to cool by about 1 degree Celsius. I think that this is a great idea. We could use a water soluble dust so that asthmatics will not be affected as badly. The dust will settle within a year, so there is no risk of permanent effects. We could keep doing this as often as needed until we choose to stop emitting greenhouse gases. The dust could be shot into the upper atmoshpere with a specially made cannon, or perhaps a rocket that explodes at the proper altitude. I think that we urgently need to pursue this idea, as the effects of global warming are alarming.

Answer 1

The idea of shooting fine particulate into the atmosphere to stop global warming is disturbing, and unpractical. The volume of ash and soot generated by a volcanic eruption is immense--Mt St. Helens ejected 1.4 billion cubic yards. This is the equivalent of 140 million dump trucks! There are no launch vehicles even remotely capable of doing this.

This amount of ash would weigh approximately 2.9 billion tons. Given that a shuttle payload is around 40 tons, it would take 71 million trips.

I think what you're referring to is the article by Professor Paul Crutzen, who proposed to release pure sulfur into the atmosphere (large amounts of sulfur are also ejected in a volcanic eruption). The basis for the idea is that the sulfur would reflect solar radiation, and re-engineer the upper atmosphere.

However, delivery still remains a question, and the sulfur would eventually fall into the lower atmosphere where it would form acid rain (Sulfuric acid, H2SO4) and fall to the earth. I can't imagine a worse scenario.

Hence, why he is now being called the "Nutty Professor".

Answer 2

That sounds like a bad idea to me. The environmental consequences of all that dust settling all over the planet are unknown, as is the effect of breathing it in.

A related idea is to put large sun shades in space to reduce the amount of sunlight reaching Earth. We could definitely do this with current technology. It would be a political nightmare though, with some people saying we didn't put up enough shades and others saying we put too many while still others agree it is the right number of shades but that it is messing up the weather in some other way.

Answer 3

It might work in theory, but I imagine to much plant life would be adversely affected from lack of direct sunlight. This probably isn't noteworthy, but in the story The Matrix, the humans clouded the skies in an attempt to remove the machines' primary energy source. Simply cutting down greenhouse gases today will save a lot of trouble down the road. Continuously darkening the skies is going to take quite a bit of dust collection.

Answer 4

Yeah, nuclear winter and the next ice age really would be a great alternative!!!

The greatest danger to the planet is not pollution, natural disaster or things from space but the likelihood that mankind will attempt something like that in the belief that it would be good and cause tremendous damage instead!!

Answer 5

Wow, you're a genius. What do you mean the effects of global warming are alarming? What dust? Do a little research then maybe you'll know what you're talking about.

"it is generally difficult to attribute specific natural phenomena to long-term global warming."

It took me 5 seconds to find this line. Look it up in the link, if you know how to read.

Answer 6

Global Warming could be halted altogether if someone stuck a rag in Al Gore's mouth.