Subscribe free to our newsletters via your
. Space Industry and Business News .




CLIMATE SCIENCE
Climate engineering - what do the public think?
by Staff Writers
Southampton, UK (SPX) Jan 16, 2014


File image.

Members of the public have a negative view of climate engineering, the deliberate large-scale manipulation of the environment to counteract climate change, according to a new study.

The results are from researchers from the University of Southampton and Massey University (New Zealand) who have undertaken the first systematic large-scale evaluation of the public reaction to climate engineering. The work is published in Nature Climate Change.

Some scientists think that climate engineering approaches will be required to combat the inexorable rise in atmospheric CO2 due to the burning of fossil fuels. Climate engineering could involve techniques that reduce the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere or approaches that slow temperature rise by reducing the amount of sunlight reaching the Earth's surface.

Co-author Professor Damon Teagle of the University of Southampton said: "Because even the concept of climate engineering is highly controversial, there is pressing need to consult the public and understand their concerns before policy decisions are made."

Lead author, Professor Malcolm Wright of Massey University, said: "Previous attempts to engage the public with climate engineering have been exploratory and small scale. In our study, we have drawn on commercial methods used to evaluate brands and new product concepts to develop a comparative approach for evaluating the public reaction to a variety of climate engineering concepts."

The results show that the public has strong negative views towards climate engineering. Where there are positive reactions, they favour approaches that reduce carbon dioxide over those that reflected sunlight.

"It was a striking result and a very clear pattern," said Professor Wright.

"Interventions such as putting mirrors in space or fine particles into the stratosphere are not well received. More natural processes of cloud brightening or enhanced weathering are less likely to raise objections, but the public react best to creating biochar (making charcoal from vegetation to lock in CO2) or capturing carbon directly from the air."

Nonetheless, even the most well regarded techniques still has a net negative perception.

The work consulted large representative samples in both Australia and New Zealand. Co-author Pam Feetham said: "The responses are remarkably consistent from both countries, with surprisingly few variations except for a slight tendency for older respondents to view climate engineering more favourably."

Professor Wright noted that giving the public a voice so early in technological development was unusual, but increasingly necessary.

"If these techniques are developed the public must be consulted. Our methods can be employed to evaluate the responses in other countries and reapplied in the future to measure how public opinion changes as these potential new technologies are discussed and developed," he said.

.


Related Links
University of Southampton
Climate Science News - Modeling, Mitigation Adaptation






Comment on this article via your Facebook, Yahoo, AOL, Hotmail login.

Share this article via these popular social media networks
del.icio.usdel.icio.us DiggDigg RedditReddit GoogleGoogle








CLIMATE SCIENCE
Climate changes the distribution of plants and animals
Basel, Switzerland (SPX) Jan 13, 2014
Swiss plants, butterflies and birds have moved 8 to 42 meters uphill between 2003 and 2010, as scientists from the University of Basel write in the online journal "Plos One". Climate warming is changing the distribution of plants and animals worldwide. Recently it was shown that in the past two decades, European bird and butterfly communities have moved on average 37 and 114 kilometers to ... read more


CLIMATE SCIENCE
ISS delays planned orbit raise due to space junk threat

IBM to invest $1.2 bn to expand 'cloud'

Space fishing: Japan to test 'magnetic net' for space junk

Boeing Space Surveillance System Reduces Risk of Satellite Loss by 66 Percent

CLIMATE SCIENCE
Boeing Transmits Protected Government Signal Through Military Satellite

Fifth MUOS Completes Assembly, Enters System Test

Northrop Grumman Supports US Marine Corps Command, Control and Communications Facility for Tactical Air Operations

Rocket Rokot brings 3 Russian military-purpose satellites on orbit

CLIMATE SCIENCE
NASA's Commercial Crew Partners Aim to Capitalize, Expand on 2013 Successes in 2014

Ariane Flight VA217; Ariane Flight VA216 and Soyuz Flight VS07

2014 set to be a very productive year for collaboration between Arianespace and Italy

Vega Flight VV03 And Ariane Flight VA218

CLIMATE SCIENCE
Northrop Grumman and Trex Enterprises to Introduce Celestial Navigation to Soldier Precision Targeting Laser Systems

GPS Traffic Maps for Leatherback Turtles Show Hotspots to Prevent Accidental Fishing Deaths

China to upgrade homegrown GPS to improve accuracy

Beidou to cover world by 2020 with 30 satellites

CLIMATE SCIENCE
Indonesia closes in on Grumman F-5 Tiger replacement

One killed after US Army helicopter makes 'hard landing'

Embraer says it met all regional jet delivery targets

Taiwan displays upgraded fighter jets with 'smart' munitions

CLIMATE SCIENCE
Eye-catching electronics

Intel to cut staff in face of stagnant earnings

2-proton bit controlled by a single copper atom

New Technique for Probing Subsurface Electronic Structure

CLIMATE SCIENCE
China's pollution seen from space

Charles River Analytics Develops Satellite Image Processing System for NASA

Earth may be heaver than thought due to invisible belt of dark matter

More BARREL Balloons Take to the Skies

CLIMATE SCIENCE
Dangerous pollution hits China's capital

Toxic chemicals found in children's clothes, shoes: Greenpeace

Italy's govt agrees to send in army against mafia dumps

Hong Kong suffers in smog as pollution problems rise




The content herein, unless otherwise known to be public domain, are Copyright 1995-2014 - Space Media Network. AFP, UPI and IANS news wire stories are copyright Agence France-Presse, United Press International and Indo-Asia News Service. ESA Portal Reports are copyright European Space Agency. All NASA sourced material is public domain. Additional copyrights may apply in whole or part to other bona fide parties. Advertising does not imply endorsement,agreement or approval of any opinions, statements or information provided by Space Media Network on any Web page published or hosted by Space Media Network. Privacy Statement