The Plan B Post: May 23, 2024

Your free weekly update on the latest news about chilling the earth with geo-engineering.

This week: weather management becomes increasingly mainstream while a growing coalition applies their creative forces to geoengineering.

Associated Press in The Sydney Morning Herald

Cloud seeding: Indonesia attempts to redirect rain after killer floods

Indonesia is using cloud seeding to redirect rain away from areas devastated by recent monsoon-triggered floods in Sumatra, which resulted in at least 67 deaths and 20 missing persons. The floods, exacerbated by landslides from Mount Marapi, have forced over 1500 families into temporary shelters. Authorities aim to prevent further downpours that could hinder rescue operations and are considering relocating residents from high-risk zones. The weather modification efforts involve dispersing salt particles into clouds to induce precipitation away from the affected regions.

The Verge

Big Tech thinks it can plant trees better than you

Google, Meta, Microsoft, and Salesforce have joined forces to form the First Movers Coalition, pledging $500 million to advance carbon removal technologies. The goal is to decarbonize heavy industries like steel, aluminum, and aviation by using advance purchase commitments to drive demand for clean technologies.

Fast Company

What is ‘cloud brightening’—and why did California just stop scientists from studying it?

Key quote from this article: “The entire purpose of solar engineering is to reduce the amount of climate change,” Keith says. “It is certainly trying to change the climate, but it’s trying to change the climate in a way that reduces the human impact on the Earth, not increases it.”

MongaBay

Report ranks 60+ ideas, including geoengineering, to save the Arctic

Download a PDF of the report here.

A recent report has evaluated 61 climate mitigation strategies for the Arctic, including geoengineering. The top-ranked ideas emphasize tried-and-true methods like peatland restoration, but some geoengineering approaches, such as solar radiation management, also scored high. However, experts caution that the primary focus should remain on aggressively cutting emissions to address the root cause of climate change.

Cordis

GENIE: GeoEngineering and Negative Emissions pathways in Europe

Did you know the EU has given more than €9 million in funding to explore greenhouse gas removal and solar radiation geoengineering. The GENIE project project launched in 2021, but don’t hold your breath. It’s not due to be completed until 2027. Is that a reasonable time frame or an exercise in delay?

PV Magazine

Solar catamarans for cloud brightening?

How about a fleet of autonomous, solar-powered catamarans dispersing efficiently distributing sea salt particles across the oceans? Why? Catamarans could capture more solar energy, are more stable, and thus can disperse more aerosols.

Axios

Veteran climate diplomat switches to geoengineering startup

Israeli geoengineering startup Stardust Solutions has recruited Janos Pasztor, a veteran climate scientist and diplomat. The move shows how quickly geoengineering is becoming a viable option. Stardust has begun testing a system to disperse a cloud of tiny reflective particles about 60,000 feet in altitude. Read more in the WSJ piece from Feb 2024.

The Hill

Democrats refer Big Oil probe findings to the Justice Department

House and Senate Democrats are referring the results of their probe into alleged climate disinformation by the oil industry to the Justice Department. Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) wants the Justice Department to investigate big oil for its decades long disinformation campaign in the same manner that the department’s 1999 anti-racketeering suit against major tobacco companies.

---