Comments on: Climate-Saving Sunshade Would Screw up Climate-Saving Solar Facilities

By: Mark

Mark — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 11:39:11 +0000

This discovery doesn’t bode well for a switch away from fossil fuels on a global scale. Imagine a time in the future when the vast majority of the planet has weaned itself off carbon-based energy sources.

Now a major volcanic eruption – or several – happens AGAIN.

With a global population approaching 10B, with water resources at an all time low, with shorelines changing constantly resulting in constant pan-migrations inland, no human population could tolerate a dramatic reduction in a naturally-occurring energy source. It would cause total economic collapse.

By: Nick

Nick — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 20:04:20 +0000

Pollution has messed up our atmosphere. I know, lets pollute it some more to fix it!!

Some of these so-called geoengineering schemes are the stupidest ideas I’ve ever heard. THE SUN IS NOT THE PROBLEM. Our pollution is the problem and until we tidy up that waste stream everything else is worthless.

Like Doug said, acid rain. Other unforseen effects will occur. This mess has started because of the excess crap we’ve dumped into our atmosphere, oceans and lands. Adding extra is not going to re-balance the system. It’s like having 200lbs at one end of a teeter totter and 20 lbs at the other, and to try to lift the 200lbs you add 20 extra pounds to the 200lbs side and wonder why it’s suddenly sinking into the ground.

By: Doug

Doug — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 18:06:52 +0000

If I could manage thunderous applause all on my own, this post would receive it. As it stands, I will say thank you very much for pointing out that, in a system as chaotic and complex as the ecosphere, the law of unintended consequences is rarely given the voice it needs.

I always thought the sulphur aerosol idea was laughable anyway, especially since it would set the stage for global acid rain as a by-product. I am glad that this plan is starting to have holes poked in it, and would hope that more realistic approaches – population controls and a global culture of efficiency, for example – will soon come to the fore.

By: Eliza Strickland

Eliza Strickland — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 17:11:45 +0000

Good question, and the Register has the answer: the annual energy output "fell by 16 per cent the year after Mt Pinatubo."

By: Damian

Damian — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 16:57:20 +0000

“The researchers found that the eruption also reduced peak power output at a California solar-thermal plant by 20 percent.”

I’m not surprised peak output was strongly affected. But what about average output? Even if the system couldn’t produce as much energy at noon on a sunny day, how did it do during the overall balance of a year?