Last September, researchers in the UK launched a high-altitude weather balloon that released a few hundred grams of sulphur dioxide into the stratosphere, a potential scientific first in the solar geoengineering field.
Solar geoengineering is the theory that humans can ease “global warming” by deliberately reflecting more sunlight into space. One possible means, climate alarmists believe, is spraying sulphur dioxide in the stratosphere.
It is highly controversial given, among other issues, that blasting chemicals into our immediate orbit tampers with the natural order, making weather less predictable or threatening populations’ food supplies by causing drought.
The UK effort was not a test of or experiment in geoengineering itself. Rather, the stated goal was to evaluate a low-cost, controllable, recoverable balloon system, according to details obtained by MIT Technology Review.
Remarkably, the system has been named – SATAN. It’s an acronym for ‘Stratospheric Aerosol Transport and Nucleation’.
Andrew Lockley, an independent researcher previously affiliated with University College London, led the effort last autumn, working with European Astrotech, a company that does engineering and design work for high-altitude balloons and space propulsion systems.
His paper about his SATAN experiments has been submitted but has not yet been published. When he discovered his paper had been “leaked” Lockley wrote an email to MIT Technology Review:
“Leakers be damned! I’ve tried to follow the straight and narrow path and wait for the judgment day of peer review, but it appears a colleague has been led astray by diabolical temptation. There’s a special place in hell for those who leak their colleagues’ work, tormented by ever-burning sulphur.”
Lockley’s balloons were equipped with instruments that could track flight paths and monitor environmental conditions. They also included several safety features designed to prevent the balloons from landing while still being filled with potentially dangerous gases.
Shuchi Talati, a scholar in residence at American University who is forming a non-profit focused on governance and justice issues in solar geoengineering said: “I’m really concerned about what the intent here is. There’s a sense of them having the moral high ground, that there’s a moral imperative to do this work.”
Talati said that forging ahead in the way Lockley did is ethically dubious because it takes away any opportunity for others to weigh in on the scientific value, risks, or appropriateness of the efforts before they happen. She added that part of the intent seemed to be a provocation.
David Keith, a Harvard scientist who has been working for years to move ahead with a small-scale stratospheric balloon research program, questioned both the scientific value of the effort and its usefulness in terms of technology development. When asked if being provocative might have been a partial goal of the effort, Keith said: “You don’t call something SATAN if you’re playing it straight.”
Lockley is not the only “climate change” researcher who appears to have become unhinged. More bonkers ideas recently came from the climate change lunatics at the United Nations (“UN”). In a report, the UN Environment Programme (“UNEP”) put forward proposals to meet climate targets, including positioning giant mirrors to reflect sunlight back into space.
The Independent noted that it is not the first time that space mirrors have been proposed to alleviate the worst effects of climate change. Former US presidential hopeful Andrew Yang notably published a plan to geoengineer the planet in 2019. His proposal to place giant foldable space mirrors into orbit would have cost $4.86 trillion and taken around two decades to implement.
Other methods UNEP suggests for cooling our planet by restricting sunlight and darkening our skies are:
- Injecting reflective nanoparticles/sulphur dioxide into the atmosphere (stratospheric aerosol injection)
- Brightening of low clouds over the ocean by seeding ocean clouds with submicron salt particles
As noted by Igor Chudov, sulphur dioxide – the chemical of choice for both SATAN and UNEP – was a free by-product of coal and oil burning, emitted into the atmosphere until recent decades. Environmental activists and authorities concluded that sulphur dioxide (SO2) was a pollutant gas contributing to the phenomenon of acid rain and causing significant health problems.
Having been assured that sulphur dioxide was bad for us, we spent billions of dollars eliminating it from coal and oil-burning emissions and building sulphur-capture technology to keep SO2 out of the atmosphere.
Now, it turns out that sulphur dioxide is good for us, and we need to spend even more untold billions to inject it into the atmosphere.
Does this sound stupid to you?
I am sure, however, that investors will earn quite a bit of money from “sulphur dioxide atmospheric injections” right after making billions on “eliminating sulphur dioxide emissions” from coal-burning plants.
As justification for injecting chemicals into the atmosphere, the UNEP report indicates that volcanic eruptions sometimes fill the skies with ash or sulphur, dim the sun for years, and lead to measurable global cooling episodes. However, Igor Chudov wrote, much darker pages of human history were associated with volcanoes causing catastrophic climate changes. For example, in 1600, the eruption of the Huaynaputina in Peru caused famines in Europe and led to mass deaths:
- In Russia, 1601-1603 brought the worst famine in the country’s history, leading to the overthrow of the reigning tsar.
- Records from Switzerland, Latvia and Estonia record exceptionally cold winters in 1600-1602.
- In France, the 1601 wine harvest was late, and wine production collapsed in Germany and colonial Peru.
- In China, peach trees bloomed late, and Lake Suwa in Japan had one of its earliest freezing dates in 500 years.
Such global sun-dimming projects may indeed cause global cooling at the cost of poisoning the atmosphere, causing acid rain, and leading to the collapse of agriculture in several regions of the world. Additionally, blocked sunlight will prevent plants’ uptake of carbon dioxide (CO2) because converting carbon dioxide into plant matter and oxygen needs sunlight.
Never far away from a plot to destroy, control and profiteer, since early last year Bill Gates and other private donors have funded Harvard University’s Solar Geoengineering Research Program, SCoPEx, to study effective ways to block sunlight from reaching Earth’s surface.
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