1.1 Objectives
A cost effective technology for delaying the projected damaging warming of the biosphere due to excessive man-made greenhouse gas emissions is needed to provide time in which to make the transition from fossil fuels to hydrogen and renewable energy sources and to develop and implement carbon management technologies. This research plan describes the activities that will be required to develop and implement such a cost effective mitigation technology.
The primary objective of the research phase is to determine through modeling and field testing if covering a large surface area in one of the earth’s deserts (1000-5000 square miles) with white plastic polyethylene film will increase the albedo (reflectivity of solar radiation) of the surface enough to significantly reduce the surface (soil) and lower atmospheric temperatures inside and outside the covered area.
This will be accomplished by reducing infrared radiation emitted by the surface and re-emitted by greenhouse gases in the atmosphere above the area. A significant reduction is defined here as enough that scale-up to sufficiently large areas of coverage could be expected to offset some or all of the projected additional radiative forcing and global warming from 2010 to 2070. The long-term stability and maintenance requirements of the plastic cover will also be determined.
If field testing and related climate modeling show the use of a plastic cover is feasible, cost effective and will not adversely impact local, regional or global climate, then plans for full scale deployment beginning around 2010 (approximately 67,000 square miles per year for 60 consecutive years) will be developed with the Sahara, the Arabian and the Gobi deserts the prime locations. These plans will establish the feasibility and cost of deploying and maintaining such large-scale surface coverage.
The objective of the full-scale program will be to maintain the earth’s average temperature at or near its level in 2010 until 2070. By 2070, it is likely that the transition to hydrogen and renewable energy sources will be well underway, if not complete and that large-scale carbon management strategies will have been implemented. Even if no significant progress in reducing emissions has been accomplished by 2070, the surface coverage program, the Global Albedo Enhancement Project (GAEP), could delay expected climate change damage for 60 years, long enough for a more complete assessment of the climate change problem to have been made and adaptive countermeasures to have been developed.
If the GAEP is determined to be feasible and desirable, modifications to the Kyoto Protocol to allow for thermal credits for surface albedo enhancement performed to offset carbon equivalent greenhouse gas emissions can then be proposed along with financing mechanisms and a new schedule for compliance by all countries.
