The Risks of Experimenting With the Sun

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David Keith leads the Climate Systems Engineering Initiative at the University of Chicago.Credit…Mustafa Hussain for The New York Times

To the Editor:

Re “Scientist Wants to Block Sunlight to Cool Earth” (“Buying Time” series, front page, Aug. 4):

Your article about solar geoengineering raises serious concerns about a complex issue that demands diverse voices and rigorous scrutiny of the potential effects of these speculative interventions on climate, ecosystems and human rights.

Claims that solar radiation modification, or S.R.M., could control the sun’s warming effects ignore the immense risks and the reality of sudden temperature spikes if deployment is stopped. This technology could never “restore” the climate but would further destabilize an already disturbed climate system, leading to unforeseen and irreversible ecological disasters, and severely affecting current and future generations.

Almost 500 leading scientists and more than 2,000 civil society organizations worldwide are calling for a solar geoengineering non-use agreement. Both African ministers and the European Parliament have called for such a mechanism, reflecting a growing consensus against these dangerous experiments.

It’s alarming that the key lesson learned from the Harvard solar geoengineering research project’s failure appears to be to proceed with less transparency, denying the public’s right to know about future experiments — while ignoring a global de facto moratorium of the United Nations on all geoengineering.

Solar geoengineering is no insurance to “buy time” to tackle the climate crisis. It is a recipe for disaster that distracts from the urgent need to transition away from fossil fuels.

Lili Fuhr
Berlin
The writer is director of the fossil economy program at the Center for International Environmental Law.