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Is cloud brightening an idea whose time has come?

By Ed Goldman

A distinguished scientist says he’s come up with an economical way to cool down earth’s climate. It involves the deliberate release of sulfur dioxide into the stratosphere, the place usually reserved for my blood-pressure count after watching Sean Hannity for a few minutes. 

Because the scientist shares the name of a fine but overlooked film actor, David Keith—he played Richard Gere’s fellow U.S. Navy pilot recruit in “An Officer and a Gentleman”—I’m inclined to have warm feelings about the scientist and his theory. Maybe even globally warm feelings.

Even so, his proposal sounds a little like one of the instant solutions we the people always prefer—like shooting ourselves up with Ozempic or undergoing Lipo surgery rather than reducing our intake of Tater Tots.

Theoretically, Dr. Keith’s approach could get our planet back to normal weather cycles: ice bergs would regain their ability to sink cruise ships with 24-hour shrimp buffets, and we’d never again have to endure footage of the musician Sting wearing glasses to indicate his seriousness as he scolded us from a rain forest.

Now, I applaud science at every chance I get, meaning whenever its advances have allowed me to not die during a pandemic, force me to walk up 50 floors in a high-rise building and be able to microwave a cup of coffee in 55 seconds rather than wait an interminable 10 minutes to boil water. But many a “solution” fails to address that we caused the problem in the first place. 

Due to the marvels of some scientific minds, we’re never inspired to modify our behavior because they make sure we don’t have to. Pre-Ozempic, dietitians and charlatans alike suggested we could lose weight by, alternately, eating a high-fat diet, a low-fat diet, a Mediterranean diet or a paleolithic diet. We could slim down by chewing or eschewing grains (high-fiber and gluten-free plans, respectively). 

What we didn’t have to do—and what I’ve done many times in my life when the suits in my closet mysteriously shrank—was stop eating so much and start moving much more. This is maybe the simplest solution of all; but it requires an effort, and we Americans aren’t praised around the planet for our sense of self-discipline. 

Dr. Keith isn’t the only researcher working to concoct a way for us to shrug off our fossil-fuel-burning dependency and addiction to aerosol sprays for keeping our side-swept bangs in place, our armpits smelling like gardenia trees and our houseflies dying mid-flit. Already in operation are facilities that “vacuum up the carbon dioxide that’s heating up the atmosphere and bury it underground,” according to a New York Times story. 

“Some scientists,” the story goes on to say, “are performing experiments designed to brighten clouds” which is “another way to bounce some solar radiation back to space. Others are working on efforts to make oceans and plants absorb more carbon dioxide.”

To my non-scientific mind (a greatly understated adjective phrase), these sound akin to wearing a military uniform made of a human-size mirror so that when bullets hit it they’d bounce back and hit the shooters. In other words, what a seven-year-old kid or Austin Powers’s nemesis Dr. Evil would come up with (for the latter, toss in the word “magma” just about anywhere and it sounds real science-y).