A new claim has been made that ‘stratospheric aerosol injection’, which has been proposed to slow the polar warming that causes the collapse of the West Antarctic ice sheet, has little practical effect.
In a research report recently published by a research team from the University of Bern in Germany, the claim to arbitrarily release aerosols into the stratosphere to mitigate polar warming is very small compared to the effort invested.
Stratospheric aerosol injection is one of the ‘Solar Radiation Modification (SRM)’ technologies. Aerosols are naturally emitted following large-scale volcanic eruptions, and stratospheric aerosol injection physically realizes the phenomenon of blocking sunlight.
The consensus in the scientific world is that if global warming continues as it is now, the West Antarctic ice sheet collapse cannot be prevented. <사진=pixabay>
The research team set out to simulate whether this method, which has recently attracted attention, is really effective. Assuming three future greenhouse gas reductions: ‘reduction above expectations’, ‘moderate reduction’, and ‘no reduction’, respectively, aerosol injection was simulated to be conducted in 2020, 2040, 2060, and 2080. All scenarios lasted until 2300.
As a result, it was confirmed that the West Antarctic ice sheet melted due to the warming of the Antarctic region in all scenarios. Although the rate of melting differed among scenarios, it was concluded that the stratospheric blast of an aerosol would not have an immediate effect and would have to be sustained over a fairly long period of time.
“Even if aerosol injection is executed immediately, this method will have to be maintained for thousands of years to be effective,” said an official in charge of the experiment.
A method of physically spraying aerosol into the stratosphere to reduce the amount of incident on the ground is being devised. <사진=pixabay>
Currently, scholars are studying SRM as a way to mitigate global warming, in addition to reducing greenhouse gas emissions themselves. Among SRMs that encompass technologies that reduce the amount of sunlight reaching the ground, stratospheric aerosol injection is receiving a lot of attention.
“Aerosol, which refers to solid or liquid particles dispersed in a gas, reflects sunlight and lowers the average temperature,” said an official in the experiment. We cannot guarantee that, and we are concerned about potential adverse effects.”
Scholars who study SRM believe that if the global temperature rises by more than 2℃ compared to pre-industrial revolution, the adverse effects on human and animal ecosystems will increase. In terms of climate change measures, 2℃ is regarded as the last chance given to humans. The 2015 Paris Agreement also adopted a plan to limit the increase in global average temperature to less than 2 degrees Celsius.
Reporter Yoonseo Lee lys@sputnik.kr
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