Hundreds of documents show how researchers failed to notify officials in California about a test of technology to block the sun’s rays — while they planned a much huger sequel.
Archived version: https://archive.is/20250728172625/https://www.politico.com/news/2025/07/27/california-sunlight-dimming-experiment-collapse-00476983
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It’s literally our only option to buy us time to sequester carbon. I don’t agree with aerosol or particle based shields that aren’t easily removed, but a metal or solid shield in space locked between the sun and earth to deflect a % of the rays is totally doable and needed. I personally think a partially living shield made of 3D printed vulture head skin would work well but it is quite gruesome, so a bunch of metal is probably more likely than that.
I would think the aerosol or particle based shields would be even easier to remove than something up in orbit. The stuff in orbit will need to be pretty high up if you don’t want it to immediately decay and reenter, so anything in orbit will remain that way for some time. Plus there’s Kessler to worry about. But sulfurs and other aerosols wash out of the atmosphere pretty quickly. That’s the whole reason people talk about termination shocks, and fret that we’ll have to keep the aerosol effort continuously going. To me this seems like a virtue. If at any time we decide we don’t like the effects, we can simply stop. There’s no long term commitment.
What I’m proposing is something like the start of the technology of a dyson sphere tbh, it would be further out into space and ideally only maintained by machine, no humans. If it has issues, the panels can be turned perpendicular to the direction of energy coming from the sun to let in more sun, or fuck, we could just set bombs on it and later remote detonate it if it’s truly a concern.
I think the impact of spreading a bunch of sulfur or other particulates in the air is just a bad idea in terms of health for everyone (a major component of smog/pollution is sulfur, and we know sulfur works bc during covid, less ships running meant less sulfur and heating accelerated) and having a large blanket or shield in space would be less risky in that aspect but yes, more technically challenging. However, Beijing, MIT, Stanford, Japan, and Germany etc should be able to figure it out easily - they pretty much already made a cure for HIV and rabies together and permanently altered warfare w invention of drones and AI.