“Global worming may be unstoppable regardless of what we may or may not do in the interim to reduce Carbon Emissions.”

The answer may lie in Geoengineering, according to Eli Kintisch, a reporter for Science Magazine.

The word sounds like a contraction in terms. How can our machines possibly change the entire earth? And is the damage to the earth irreversible. Apparently so.

One of the major problem with global warming is Greenland’s Ice Sheet, which is disintegrating faster than predicted even just a few years ago. One fear is that large amounts of water flooding in the North Atlantic could threaten the warm water currents known as the North Atlantic Drift – Such an event would likely throw most of Europe especially the UK into another Ice Age. The last time currents shut down was 12,000 years ago at the beginning of the last Ice Age.

Mega Drought are also a likely scenario to global warming –As is Methane release, a green house gas much more of a greenhouse gas than Carbon Dioxide, much of which could be released from the thawing of Siberia.

So what are the options available using Geoengineering?

Well we could grow large quantities of Algae blooms to take in some of the CO2 in the atmosphere. On a large enough scale this could produce enough algae to take 1 billion tons of carbon out of the atmosphere each year. The problem is that the algae could become toxic and be unstoppable once introduced in such quantities into the ecosystem.

Another way is to genetically engineer trees designed to take out vast quantities of CO2 in the atmosphere. There are also plans to make plants shinier, to reflect heat away from the planet in the same way that glaciers do at the poles.

This is perhaps more favorable than the introduction of a Dooms Day Machine: designed to actively polluting the upper atmosphere with Sulfur, a natural greenhouse gas which could fill the void left by the thinning Ozone. This could in turn further damage the Ozone layer however.

“All you need is are giant hoses suspended into the stratosphere by titanic balloons, and the sulfur could be pumped from the ground relatively cheaply.”

Geoengineering lacks any significant testing or experimentation while other methods like Clean Coal Technology are much further down the line.

“The most important things we can do is to stop putting greenhouse gasses into the environment.” Eli Kintisch points out. “If the planet turns out to be much more sensitive than predicted, countries in a desperate state of either flooding or drought may well take desperate measures to save their own micro environments.”

Cutting demand for production is a key area pointed out in his book. “The demand for consumer electronics and the growing need to have more and more gadgets and computer components feeds the increase in Carbon emissions through manufacturing production and the energy needed by the end user to operate them.

The rising demand of coal in China is directly influenced by the rising demand for items like the iPhone and blackberry cell phones, digital cameras and other electronics. Keeping these devices for longer or choosing to buy them pre-owned may be one of the easiest short term solutions out there.

Eli Kintisch’s book ‘Hacking the Planet’ is available in all good book stores and also at Amazon.