As alarm over global warming spreads, a radical idea is gaining
momentum. Forget cuts in greenhouse gas emissions, some scientists
argue. Instead, bounce sunlight back into space by pumping reflective
nanoparticles into the atmosphere. Launch mirrors into orbit around the
Earth. Make clouds thicker and brighter to create a "planetary
thermostat."
These ideas might sound like science fiction, but in fact they are part
of a very old story. For more than a century, scientists, soldiers, and
charlatans have tried to manipulate weather and climate, and like them,
today's climate engineers wildly exaggerate what is possible. Scarcely
considering the political, military, and ethical implications of
managing the world's climate, these individuals hatch schemes with
potential consequences that far outweigh anything their predecessors
might have faced.
Showing what can happen when fixing the sky becomes a dangerous
experiment in pseudoscience, James Rodger Fleming traces the tragicomic
history of the rainmakers, rain fakers, weather warriors, and climate
engineers who have been both full of ideas and full of themselves.
Weaving together stories from elite science, cutting-edge technology,
and popular culture, Fleming examines issues of health and navigation in
the 1830s, drought in the 1890s, aircraft safety in the 1930s, and world
conflict since the 1940s. Killer hurricanes, ozone depletion, and global
warming fuel the fantasies of today. Based on archival and primary
research, Fleming's original story speaks to anyone who has a stake in
sustaining the planet.
