Page 1 of 4 M ORAL P ERSPECTIVES ON C LIMATE P OLICY February 1, 2023 Robert Tulip Abstract : The mainstream climate action movement sees emission reduction as the primary strategy to address global warming. Evidence that cutting emissions can only have marginal effect on climate supports a moral case to reduce warming by enhancing planetary albed o. The Moral Debate Is it reasonable to describe people who oppose brightening the planet as immoral? Using technology to make the planet brighter would reflect more sunlight back to space, enhancing albedo. Brightening the planet is plausibl y the only available way to reverse global warming, in view of looming tipping points that could be activated before conventional mitigation approaches can prevent them. 1 A recent article by James Hansen et al 2 discussed the need “to temporarily affect E arth Energy Imbalance via Solar Radiation Management (SRM), if the world is to avoid disastrous consequences, including large sea level rise.” This means new climate cooling technology is needed to prevent severe climate impacts. Public debate on these proposals is vigorous. A call for an International Non - use Agreement on Solar Geoengineering 3 has proposed that research on such technology should not proceed. Popular opposition is reflected in the view supported by Greta Thunberg that “all geoengineeri ng schemes are attempts to manipulate the Earth with the same domineering mindset that got us into the climate crisis in the first place.” 4 A counterargument to Thunberg is that only technology can enable ongoing human flourishing and protection of biodi versity, and that rejection of methods to directly regulate the temperature would “ignore the energetic and material imperatives of our world.” 5 The widely held belief that brightening the planet is too dangerous and impractical has direct moral implicati ons. Enhancing planetary albedo through SRM could mitigate serious climate risks such as sea level rise, biodiversity loss, extreme weather and systemic instabilities. Limiting these effects of warming would prevent avoidable suffering and enhance planeta ry security and stability. Opponents of new brightening technologies appear not to have thought this moral balance through. Their argument is that hypothetical risks of new technology justify forgoing the possibility of achieving these valuable benefits. The main hypothetical risks of brightening the planet are that it may only be a temporary solution, it could have unforeseen side effects and it could slow the pace of decarbonisation. While these are essential concerns, 1 Heutel, G., et al., Climate tipping points and solar geoengineering . J. Econ. Behav. Organ. (2016), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jebo.201 2 Hansen, J., et al., Global Warming In the Pipeline , (2022) https://arxiv.org/abs/2212.04474 3 https://www.solargeoeng.org/non - use - agreement/ 4 The Climate Book , created by Greta Thunberg, 2022, reviewed at https://www.theguardian.com/books/2022/oct/26/the - climate - book - by - greta - thunberg - review - global - warning 5 Vaclav Smil, How the World Really Works , Penguin, 2022, p5 Page 2 of 4 the practical impact of preventing progress on planetary brightening is to allow unchecked warming, given that emissions are increasing. 6 The impacts of warming would otherwise be far worse than any of the risks from a well - governed brightening program. It appears that hostility toward technology solutions for climate change has led people to ignore relevant facts. That is a serious moral problem. The following claims support the need for planetary brightening. 1. Action to cut greenhouse gases (GHGs) cannot affect temperature or weather for decades. 2. Preventing global warming by carbon - based methods alone is not feasible on a climate - relevant timescale. 3. Brightening the planet, for example by refreezing the poles 7 , could have rapid effects to reduce weather extremes. 4. Global governance systems for climate technology could minimise risk and bring benefits for prosperity and peace. 5. Without higher albedo, tipping points are expected to be breached quickly with serious social, economic and environmental damage. 8 6. Methane from per mafrost tipping points alone could swamp GHG cuts. 7. The real alternatives are brightening the planet or accepting global warming. Brightening or Warming? The real alternatives – brightening or warming - show the stark moral choice facing humanity. Oppo sing brightening allows warming. This is a reasoned scientific critique of widely accepted ideas in IPCC and NGO documents. It implies that doing nothing to reverse the current loss of planetary albedo 9 fails our duty of care to our common future. The moral debate over climate policy has political and economic implications. Cutting GHGs is expensive, slow and difficult, facing powerful opposition. Together with the technical challenges, the political and economic challenges make emission reduction impractical and risky on the climate - relevant timescale created by the need to mitigate likelihood of tipping points. By contrast, available methods to brighten the planet such as Marine Cloud Brightening and Mi rrors to Enhance Earth’s Reflectivity could be deployed quickly with high cooling return on investment. 10 Researching and deploying these and other technologies could rapidly and safely cool the planet at low cost, while methods to remove GHGs and more con troversial brightening technologies such as Stratospheric Aerosol Injection are examined. While it is generally accepted that brightening cannot substitute for cutting GHGs in the long term, 11 the short - term problem appears to be the reverse, that cutting GHGs 6 https://climateactiontracker.org/documents/1094/CAT_2022 - 11 - 10_GlobalUpdate_COP27.pdf 7 Wake Smith et al 2022 Environ. Res. Commun. 4 095009 DOI 10.1088/2515 - 7620/ac8cd3 8 https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/sep/08/world - on - brink - five - climate - tipping - points - study - finds 9 Goode, P. R., Pallé, E., Shoumko, A., Shoumko, S., Montañes - Rodriguez, P., & Koonin, S. E. (2021). Earth's albedo 1998 – 2017 as measured from earthshine. Geophysical Research Letters, 48, e2021GL094888. https://doi.org/10.1029/2021GL094888 10 https://www.meer.org/firstprinciples 11 https://theconversation.com/solar - geoengineering - is - worth - studying - but - not - a - substitute - for - cutting - emissions - study - finds - 157828 Page 3 of 4 cannot substitute for brightening. This creates what the US Council on Foreign Relations described 12 as “a high - stakes timing predicament.” Opponents of brightening argue that good governance is impossible. That view ignores the many precedents of int ernational organisations, such as the Bretton Woods institutions established in 1944, the World Bank and International Monetary Fund. These provide models for international cooperation, as do numerous more recent bodies including the Intergovernmental Pan el on Climate Change. A similar global organisation established to assess and deploy climate technology could ensure transparent and inclusive approaches, providing a forum for practical agreement in ways that would build confidence, stability and securit y. Concerted international action to refreeze the polar regions would be a useful initial goal. A main argument against creating a brighter world is that it would enable emissions to continue. However, while climate science has shown that business as usual could be catastrophic, 13 the momentum, power and inertia of economic and political systems make faster decarbonisation extremely challenging. Climate activists widely consider that the need to foment political opposition to fossil fuels rules out the use of planetary brightening to slow global warming. Unfortunately, this ‘moral hazard’ argument 14 ignores the problem that climate tipping points cannot be prevented by any feasible level of emission reduction, or even by GHG removal at scale, contrary t o arguments from Lenton et al. 15 Efforts to speed up emission reduction promote an unwinnable conflict at high cost and risk. People who insist on clinging to this ideology of conflict are dubious allies for effective climate action, even though they now dominate much of the public climate policy conversation. Rather than insisting warming of 1.5°C is inevitable, 16 the more scientific approach is to recognise that urgent action to brighten the planet is needed to limit warming. Conclusions All factors considered, brightening the planet is the only response that can prevent dangerous near - term warming. That means opposition to SRM research serves only to prevent effective climate action. Opposition to a brighter world is therefore an arguably immoral st ance, due to its erroneous basis and harmful effects. This ethical implication can help people to question the policy of emission reduction alone, a view widely promulgated within IPCC and NGO circles. It also challenges the view that carbon dioxide remov al without albedo enhancement could deliver climate stability. Dialogue on ethical beliefs influences social legitimacy and political mandates. Rapid policy change can become possible when leaders are convinced that ideas previously seen as morally good are actually deficient, and that ideas they had been taught to fear are actually safe and necessary. This shift of thinking is needed in climate policy. Clarity of message and 12 Council Special Report No. 93 April 2022 Reflecting Sunlight to Reduce Climate Risk - Priorities for Research and International Cooperation , Stewart M. Patrick https://www.cfr.org/report/reflecting - sunlight - reduce - climate - risk 13 Kemp et al, Climate Endgame: Exploring catastrophic climate change scenarios , PNAS 2022, https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2108146119 14 https://thebulletin.org/2019/12/geoengineering - is - no - climate - fix - but - calling - it - a - moral - hazard - could - be - counterproductive/ 15 https://w ww.nature.com/articles/d41586 - 019 - 03595 - 0 16 https://www.unep.org/resources/emissions - gap - report - 2022 Page 4 of 4 courteous discussion can expose the error of ideological opposition to planet ary brightening, especially the dire consequences of failure to act in time. The wider public can be convinced that the ideology now prevailing in the IPCC and related forums of doing nothing about albedo is superficially attractive but profoundly wrong. The climate goal should shift from Net Zero Emissions to Net Zero Heating, aiming to balance warming effects with equal and opposite cooling. People will only support action for climate security, restoration and repair when they reject both the conflictin g ideologies of emission reduction alone and climate change denial. It is essential to put the debate in these confronting terms, given that complacency and confusion about these moral issues is allowing inaction, with the high risk of dangerous tipping p oints continuing to grow. Emission reduction is not enough. We need to brighten the planet. Robert Tulip worked for the Australian Agency for International Development from 1989 to 2017 and has a Master’s Degree in Ethics and Ontology. He participates in the Healthy Planet Action Coalition and the Planetary Restoration Action Group. Comments on t his paper are welcome at robert@rtulip.net