Cool the planet... How?

[Externet]

Hi.

Scientists are not fully sure; they have good suspicions the warming is caused by us. Very probable.

 

What would be wrong with a lunatic idea of massively attempting to cover with cheap mylar mirror film the sunniest unused areas of the planet? Even roofs?

Would that reflect a ~95% of their incident solar heat back to space? Tiny area in the global context, but... is there another action in plan?

 

I have no clue on how calculations would have to be conducted to come up with a mirrored acreage to at least counteract the situation to get worse.

 

Would you replace your car with a bicycle forever? Or just spend more energy in airconditioning your home ?

 

Costly, well, as soon as mylar film factories find out another application for their product, will immediately pump up the price. Or should it come down by volume production ?

The money spent in wars could buy quite an acreage of mylar mirror instead.

 

How would you plan action ? A huuuuge umbrella held at the space station?

Alternative; just hear the press talk about it and do nothing.

 

Miguel

[Rocket Man]

well, the amount of co2 produced in making this large amount of mylar would neatly counter the effect of radiation reflection by trapping other wavelengths more fully.

 

i think the most reasonable option would be to add a water tank to long haul jets to produce a bigger vapour trail.

 

a reflector in space would need to be unfesably large. you'd do better to use a smaller reflector to beam intense heat into the ocean to make a cloud. the could would be bigger and more effective than any orbital shade-cloth.

[weknowthewor]

My view point is we must take relevant steps to avoid pollution around us...

[jackson33]

very little of reflected energy make it back out into space. actually most is absorbed by the atmosphere before it get to the earth and used by all that requires it. its the atmosphere that holds temperature to what they are or the extremes they would be w/o.

 

Venus for instance has a very dense basic CO2 95% atmosphere which allows ahead temp of 500 degree C. Mercury has a thin Helium-Sodium and Oxygen atmosphere which holds little energy and temperature range from plus 400 to minus 200 degree C. earth on the other hand as a nitrogen, oxygen 77 an 21% atmo which deflects and retains our fairly constant temps. the closest to the sun is then cooler and not as warm as the 3rd planet which stays around 500.

 

you said scientist are not that clear and this should be made clear. not all in fact i question half, feel anything but a gentle warming trend (1 degree in a century) is in process. we survive day to day on a planet that ranges from minus 50 to plus 100 F and should manage changes for a long time. i might add according to NASA, at their observation post in Ant-Arctic, the temps are heading down .6 per 10 years.

[Externet]

Rocketman:

About making clouds with airplanes; I thought clouds trap more heat, as cloudy nights get warmer. In the other hand, clouds block the sun... How would the ideal work?

Making clouds during the day but not having them at nights in order to cool the planet ?

Miguel

[Rocket Man]

the greenhouse gasses trap the heat.

what hits the ground as near IR, is re-emmitted as far IR. the far IR is reflected back to the surface by the greenhouse gasses.

a vapour trail from a jet is at high altitude. it's also a fairly pure white. it scatters the light enetering the atmosphere (which is going straight down), some of the light will go straight back out.

it would need to trap substantially more heat than the heat it reflects to give a net heating effect.

also, i heard that a vapour trail aids the production of more similar cloud

[weknowthewor]

what is the need of all this?? grow more trees as they absorb heat, reduce air conditioners, refrigerators, they release chlorofluorocarbons depleting the ozone layer thus increasing atmospheric temperature. according 2 ur question, for reflection of sunlight, think how much mirrors will u need??, and is it economically feasable, another way is 2 use solar energy 4 our applications and also heat energy has so many applications...

[Rocket Man]

live in australia and say that!

airconditioners do not release CFCs. it's a perfectly sealed system unless it breaks. otherwise it would simply fail after a couple of hours work.

also, i'm not sure the ozone has much effect over limiting total radiant energy

 

growing more trees is not the answer to reducing carbon dioxide. trees absorb carbon, and release it when they die, forests have a limit to the density of biomass.