Geoengineering briefing Stratospheric Controlled SCoPEx Perturbation Experiment

Location: particles into the upper atmosphere Key dates: World View Spaceport from a high-altitude balloon and Project initiated: 2015 Tucson, Arizona, USA measure how effectively the resulting Research activities: 2017-2024 clouds block sunlight, while also First field tests programmed: 2018 Key Players: tracking any effects on the air in Frank Keutsch, David Keith, John the upper atmosphere. While the Regulatory status: Dykema, and Lizzie Burns, all environmental impacts are currently The UN Convention on Biodiversity Harvard Professors. Burns and unknown, the political effects of has passed a moratorium on Keith head the Harvard Solar the project, however, are the most ocean fertilization (2008) and on Geoengineering Research Program. consequential: if the experiments geoengineering (2010) that cover SRM are allowed to proceed, they would and experiments like this. However, Budget: legitimize geoengineering and move the US is not a party to the CBD. The $20 million ($7m raised as of Oct. ‘17) us one step closer to a global sun- UN Environmental Modification block and more geoengineering in Convention (ENMOD) prohibits Summary: the region. military use of The Stratospheric Controlled technology globally. Perturbation Experiment (SCoPEx) Funding: Under US Federal law (National is a planned experiment in a form Funding comes from Harvard Weather Modification Policy Act of geoengineering known as Solar University and its Solar of 1976), any modification of the Radiation Management (SRM). Geoengineering Research Program, weather is required to be reported SRM techniques aim to block or which is funded by , several to the National Oceanic and reflect sunlight before it reaches the venture capitalists and hedge fund Atmospheric Administration, and earth’s atmosphere, which would higher-ups, a former senior VP at the results of research must be made hypothetically slow down global Google, the Hewlett and Alfred P. public. temperature rise. SCoPEx aims to Sloan foundations (among other The O’odham Nation, represented develop a form of SRM known as philanthropic organizations), and a by a handful of tribal governments, Stratospheric Aerosol Injection. foreign policy research centre with have lived in the area around the The SCoPEx project would spray military ties. World View Spaceport for thousands water, finely-ground chalk and sulfur SCoPEx Funders: William and Flora Hewlett Foundation; The Open Philanthropy Project; Pritzker Innovation Fund; The Alfred P. Sloan Foundation; VoLo Foundation; The Weatherhead Center for International Affairs; G. Leonard Baker, Jr.; Alan Eustace; Ross Garon; Bill Gates; John Rapaport; Michael Smith; Bill Trenchard. of years. The reservations where the be “very small compared to other Project details: tribal governments exercise extra- routine releases of material into the David Keith, among others, has constitutional sovereignty under stratosphere by aircraft, rockets, or proposed a suite of field experiments, US law cover a vast area of southern routine balloon flights.” some to test the effectiveness and Arizona, with traditional territories However, the political effects of risks of geoengineering and others to extending into Mexico. For example, the project are easier to predict. As develop technologies for larger-scale the Pascua Yaqui Tribe’s offices are a governments continue to fall deployment. The closest to 20 minute drive from the Spaceport short of climate targets, execution is SCoPEx. that will be the SCoPEx staging area. David Keith and “These are This experiment would While the sovereign rights of other geoengineers not dispassionate try to understand tribal governments over airspace is will be able to scientists, but the microphysics an emerging legal area, the Air Force point to research entrepreneurs backed of introducing and others have signed Memoranda findings to bolster by venture capital who particles into the of Understanding with the tribal the case for larger stand to profit from stratosphere to governments about their use of geoengineering better estimate the SRM.” O’odham airspace, indicating that experiments. efficacy of different government agencies are aware that However, these are not materials to reflect they have some rights. One lawyer dispassionate scientists, but sunlight as part of an effort to has made a persuasive case that tribal entrepreneurs backed by venture develop SRM techniques. They first governments have sovereignty over capitalists who stand to become plan to spray water molecules into what happens in the airspace over fabulously wealthy if governments the stratosphere from a balloon 20km their lands. should opt to move forward with an above the earth, to create a massive icy SRM project in the future. plume to be studied from the flight Possible impacts: If SCoPEx moves forward, it will balloon. They then aim to replicate it The environmental effects of contribute to entrenching technology, with limestone or calcium carbonate, SCoPEx are mostly unknown. The capital and public relations power of followed by sulphates. project’s web site claims that the geoengineering and divert resources amounts released by the project will away from real climate solutions. –November 2017 , [email protected]

David Keith’s Earlier Attempts In 2012, news broke that David Keith and Harvard After media revealed Keith’s own experiment, engineer James Anderson were planning the first it too was cancelled, and Keith shifted energies to outdoor experiment in . This a new incarnation of the project. In early 2017, he would have involved the release of particles into the helped launch Harvard's Solar Geoengineering atmosphere from a balloon flying 80,000 feet over Research Program, backed by several million in Fort Sumner, New Mexico. Their stated aim was to funding by billionaires and private foundations. measure how releasing sulfate would impact Now, Keith is covering his bases politically: he chemistry, and to test ways to make the aerosols the claims the amounts of particles released will be appropriate size. small, and in an attempt to win support among civil The announcement came soon after a society, the project says it will have an independent controversial proposed field test of another advisory process for the experiments. This is in SRM scheme – the British government-funded keeping with what constitutes a problem with all Stratospheric Particle Injection for Climate small-scale experiments like this: the slow and Engineering (SPICE) – was cancelled after a global careful accumulation of mainstream legitimacy for outcry. Keith bemoaned its fate: “I wish they'd had large-scale experiments in solar geoengineering a better process, because those opposed to any such in the media, scientific bodies, and institutions of experiments will see it as a victory and try to stop governance, both regionally and globally—ultimately other experiments as well." leading toward full deployment.