Some interesting thoughts from Oliver Morton (who I unfortunately missed having lunch with in London last week, maybe next time):
AI worries people more, but geoengineering seems pretty well placed in second place. (Incidentally, what’s up with space as the top societal risk enhancer? If AI takes the laurels in terms of economy, geopolitics and tech, how come space outdoes it in the exacerbation of societal risks? A mystery for another time…)
Indeed. I have some ideas, and that some it arises from ignorance and too much bad SF in television and movies, but I’ll let the commenters have at it.
I have been very interested in a technology that has been classed as geoengineering: atmospheric CO2 capture. You might want to look at some of the shenanigans associated with this.
The APS released a report in 2011 that was critical of it, but that report looks very regrettable now, with excessive cost estimates and playing down of other approaches. There are several groups now touting technologies that may be as cheap as $30/ton CO2.
“The state of air capture technology, while still young, has evolved to include several field trials that show great promise and very low costs—far lower than the APS paper suggests.”
https://climatediscovery.org/a-perspective-on-air-capture-of-carbon-dioxide-much-easier-than-media-reporting-suggests/
BTW, if gasoline had to pay the full cost of removing/storing CO2 from air, the $30/ton figure would add about $0.60/gallon.
The primary means of storing CO2 will be in old oil wells, where it will also help scrub out more of the oil. Distributed capture from air means the CO2 can be captured at the fields where it will be used.