Phew, okay, we did decide to invest in a planetary clean-up project back in the 2050s.
Luckily that means that there are fewer greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. The planet will warm a bit, but the magnificent Council has enough time to fix the space mirrors before anything too bad happens. Thank you, Council!
One of the potential risks of blocking some of the sun’s rays to offset global warming is that if we stopped, the temperature could rise very quickly. This would happen if geoengineering was deployed without society also reducing greenhouse gas emissions at the same time. Suddenly stopping geoengineering would cause temperatures to rebound fast. Scientists call this risk “termination shock” and it would be catastrophic for ecosystems globally.
