As the climate crisis deepens, scientists are considering ways to cool the planet. A new study proposes spraying millions of tons of diamond dust every year to cool Earth’s upper atmosphere. The study, published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters, was conducted by a multi-institutional team of climatologists, meteorologists and Earth scientists. The team found evidence based on 3D climate models, comparing aerosols that could be used to cool the planet.
Earlier studies have shown that Earth was at or near its tipping point, causing significant changes in global weather patterns. Over time, the planet will continue to warm.
Therefore, experts have argued that the only solution to this issue is to cool the planet. Among other suggestions, scientists have also advised deploying millions of devices to extract carbon from the air which can then be separated.
However, one problem with this idea is that if the Earth has already reached its tipping point, simply removing carbon from the air will not help. According to Phys.org report, scientists will have to look for ways to not only curb temperature rise but also actively cool the planet.
The latest proposed solution is to inject aerosols into the atmosphere. It will reflect heat and sunlight into space.
To find a solution, the team of researchers in their latest study tried to look for materials that could serve as the best medium to cool the planet.
For this, they came up with the idea of creating a 3D climate model, which shows the effect of aerosol dispersion in the atmosphere. It also included the effects of different aerosols, such as light and heat reflection, meaning how it would eventually settle on the ground and whether these aerosols would clump together in the atmosphere, retaining more heat.
In their study, the team modeled the effects on Earth of injections of calcite, silicon carbide, diamond, aluminium, anatase, rutile and sulfur dioxide.
Ultimately, they concluded that diamond dust was the best choice because its particles reflected the most light and heat, in addition to staying aloft the longest. Another positive side to this is that since they are chemically inert, they cannot react to form acid rain.
In their study, the researchers found that if 5 million tons of synthetic diamond dust were injected into the atmosphere the Earth could cool by at least 1.6 degrees Celsius over 45 years. However, the downside is that it would cost approximately $200 trillion.
