A Concept in Geoengineering: Stop Burning the Amazon Rainforest

We’re starting to hear more about geoengineering, i.e., manipulating the planet’s climate as to undo the effects of greenhouse gases. No major actions have been taken to date, and the subject is so intensely debated that it is extremely unlikely that anything will happen soon; there are profound questions that need to be resolved in many different disciplines in politics, science, and ethics, for instance:

What agencies would be responsible? Who should control the Earth’s thermostat?
What exactly are the goals?
What is the best combination of methods to accomplish the goals?
Who will pay the costs?
How can we ensure that the cure’s not worse than the disease, i.e., that the risk of unintended consequences is justified?

Normally, I’m the guy urging swift action. Here, I’ll be happy to see this debate rage on for some time.

In the meanwhile, I point out that we’re burning 200,000 acres of the Amazon rainforest per day. It seems a bit strange to talk about pumping tons of sulfur dioxide into the upper atmosphere to reflect a higher percentage of sunlight back into space or fertilizing the oceans to promote algae growth while we’re aggressively ruining the surface of the planet.