Scientists recommend a system of checkpoints to help guide climate engineering research

Brightening marine clouds might reflect sunlight, but carries risks not fully understood. Credit: NOAA

Research into engineering techniques that might one day be employed to artificially cool the planet poses some of the thorniest questions facing society today. For climate scientists, that tension is compounded by the lack of a broadly accepted oversight framework to guide their research.

In an opinion article published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, a team of scientists led by NOAA and CIRES researchers outline a framework for assessing the viability of a method for reflecting sunlight called marine cloud brightening, or MCB. The proposed method would use ocean sea-salt particles to increase the reflectivity of low-lying clouds over certain ocean regions. This is one of a number of proposed methods under consideration as a temporary measure to limit rampant warming.

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