Climate engineering in offing?

Sep 14, 2011 - Aashima Dogra |

London

UK scientists are set to perform preliminary tests for game-changing technology that will engineer the atmosphere to counter global warming.

Their ultimate aim is to inject “cooling particles” high up in the atmosphere that will be pumped through a pipe held by a balloon floating 20 km above the earth surface.

This, they said might take a “couple of decades” to become a reality. For now, they are preparing a technology trial involving water particles hosed from a pipe stretched only 1 km above the ground by a smaller balloon.

They announced their plans at the British Science Festival underway at Bradford. “Designing such a balloon is a complex engineering feat,” said Dr Hugh Hunt of Cambridge University, one of the researchers in the team. He added that the trail would give them a sense of scale at which they were working, by providing clues on “pumping pressure at high altitude”, “vibration and oscillation of the tether”, “size of the balloon” etc.

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