Abstract
The focus of climate policy so far has been on reducing the accumulation of greenhouse gases. That approach, however, requires broad international cooperation and, being expensive, has been hindered by free riding; so far, little action has been taken. An alternative approach is to counteract climate change by reducing the amount of solar radiation that strikes the Earth—“geoengineering.” In contrast to emission reductions, this approach is inexpensive and can be undertaken by a single country, unilaterally. But geoengineering also has worrying consequences: it may harm some countries; it would not address ocean acidification; it would pose new risks. The fundamental challenge posed by this new technology is not free riding but governance: who should decide if and under what circumstances geoengineering should be used?
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Anderson S, Newell R (2004) Prospects for carbon capture and storage technologies. Annu Rev Environ Resour 29: 109–142
Ansolabehere S, Deutch J, Driscoll M, Gray PE, Holdren JP, Joskow PL, Lester RK, Moniz EJ, Dodreas NE (2003) The future of nuclear power: an interdisciplinary MIT study. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA
Barrett S (2005) Environment and statecraft: the strategy of environmental treaty-making (paperback edition). Oxford University Press, Oxford
Barrett S (2006a) Climate treaties and ‘breakthrough’ technologies. Am Econ Rev Pap Proc 96(2): 22–25
Barrett S (2006b) The smallpox eradication game. Public Choice 130: 179–207
Barrett S (2007) Why cooperate? The incentive to supply global public goods. Oxford University Press, Oxford
Blaizot J-P, Iliopoulos J, Madsen J, Ross GG, Sonderegger P, Specht H-J (2003) Study of potentially dangerous events during heavy-ion collisions at the LHC: report of the LHC safety study group. Geneva, CERN 2003-001
Bodansky D (1996) May we engineer the climate?. Clim Change 33: 309–321
Caldeira K, Jain AK, Hoffert MI (2003) Climate sensitivity uncertainty and the need for energy without CO2 emission. Science 299: 2052–2054
Cicerone RJ (2006) Geoengineering: encouraging research and overseeing implementation. Clim Change 77: 221–226
Crutzen PJ (2006) Albedo enhancement by stratospheric sulfur injections: a contribution to resolve a policy dilemma?. Clim Change 77: 211–219
Govindasamy B, Caldeira K (2000) Geoengineering earth’s radiation balance to mitigate CO2-induced climate change. Geophys Res Lett 27(14): 2141–2144
Govindasamy B, Caldeira K, Duffy PB (2003) Geoengineering earth’s radiation balance to mitigate climate change from a quadrupling of CO2. Glob Planet Change 37: 157–168
Govindasamy B, Thompson S, Duffy PB, Caldeira K, Delire C (2002) Impact of geoengineering schemes on the terrestrial biosphere. Geophys Res Lett 29(22): 2061, doi. 1029/2002GL015911
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (2007) Climate change 2007: the physical science basis. Summary for policymakers. Available at http://www.ipcc.ch/SPM2feb07.pdf
Keith DW (2000) Geoengineering the climate: history and prospect. Annu Rev Energy Environ 25: 245–284
MacCracken MC (2006) Geoengineering: worthy of cautious evaluation?. Clim Change 77: 235–243
Nordhaus WD (1994) Managing the global commons: the economics of climate change. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA
Nordhaus WD, Boyer J (2000) Warming the world: economic models of global warming. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA
Panel on Policy Implications of Greenhouse Warming (1992) Policy implications of greenhouse warming: mitigation, adaptation, and the science base. National Academy Press, Washington, DC
Rees M (2003) Our final hour. Basic Books, New York
Robock A (2002) The climatic aftermath. Science 295: 1242–1243
Royal Society (2005) Ocean acidification due to increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide. The Royal Society, London
Schelling TC (1996) The economic diplomacy of geoengineering. Clim Change 33: 303–307
Schneider SH (2001) Earth systems engineering and management. Nature 409: 417–421
Stern N (2007) The economics of climate change: the Stern review. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
Sterner T, Troell M, Aniyar S, Barrett S, Brock W, Carpenter S, Chopra K, Ehrlich P, Hoel M, Levin S, Mäler K-G, Norberg J, Pihl L, Söderqvist T, Wilen J, Vincent J, Xepapadeas A (2006) Natural disasters and disastrous policies. Environment 48(10): 20–27
Teller E, Hyde R, Ishikawa M, Nuckolls J, Wood L (2003) Active stabilization of climate: inexpensive, low risk, near-term options for preventing global warming and ice ages via technologically varied solar radiative forcing. Lawrence Livermore National Library, 30 November
Travis DJ, Carleton AM, Lauritsen RG (2002) Contrails reduce daily temperature range. Nature 418: 601
Wigley TML (2006) A combined mitigation/geoengineering approach to climate stabilization. Science 314: 452–454
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Additional information
In my lecture to the British Association for the Advancement of Science, I gave an overview of my new book on global public goods (Barrett 2007), of which the topic of this paper is but one example. I have used the opportunity of this special issue to expand upon and recast my brief discussion of this topic as presented in my lecture and in the first chapter of this book
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Barrett, S. The Incredible Economics of Geoengineering. Environ Resource Econ 39, 45–54 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10640-007-9174-8
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10640-007-9174-8