Abstract
Defined as the “deliberate, large-scale manipulation of the planetary environment in order to counteract anthropogenic climate change,” geoengineering is an umbrella term that captures a variety of different technologies. This chapter will offer a concise overview of geoengineering as a response to anthropogenic climate change, with a primary focus on the ethical aspects this grouping of technologies engenders. We will start by exploring why it is that we are even considering these technologies rather than just doubling down on mitigation and adaptation, and then move into a brief explanation of some of the different technologies under consideration. With that brief explanation out of the way, we will then introduce a number of ethical considerations that some or all of the technologies give rise to. For the sake of organization, we will look at different ethical considerations that arise: (1) during research into these technologies; (2) after deployment or full-scale use of these technologies; and (3) in the kind of world in which these technologies have become the new normal.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Arneson, R. (1979). Democracy is not intrinsically just. In P. Laslett & J. Fishkin (Eds.), Philosophy, politics and society. Yale University Press.
Bunzl, M. (2008). An ethical assessment of geoengineering. Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, 64(2), 18.
Callies, D. E. (2018). The slippery slope argument against geoengineering research. Journal of Applied Philosophy. https://doi.org/10.1111/japp.12345
Callies, D. E. (2019a). Climate engineering: A normative perspective. Lexington Books.
Callies, D. E. (2019b). Institutional legitimacy and geoengineering governance. Ethics, Policy & Environment, 21(1), 1–17. https://doi.org/10.1080/21550085.2018.1562523
Cole, D. N., & Aplet, G. H. (2010). The trouble with naturalness: Rethinking park and wilderness goals. In D. N. Cole & L. Yung (Eds.), Beyond naturalness: Rethinking Park and wilderness stewardship in an era of rapid change (pp. 12–29). Island Press. http://qut.eblib.com.au/patron/FullRecord.aspx?p=3317526
Dembe, A. E., & Boden, L. I. (2000). Moral hazard: A question of morality? New Solutions: A Journal of Environmental and Occupational Health Policy, 10(3), 257–279. https://doi.org/10.2190/1GU8-EQN8-02J6-2RXK
Gardiner, S. (2010). Is arming the future with geoengineering really the lesser evil? In S. Gardiner, S. Caney, D. Jamieson, & H. Shue (Eds.), Climate ethics (pp. 284–312). Oxford University Press.
Hale, B. (2012). The world that would have been: Moral hazard arguments against geoengineering. In C. Preston (Ed.), Engineering the climate: The ethics of solar radiation management (pp. 113–131). Lexington Press.
Honegger, M., & Reiner, D. (2018). The political economy of negative emissions technologies: Consequences for international policy design. Climate Policy, 18(3), 306–321. https://doi.org/10.1080/14693062.2017.1413322
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. (2013). IPCC, 2013: Summary for policymakers. In: Climate change 2013: The physical science basis. Contribution of Working Group I to the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Cambridge University Press. http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar5/wg1/WG1AR5_SPM_FINAL.pdf
International Energy Agency. (2020, November 12). Direct air capture. IEA. https://www.iea.org/reports/direct-air-capture
Janssen, M. A., & den Elzen, M. (1992). Allocating C02-emissions by using equity rules and optimization. National Institute of Public Health and Environmental Protection – Bilthoven, The Netherlands.
Kahan, D. M., Jenkins-Smith, H. C., Tarantola, T., Silva, C. L., & Braman, D. (2014). Geoengineering and the science communication environment: A cross-cultural experiment. Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science. https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1981907
Kass, L., & Wilson, J. Q. (1998). The ethics of human cloning. AEI Press.
Keith, D. W. (2013). A case for climate engineering. The MIT Press.
Kola, I., & Landis, J. (2004). Can the pharmaceutical industry reduce attrition rates? Nature Reviews Drug Discovery, 3(8), 711–716. https://doi.org/10.1038/nrd1470
Lenzi, D., Lamb, W. F., Hilaire, J., Kowarsch, M., & Minx, J. C. (2018). Don’t deploy negative emissions technologies without ethical analysis. Nature, 561(7723), 303–305. https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-018-06695-5
McKibben, B. (2006). The end of nature (Random House trade pbk. ed). Random House Trade Paperbacks.
McKinnon, C. (2018). Sleepwalking into lock-in? Avoiding wrongs to future people in the governance of solar radiation management research. Environmental Politics, 1–19. https://doi.org/10.1080/09644016.2018.1450344
Mercer, A. M., Keith, D. W., & Sharp, J. D. (2011). Public understanding of solar radiation management. Environmental Research Letters, 6(4), 044006. https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/6/4/044006
Moellendorf, D. (2014). The moral challenge of dangerous climate change: Values, poverty, and policy. Cambridge University Press.
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association. (2020). NOAA/ESRL global monitoring division—The NOAA Annual Greenhouse Gas Index (AGGI). https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/aggi/aggi.html
Natural Environment Research Council. (2010). Experiment earth? Report on a public dialogue on geoengineering.
Neumayer, E. (2000). In defence of historical accountability for greenhouse gas emissions. Ecological Economics, 33(2), 185–192.
Nordhaus, W. D. (1994). Managing the global commons: The economics of climate change. MIT Press.
Notre Dame Global Adaptation Index. (2017). Vulnerability rankings | ND-GAIN Index. https://gain.nd.edu/our-work/country-index/rankings/
Our World In Data. (2020, October 28). Total greenhouse gas emissions. https://ourworldindata.org/greenhouse-gas-emissions
Our World In Data. (2021, February 9). CO2 and greenhouse gas emissions country profiles. https://ourworldindata.org/co2-and-other-greenhouse-gas-emissions#co2-and-greenhouse-gas-emissions-country-profiles
Page, E. A. (2012). Give it up for climate change: A defence of the beneficiary pays principle. International Theory, 4(02), 300–330. https://doi.org/10.1017/S175297191200005X
Parker, A., & Irvine, P. J. (2018). The risk of termination shock from solar geoengineering. Earth’s Future, 6(3), 456–467. https://doi.org/10.1002/2017EF000735
Preston, C. J. (2013). Ethics and geoengineering: Reviewing the moral issues raised by solar radiation management and carbon dioxide removal: Ethics & geoengineering. Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Climate Change, 4(1), 23–37. https://doi.org/10.1002/wcc.198
Reynolds, J. (2015). A critical examination of the climate engineering moral hazard and risk compensation concern. The Anthropocene Review, 2(2), 174–191. https://doi.org/10.1177/2053019614554304
Royal Society. (2009). Geoengineering the climate: Science, governance and uncertainty. Royal Society.
Shue, H. (1999). Global environment and international inequality. International Affairs, 75(3), 531–545. https://doi.org/10.1111/1468-2346.00092
Singer, P. (2010). One atmosphere. In S. Gardiner, S. Caney, D. Jamieson, & H. Shue (Eds.), Climate ethics (pp. 181–199). Oxford University Press.
Sinnott-Armstrong, W. (2010). It’s not my fault: Global warming and individual moral obligations. In S. M. Gardiner, S. Caney, D. Jamieson, & H. Shue (Eds.), Climate ethics: Essential readings (pp. 332–346). Oxford University Press.
Thompson, A. (2017). Novel ecosystems and adapting nature conservation. In D. Schmidtz (Ed.), Philosophy: Environmental ethics (pp. 69–96). Macmillan Reference USA, a part of Gale, Cengage Learning.
Trisos, C. H., Amatulli, G., Gurevitch, J., Robock, A., Xia, L., & Zambri, B. (2018). Potentially dangerous consequences for biodiversity of solar geoengineering implementation and termination. Nature Ecology & Evolution, 2(3), 475–482. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-017-0431-0
United Nations. (1992). United Nations framework convention on climate change. http://unfccc.int/essential_background/convention/items/6036.php
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Section Editor information
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2023 Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this entry
Cite this entry
Callies, D.E. (2023). The Ethics of Geoengineering. In: Pellegrino, G., Di Paola, M. (eds) Handbook of the Philosophy of Climate Change. Handbooks in Philosophy. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-07002-0_78
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-07002-0_78
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-031-07001-3
Online ISBN: 978-3-031-07002-0
eBook Packages: Religion and PhilosophyReference Module Humanities and Social SciencesReference Module Humanities