Billionaires are backing a geoengineering startup to reflect sunlight and save the world — or sell it off, one patented particle at a time

cross-posted from: https://news.abolish.capital/post/4087

A US-Israeli geoengineering startup has raised $60m as part of its plan to test ‘sun-reflecting technology’. Critics are warning the new tech could have unexpected negative impacts on global weather and drive “geopolitical conflict”. Supporters, meanwhile, have pointed out it might not do that. 🚨Big News in Solar Geoengineering Stardust Solutions, an Israeli-U.S. startup developing […]

By Willem Moore

If you’re unfamiliar with solar ‘geoengineering’, it’s essentially climate change in reverse. Much like how we’ve caused global warming and other changes by releasing carbon, methane, and other gases, scientists believe we can reverse the problem by releasing particles which reflect sunlight back into space.

In a report titled The Risks of Geoengineering, the Center for International Environmental Law summarised:

   Geoengineering technologies, if deployed at scale, could have profound, unpredictable, and potentially irreversible effects on biodiversity, both through their direct impacts and as a result of compounding and exacerbating existing planetary crises caused by pollution, climate change, and unsustainable land use.

As reported by Politico, this latest geoengineering plan is being led by US-Israeli startup Stardust Solutions. Their technology involves custom particles which the company claims are ‘inert’. They also believe these particles will not accumulate in humans or ecosystems, will not harm the ozone layer, and will not create acid rain.

Stardust Solutions’ founders are nuclear physicists who worked for the Israeli government. Although they insist their new project is unaffiliated with the state of Israel, they are headquartered outside Tel Aviv. This could cause problems for them worldwide given the boycott of Israel which began during Israel’s apartheid era and continued throughout the genocide.

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  • Euergetes [none/use name]@hexbear.netEnglish
    13·
    2 months ago

    unilaterally start doing it and then everyone else has a gun to their heads to keep it going.

    everyone else is going to start shooting at these nations. when responsibility is spread to the self-interest of the nations everyone will be encouraged to maximalize aerosols that don’t blow over their own territory, and everyone subject to these crop-failure clouds will retaliate.

    the only semi-rational, last resort way to do this would be with strict international control and scope but every compounding failure of global climate policy has set the stage for profound violence