Could Salting Clouds Buy Precious Time in Fight Against Global Warming?
Once considered a risky last resort, geoengineering is becoming more accepted as a possible way to slow down global warming – but that doesn’t mean some of the ideas scientists are coming up with don’t sound downright kooky to the layman. One proposal involves lightening clouds with salt to improve their ability to reflect sunlight. Scientist John Latham suggested that increasing the number of droplets in maritime layer clouds (stratocumulus), which cover a third of the ocean, could significantly increase their reflectance. From BBC News: The water droplets in clouds reflect solar radiation back to space. And the numbers of droplets they contain are largely controlled by the number of cloud condensation nuclei (CCN), such as specks of dust. Many of these nuclei are produced over the land. Land-locked clouds therefore contain many hundreds of cloud droplets per cubic centimetre, whilst clouds that form over the sea contain substantially fewer. Generally, the more droplets that are prese
