Global Warming Is Speeding Up: Should We Be Talking About Geoengineering?
Global temperatures are rising faster than scientists expected, and the reasons are more complicated than they might appear. Emissions cuts and clean energy investment remain essential, but a growing number of voices are asking whether the world also needs to consider more dramatic interventions. Geoengineering, once dismissed as fringe science, is entering the mainstream climate conversation. The science is contested, the risks are significant, and there is a problem that rarely gets discussed in the same breath: public trust.
A dimming planet
Satellite data shows that since the turn of the century, Earth’s albedo – the amount of incoming sunlight it reflects – has been steadily dropping. Light that is not reflected is absorbed, adding heat to the system and accelerating warming. The rate at which the planet is warming, which stood at around 0.18°C per decade until the 2010s, now appears to be well over 0.2°C per decade.1
Part of the explanation is, ironically, a consequence of cleaning up air pollution. Sulphur dioxide, produced when fossil fuels burn, is harmful to human health. It also acts as a cooling aerosol, forming tiny particles that scatter light back into space and seed the water droplets that make up clouds. As China and the international shipping industry reduced their sulphur emissions, that inadvertent cooling effect diminished. Regulations introduced by the International Maritime Organization (IMO) in 2020 required roughly an 80% reduction in the sulphur content of shipping fuel, further accelerating that trend.
What is geoengineering?
Geoengineering refers to deliberate, large-scale interventions in the Earth’s systems aimed at counteracting climate change. There are two broad categories:
Carbon dioxide removal (CDR) technologies aim to extract greenhouse gases from the atmosphere. These range from nature-based approaches such as afforestation and peatland restoration to engineered solutions like direct air capture. Scientists broadly agree that CDR, alongside deep emissions cuts, will be necessary to meet climate targets.
Solar radiation modification (SRM) is more controversial. Sulphate particles high in the stratosphere stay aloft far longer than those closer to the surface, providing much more cooling per tonne. A thin layer of sulphates deliberately added to the stratosphere could, in theory, provide meaningful cooling at far lower cost to human health than the polluting smogs that have historically acted as an accidental brake on warming.
In December 2024, the European Commission’s Scientific Advice Mechanism recommended an EU-wide moratorium on SRM deployment, while calling for continued research and the development of a global governance framework. The tension between those two positions reflects where the debate currently sits.1
The social licence problem
Even where the science is promising, there is a more immediate obstacle: public trust; and the track record so far is not encouraging.
In April 2024, a team trialling marine cloud brightening over San Francisco Bay kept the experiment secret specifically to limit protests. When the mayor of Alameda, California, read about it in a newspaper, she discovered her city had not been informed. The city council subsequently voted to ban further work. As she put it: “It really backfired.”2
A similar story unfolded in Cornwall in 2023, when a Canadian start-up presented plans to trial ocean-alkalinity enhancement in St. Ives Bay. A community meeting turned hostile. Residents raised concerns about local ecology and a region with a long, painful history of industrial pollution. A protest campaign formed within weeks. The trial has remained on hold ever since.2
These cases are not unusual. However, social licence can be achieved with forethought and empathy. A cloud brightening project over the Great Barrier Reef has operated since 2020 without protest, because the research team spent a year running community panels, sought permission from every Indigenous group in the testing area, and invited the public to help shape the research. A 2024 survey found majority support across Australia.2 As the project lead put it: “There’s no point having a technological solution if you don’t have the social licence to use it.”
What this means for businesses
Geoengineering is no longer a fringe topic. Whether the focus is on carbon removal, solar radiation modification, or the accidental geoengineering we have been conducting through industrial emissions for decades, the direction of travel is clear: large-scale climate intervention is moving from theory to practice, and the decisions being made now will shape how it unfolds.
The lesson from the cases above is not primarily scientific. It is about transparency. Stakeholders who feel informed after the fact, or consulted in bad faith, withdraw trust quickly and rarely extend it again. That principle applies well beyond geoengineering research. For businesses making climate commitments, the same dynamic is at play: credibility depends not just on what you do, but on how openly and honestly you communicate it.
How 2EA Can Help
2EA works with organisations to develop credible, evidence-based carbon strategies built on transparency and designed to withstand scrutiny as the regulatory and scientific landscape continues to evolve.
Sources
1. The Economist, “Global warming is speeding up. Another reason to think about geoengineering”, 19 December 2024.
https://www.economist.com/leaders/2024/12/19/global-warming-is-speeding-up-another-reason-to-think-about-geoengineering
2. Hersher, R., “Geoengineering could fight climate change — if scientists can get the public on their side”, Science, 2025.
https://www.science.org/content/article/geoengineering-fight-climate-change-if-public-can-convinced
Further Reading
