This might be the worst idea I've ever seen. I'm glad they are so interested in reducing the effects of global warming - that's fantastic - but they are literally purposefully releasing a toxic, major air pollutant into the air to create in their own words "clouds of dust" for the purposes of reflecting sunlight. Sure, there might be a slight cooling effect but who in their right mind could possibly think this is a good idea?!

I understand they are deploying to the stratosphere and not the troposphere but I can't imagine there aren't any negative second-order effects.

As someone who lives in a city with a major PM2.5 problem that effects the millions here on the daily (near an active stratovolcano no less!), reading about what they are doing was somewhat infuriating.

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sebmellen 3 hours ago | parent [-]

https://www.cremieux.xyz/p/from-pollution-to-solution

I understand your concern but I don’t believe the impact is as severe as you think.

	▲	someuser54541 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		I appreciate the link, however it should be noted that piece was written by the co-founder of that same company. They do seem to be evidence driven but let's not pretend there's not some degree of bias towards the solutions his company is proposing. Additionally, that article focuses almost solely on the chances of producing acid rain, which actually is another issue and not the one I was first concerned with. That piece talks about "redistributing" SO2 from the troposphere to the stratosphere which is a neat concept but a.) that's purely theoretical, and b.) that's not what they are doing or trying to do anyway. It could be argued that air pollution has a greater and more devastating effect on the everyday lives of people alive today then global warming does now or will in the foreseeable future. In my city it was estimated that more than 1 in every ~16 deaths is related to air pollution, and the air here isn't nearly as bad as it is in other cities. Worldwide, UNICEF estimates nearly 2,000 deaths under 5 years of age per day from air pollution [0]. Annual deaths worldwide are estimated at 8+ million yearly across all age groups. Making that problem worse by any measure in the hope of producing a cooling effect that is a fraction of a fraction of a degree is not worth it at all and at least in my opinion is a net-negative. [0]: https://ceh.unicef.org/spotlight-risk/air-pollution