Hacking Planet Earth

Informationen zum Autor Thomas M. Kostigen is an award-winning and New York Times -bestselling author and journalist. He founded the Climate Survivalist column for USA Today and has written for numerous publications, including The Washington Post , National Geographic , Discover , Departures , the Los Angeles Times , the Chicago Tribune , and The Wall Street Journal , among others. Most recently, he wrote two books for National Geographic on climate preparedness (one of which won the prestigious Louis J. Battan Author's Award). His previous nonfiction books include The Green Book: The Everyday Guide to Saving the Planet One Simple Step at a Time , You Are Here: Exposing the Vital Link Between What We Do and What That Does to Our Planet , The Green Blue Book: The Simple Water-Savings Guide to Everything in Your Life , and The Big Handout . He is also the author of the novels Golden Dawn and Fatwa . Klappentext An exploration of the cutting-edge technology that will enable us to confront the realities of climate change. For decades scientists and environmentalists have sounded the alarm about the effects of global warming. We are now past the tipping point. As floods, storms, and extreme temperatures become our daily reality, "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle" efforts aren't enough anymore. In Hacking Planet Earth, New York Times bestselling author Thomas Kostigen takes readers to the frontlines of geoengineering projects that scientists, entrepreneurs, engineers, and other visionaries around the world are developing to solve the problems associated with climate change. From giant parasols hovering above the Earth to shield us from an unforgiving sun, to lasers shooting up into clouds to coax out much-needed water, Kostigen introduces readers to this inspiring work and the people who are spearheading it. These futurist, far- thinking, world-changing ideas will save us, and Hacking Planet Earth offers readers their new vision for the future. Zusammenfassung An exploration of the cutting-edge technology that will enable us to confront the realities of climate change. For decades scientists and environmentalists have sounded the alarm about the effects of global warming. We are now past the tipping point. As floods, storms, and extreme temperatures become our daily reality, "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle" efforts aren't enough anymore. In Hacking Planet Earth , New York Times bestselling author Thomas Kostigen takes readers to the frontlines of geoengineering projects that scientists, entrepreneurs, engineers, and other visionaries around the world are developing to solve the problems associated with climate change. From giant parasols hovering above the Earth to shield us from an unforgiving sun, to lasers shooting up into clouds to coax out much-needed water, Kostigen introduces readers to this inspiring work and the people who are spearheading it. These futurist, far- thinking, world-changing ideas will save us, and Hacking Planet Earth offers readers their new vision for the future....

Autorentext

Thomas M. Kostigen is an award-winning and New York Times-bestselling author and journalist. He founded the Climate Survivalist column for USA Today and has written for numerous publications, including The Washington Post, National Geographic, Discover, Departures, the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago Tribune, and The Wall Street Journal, among others. Most recently, he wrote two books for National Geographic on climate preparedness (one of which won the prestigious Louis J. Battan Author's Award). His previous nonfiction books include The Green Book: The Everyday Guide to Saving the Planet One Simple Step at a Time, You Are Here: Exposing the Vital Link Between What We Do and What That Does to Our Planet, The Green Blue Book: The Simple Water-Savings Guide to Everything in Your Life, and The Big Handout. He is also the author of the novels Golden Dawn and Fatwa.

Klappentext

An exploration of the cutting-edge technology that will enable us to confront the realities of climate change.

For decades scientists and environmentalists have sounded the alarm about the effects of global warming. We are now past the tipping point. As floods, storms, and extreme temperatures become our daily reality, "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle" efforts aren't enough anymore. In Hacking Planet Earth, New York Times bestselling author Thomas Kostigen takes readers to the frontlines of geoengineering projects that scientists, entrepreneurs, engineers, and other visionaries around the world are developing to solve the problems associated with climate change.

From giant parasols hovering above the Earth to shield us from an unforgiving sun, to lasers shooting up into clouds to coax out much-needed water, Kostigen introduces readers to this inspiring work and the people who are spearheading it. These futurist, far- thinking, world-changing ideas will save us, and Hacking Planet Earth offers readers their new vision for the future.

Leseprobe

"Why can't we?" It's a question that nagged at me. Why can't we reset the course of nature, utilizing human innovation and advanced technologies? We have, after all, already bent nature out of shape and aimed it squarely against us. That turnabout largely began with the Industrial Revolution, when we started pluming massive amounts of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere that nature isn't able to soak up and store properly. Excess carbon means extra heat and global temperature rise-and more extreme weather. As of 2018, the annual number of extreme meteorological events had doubled since 1980. It means oceans expand and rise. The rate of global sea level rise had jumped 50 percent in just two decades. It means more droughts and floods. The number of yearly storms and ensuing floods had quadrupled from the average number forty years ago. California experienced its worst drought in a millennium and its most destructive wildfire in modern history. It means mass casualties and entire populations relocating to more amenable geography. As many as one billion people could become climate refugees by 2050.

Reducing carbon emissions, or carbon mitigation, hasn't worked; we continue to overpollute the atmosphere. And in September 2016, we went past the tipping point: Four hundred parts per million of carbon dioxide was calculated to be present in the atmosphere during the month when carbon should be circulating in the air at its lowest levels. Summer vegetation sucks more carbon out of the atmosphere than at any other time, leaving September with the least amount. But 2016 was different. The ceiling of four hundred parts per million became the floor-and we broke through it. That means the effects of global warming are likely irreversible without intervention. The result, if current rates continue, is temperature rise of 5.4¼F by the middle of the century. The consequences of that are more bouts of extreme weather, higher sea level rise, massive migrations from low-lying areas, and endangered global food supplies. The heat might even completely destroy the Amazon rainforest, also known as the Earth's "lungs" because of all the carbon that it takes from the atmosphere and stores. If the Amazon goes, climate change effects will multiply exponentially.

Given this new reality, this hostile environment of the future, we have to opt for a more extreme approach to fighting climate change. We need silver bullets.

Geoengineering is defined as "the deliberate large-scale manipulation of an environmental process that affects the Earth's climate, in an attempt to counteract the effects of global warming." It's the fighting method we need if we are to stand a chance against nature's wrath.

Many environmentalists, including Al Gore, are opposed to the idea. He and others believe that if we intervene with the climate, we will be addressing the…