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The Security Implications of Geoengineering: Blame, Imposed Agreement and Critical Infrastructure
Paul Nightingale & Rose Cairns
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Security & Geoengineering
• Who would conduct geoengineering?• Are the economics incredible?• Is it governable?• Who gets the blame?
• Take away: indirect security costs likely to be high, & high enough to make it untenable
• Caveats & Uncertainties (SRM)
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Geoengineering
• High fixed cost, capital intensive technologies characterised by uncertainties & (survivor) biases about costs
• As you move from imaginaries to working systems the secondary supporting systems & governance structures become apparent
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Military & Peaceful
• Direct military applications– Cirrus (’47-52) – Stormfurry (‘62-83) – Popeye & Motorpool (‘67-72).– ENMOD
• Value: impact v baseline, alternative means.• “we are not really interested in technologies that can
be defended against with an umbrella”
– NRC (2003), DHS (2008), China etc
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Who would be in charge?
• Caveats & Uncertainties• Common assumption it would be scientists
1. Current capabilities2. Securitisation of climate change3. Perceived termination risks4. Loop-holes in international law5. Post-War US security policy
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Who would protect it?
• Caveats & Uncertainties• Critical National Infrastructure (CIP Act, 2001,
Homeland Security Act, 2002)– terrorism, pandemics, cyber attacks, extreme
weather, accidents or technical failures.– Threat, Vulnerability, Outcome framework
• Direct indirect security costs reasonable
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Indirect Indirect Costs
• Countermeasures? Nations/people disagreeing (endpoints, etc) could vent (anger, ,methane). – Who would have a veto? – Would it be imposed over expressed preference?
• Solutions?– Global legal framework for climate policy– Enforcement & surveillance (verification)
• Indirect costs of enforcement & surveillance likely to be much higher than direct costs, particularly if agreement has to be imposed
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Geography of Blame
• Costs depend on level of resistance• Overlook impact of GE on blame– Weather natural – unlucky– Weather engineered – blameworthy
• Geography of blame under uncertainty – technical superior actor– Any extreme weather event blamed on GE, then blamed on
USA (?) even if USA wasn’t involved.– Costs of security?– Global politics of climate emerging? Impact?
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Dystopian futures
• Caveats & Uncertainties– Maybe: agree on global policy, climate overrides
security, agreement on UN control, policy changes– Secretive, bureaucratic decision-making under
conditions of uncertainty, paranoia & blame
• In combination costs not just economic• Ungovernable at any reasonable cost