Scientists to stop global warming with 100,000 square mile sun shade

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According to astronomer Dr Roger Angel, at the University of Arizona, the trillions of mirrors would have to be fired one million miles above the earth using a huge cannon with a barrel of 0.6 miles across.

The gun would pack 100 times the power of conventional weapons and need an exclusion zone of several miles before being fired.

Despite the obvious obstacles - including an estimated $350 trillion (£244trn) price tag for the project - Dr Angel is confident of getting the project off the ground.

He said: "What we have developed is certainly effective and a method guaranteed to work.

"Tests are ongoing but we expect to be ready to launch within 20 or 30 years time. Things that take a few decades are not that futuristic."

Dr Angel has already secured NASA funding for a pilot project and British inventor Tod Todeschini, 38, was commissioned to build a scaled-down version of the gun.

He constructed the four-metre long cannon in his workshop in Sandlake, Oxfordshire, for a TV documentary investigating the sun shield theory.

He said: "The gun was horrendously dangerous. This was the first gun I'd ever built.

"I knew I could put it together safely but at the end of it all I didn't know what I was going to get.

"It was immensely dangerous. I was attempting to build a gun to produce 1,500G of force but it ended up creating about 10,000G and we had to turn the power down.

"Most weapons used by the army produce 100Gs of force so our gun was about 100 times more powerful.

"The main danger was electrocution because it used enough power to boil 44,000 kettles.

"If you were working with normal levels of electricity you could get a shock and be fine, but if you got a shock off this you would be dead - no question.

"We've proved it's possible to build a scaled-down version of the gun needed to get these lenses into the air so it's just a matter of scaling up the designs for the real thing."

If Dr Angel's sun shield is successful he says the mirrors will last 50 years before needing to be replaced.

"What you are talking about is a project which will stop global warming for centuries to come," he said.

"At the moment the sums involved sound huge but in the greater scheme of things it's a price worth paying.

"Over 50 years the mirrors will become damaged and therefore fresh lenses will need to be fired into space to ensure the shield is constant."

Dr Angel, who pioneers solar energy, is developing cheaper methods of making the lenses to bring the cost of the project down.

In the meantime researchers at the University of Victoria, Canada, are testing the sun shield theory by using computer simulations of the project.

Dr Angel's sun shield theory will feature on Ways to Save the Planet on the Discovery Channel at 7pm on Sunday.

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Forests in the sky could be built to clean air of pollution belched out by factories

By Daily Mail Reporter

Visionary architects have designed a revolutionary skyscraper to combat global warming by growing trees hundreds of feet in the air.

The CO2 Scraper will hold up to 400 trees in a bid to absorb dangerous pollutants and convert carbon dioxide into oxygen.

Its award-winning designers say it should be built near factories or other major sources of pollution in order to clean the air.

Skyscraper of the future? The CO2 scraper would pump out oxygen and improve air quality

Evergreen trees will be mounted on a series of floors within a 400ft-tall concrete structure so they can filter air hundreds of feet above the ground.

They will be supplied with water and nutrients via a windmill-powered pump system.
It has been designed by Nectar Product Development, a design company based in California.

A spokesman said: 'The CO2 Scraper would be a large-scale construction for holding between two to four hundred large-size trees.

'These would potentially absorb dangerous pollutants and convert global warming-related carbon dioxide into breathable oxygen.

'The only outside power required would be electricity for an elevator to be used by maintenance personnel - the Scraper would absorb carbon dioxide and thereby increase the amount of life-giving oxygen in the atmosphere.'

Enlarge

How the CO2 scraper would work

He added: 'In addition, the structure would provide immediate benefits to people and animals in its vicinity, providing a significant amount of shade.

'It will also cool the air during the hot summer months via the temperature-lowering properties of hundreds of trees.

'We thought of the CO2 Scraper as a way to place trees in areas where they would ordinarily be difficult or impossible to plant such as near a factory, major road or perhaps even in a densely populated urban area.

'The idea here was to imagine a structure with relatively small footprint in terms of the amount of ground it covers.'

Scientist and sustainability specialist Joep Meijer, founder of theRightenvironment, has praised the 'outstanding' design.

He said: 'The CO2 Scraper is an outstanding example of the kind of ideas we need to look at now.

'It would be a great investment in natural capital for existing industries.'

Nectar's senior designer Yutaka Kazamaki said: 'Although right now the economy is naturally the focus of world attention, the issue of global warming is clearly among the greatest issues our planet is facing.

'The need to consider any and all possible solutions that address both our environmental and economic challenges has never been greater.'

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Environmental Studies Enrollment Soars

By Kate Galbraith

The Evergreen State College A student in an undergraduate environmental studies program at Evergreen State College in Olympia, Wash., studies lichen ferns.

With his emphasis on renewable energy and green jobs, President Barack Obama has picked an issue that resonates with his core supporters — young people.

At colleges around the country, students seem to be flocking to environmental studies.

At Boston College, 17 students minored in environmental studies in 2003; this year 44 students will do so (assuming everyone graduates).

Iowa State University has seen the number of students enrolled in environmental studies and environmental science programs soar from 99 students in fall 2003 to more than 150 last fall.

William Crumpton, who chairs the environmental sciences and environmental studies major at Iowa State, said that a recruiting push had been helpful, but mainly students simply seem more interested in environmental issues, partly at the expense of biotechnology, a traditional draw.

“I had this sense that environmental issues got a lot more press — or maybe more effective press — in last four to five years,” said Mr. Crumpton.

At the University of Virginia, “We have definitely seen an increase in majors over the past two-three years, but where we have really increased are the environmental science courses we teach to non-majors,” said Jay Zieman, the chair of the University of Virginia’s environmental sciences department in an e-mail message. “That number has increased 45 percent over the past five years.”

The one slight outlier of my four-college survey was the University of Pennsylvania. The number of undergraduates majoring in environmental studies peaked at 44 in 2002, but now is down to 32 (still higher than the 20 in 1999). However, the number of master’s degrees in environmental policy hit a 10-year high last year, and the university has seen a spurt of master’s enrollment in related areas like hydrology.

The student interest comes as a range of universities, from Stanford to the University of Toledo, are working to beef up their alternative-energy research.

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