Glacial Geoengineering is the deliberate modification of the climate system around a glacier to slow the melt of the ice shelf and reduce sea level rise.
Proposed Glacial Geoengineering Strategies
- Ocean-heat transport interventions: Setting sediment berms or fibrous curtains along the seabed in the front of ice shelves to block the flow of warm circumpolar deep water.
- Basal-hydrology interventions: Slow the flow of streams that carry meltwater off the ice sheets.
- This can be done through drilling holes through glacier beds to create drainage channels, thereby diverting meltwater streams and slowing ice sheet loss.
About Geoengineering
- Geoengineering is the deliberate, large-scale manipulation of Earth’s climate systems to counteract anthropogenic global warming.
- Categories of Geoengineering:
- Solar Geoengineering / Solar Radiation Management (SRM): It aims to limit the sun's radiation onto the Earth’s surface and reduce global average temperature.
- Strategies include Aerosol Injection, Marine Cloud Brightening, Albedo Improvement, Ocean Mirror etc.
- Carbon Geoengineering / Carbon Dioxide Removal (CDR): It aims to reduce the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere by removing it from the atmosphere.
- Strategies include Carbon Capture and Storage, Ocean Alkalinity Enhancement, Ocean Fertilization etc.
- Solar Geoengineering / Solar Radiation Management (SRM): It aims to limit the sun's radiation onto the Earth’s surface and reduce global average temperature.
Significance of Geoengineering
Concerns associated
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