Information about global warming is pouring in from all sides. Some say that in 50 years we will not recognize our Earth because of climate change, all because of human activity. Others say that this is the classic cycle of warming and cooling that our planet has been going through regularly throughout its history. And a third group claims that this is one big hoax.
However, scientists are trying to solve the problem in various ways, and a very unusual idea for cooling the planet was recently published in the journal PLOS Climate.
Foto de Mika Baumeister na Unsplash
Dust mitigated the effects of solar radiation by up to 2%
In their project, the group of scientists simulated different scenarios that had one common feature. And that was dust. They used thick layers of dust to shield the Earth from the rays in their simulations. This shield would not be visible to people from Earth, so it would not affect our daily lives.
From Earth, creating a dust shield would require too much energy. It proved much more economical in the simulations to transport the necessary technology to the Moon and create a dust shield just from the Moon’s surface.
Moon dust as a solution to global warming?
In addition, it turns out that lunar dust has ideal properties for effectively reflecting the sun’s rays away from the Earth. The device for releasing the dust would take the form of a cannon and the dust would then settle in orbit to form a natural screen.
The scientists themselves admit that their proposal is not an ideal solution. But they do come up with solutions to the problems of some other concepts for mitigating global warming. However, the main problem is the amount of dust that would be needed to make this idea a reality. Over 10 billion kilograms would be needed, so the dust would have to be mined directly on the Moon.
Leave a Reply