SEAD (Scottish Education and Action for Development)

There are lots of technofixes of varying degrees of plausibility popping up in media stories, for example setting up mirrors in space to reflect sunlight and seeding oceans with iron filings to encourage plankton!

Some of these projects are funded from sources which have a strong interest in encouraging ‘business as usual’, such as the oil industry. Having said that, there is a substantial interest among the scientific community in methods of ’storing’ CO2 underground. The workability of that is a whole debate in itself, raising issues of safety, waste management and sustainability.

Whether any of these technofixes can form part of the solution remains to be seen, and in the meantime they may even impede our progress in dealing with the problem by distracting us from the real issues. Our priority has got to be reducing our demand for energy, increasing the efficiency with which we use it, and building sustainable solutions to meet our energy needs.