Geo-engineering

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primary 9 26 ez musk moon satellites

SEE HAARP WEATHER

SEE CHEMTRAILS

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see heated for twts

heated gmail 9 26

some blame where it’s due.

Fossil fuel companies, obviously. (Truly, no clue how those executives sleep at night.) And I gave you my two cents on big ag.

Also:

Big banks: Since the Paris Agreement was signed in 2015, 60 banks have provided $7.9 trillion in financing to fossil fuel companies, with the top four banks alone—JPMorgan Chase, Citi, Wells Fargo, and Bank of America—providing more than $1.64 trillion.

Big tech: AI data centers are just guzzling energy, and the frothing building frenzy refuses to wait for them to be powered by clean energy. In his newsletter, Bill McKibben pointed to analysis by Bloomberg that:

“The planned data center buildout will increase greenhouse gas emissions from the electricity sector by at least twenty percent, and perhaps as much as a third.”

And as Emily Atkin reported in HEATED, “AI’s climate problem is worse than we thought” because:

“The emissions enabled by the fossil fuel industry’s use of AI are likely far greater than the emissions of powering AI as a whole. Specifically, they found that Big Oil’s use of AI to produce more oil and gas could create 3.3 to 13.3 times more climate pollution than powering AI’s data centers.”

Meanwhile, Elon Musk is suddenly concerned about climate change again, but also absurdly says we don’t have to worry about it for 50 years, and (you will be shocked) says he will solve it with satellites... catapulted off the moon. Another disingenuous money grab.

These tweets were written in the same week that our heating planet melted the permafrost that held a glacier in place in Nepal and Tibet. The collapse has led to so much death and devastation. A climate injustice if ever there was one. (Speaking of the UN, UNICEF is a good place to donate.)

Which brings me to.. .

Big Billionaires: There is enough money in the world to address this crisis. It requires government investment, of course. It requires electing politicians who are committed to climate solutions, and not afraid to hold corporations accountable. (Also, end Citizens United!) It requires an end to the wild speculative investments in AI. (Your data center resistance is working, don’t stop!). It requires the mega rich to stop hoarding and buying mega yachts. Right now, globally, only 2% of philanthropic funding goes to climate — in the U.S, only 0.5%. (Tax the rich!) We can fund the revolution and the transformation. no lnx

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USNWR

Unsubstantiated 'Chemtrail' Conspiracy Theories Lead to Legislation Proposed in US Statehouses

State legislatures are passing bills to ban weather modification and geoengineering based on decades-old “chemtrails” conspiracy theories, moving the fringe theory from online into actual public policy

By Associated Press

June 8, 2025,

](https://www.usnews.com/)

Unsubstantiated 'Chemtrail' Conspiracy Theories Lead to Legislation Proposed in US Statehouses

Jeff Chiu

FILE - A plane flies over Oakland Alameda Coliseum in Oakland, Calif., April 30, 2024. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu, File)

BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — As Louisiana Rep. Kimberly Landry Coates stood before her colleagues in the state’s Legislature she warned that the bill she was presenting might “seem strange” or even crazy.

Some lawmakers laughed with disbelief and others listened intently, as Coates described situations that are often noted in discussions of “chemtrails” — a decades-old conspiracy theory that posits the white lines left behind by aircraft in the sky are releasing chemicals for any number of reasons, some of them nefarious. As she urged lawmakers to ban the unsubstantiated practice, she told skeptics to “start looking up” at the sky.

“I’m really worried about what is going on above us and what is happening, and we as Louisiana citizens did not give anyone the right to do this above us,” the Republican said.

Louisiana is the latest state taking inspiration from a wide-ranging conspiratorial narrative, mixing it with facts, to create legislation. Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee signed a similar measure into law last year and one in Florida has passed both the House and the Senate. More than a dozen other states, from New York to Arizona, have introduced their own legislation.

Such bills being crafted is indicative of how misinformation is moving beyond the online world and into public policy. Elevating unsubstantiated theories or outright falsehoods into the legislative arena not only erodes democratic processes, according to experts, it provides credibility where there is none and takes away resources from actual issues that need to be addressed.

“Every bill like this is kind of symbolic, or is introduced to appease a very vocal group, but it can still cause real harm by signaling that these conspiracies deserve this level of legal attention,” said Donnell Probst, interim executive director of the National Association for Media Literacy Education.

Louisiana's bill, which is awaiting Republican Gov. Jeff Landry's signature, prohibits anyone from “intentionally" injecting, releasing, applying or dispersing chemicals into the atmosphere with the purpose of affecting the “temperature, weather, climate, or intensity of sunlight.” It also requires the Department of Environmental Quality to collect reports from anyone who believes they have observed such activities.

While some lawmakers have targeted real weather modification techniques that are not widespread or still in their infancy, others have pointed to dubious evidence to support legislation.

Discussion about weather control and banning “chemtrails” has been hoisted into the spotlight by high-profile political officials, including Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene.

Recently, Marla Maples, the ex-wife of President Donald Trump, spoke in support of Florida's legislation. She said she was motivated to “start digging” after seeing a rise in Alzheimer’s.

Asked jokingly by a Democratic state senator if she knew anyone in the federal government who could help on the issue, Maples smiled and said, “I sure do.”

Chemtrails vs. contrails

Chemtrail conspiracy theories, which have been widely debunked and include a myriad of claims, are not new. The publication of a 1996 Air Force report on the possible future benefits of weather modification is often cited as an early driver of the narrative.

Some say that evidence of the claims is happening right before the publics' eyes, alleging that the white streaks stretching behind aircrafts reveal chemicals being spread in the air, for everything from climate manipulation to mind control.

Ken Leppert, an associate professor of atmospheric science at the University of Louisiana Monroe, said the streaks are actually primarily composed of water and that there is “no malicious intent behind” the thin clouds. He says the streaks are formed as exhaust is emitted from aircrafts, when the humidity is high and air temperature is low, and that ship engines produce the same phenomenon.

A fact sheet about contrails, published by multiple government agencies including NASA and the Environmental Protection Agency, explains that the streaks left behind by planes do not pose health risks to humans. However, the trails, which have been produced since the earliest days of jet aviation, do impact the cloudiness of Earth’s atmosphere and can therefore affect atmospheric temperature and climate.

Scientists have overwhelmingly agreed that data or evidence cited as proof of chemtrails “could be explained through other factors, including well-understood physics and chemistry associated with aircraft contrails and atmospheric aerosols,” according to a 2016 survey published in the journal Environmental Research Letters. In the survey of 77 chemists and geochemists, 76 said they were not aware of evidence proving the existence of a secret large-scale atmospheric program.

“It’s pure myth and conspiracy,” Leppert said.

Cloud seeding

While many of the arguments lawmakers have used to support the chemtrails narrative are not based in fact, others misrepresent actual scientific endeavors, such as cloud seeding; a process by which an artificial material — usually silver iodide — is used to induce precipitation or to clear fog.

“It’s maybe really weak control of the weather, but it’s not like we’re going to move this cloud here, move this hurricane here, or anything like that,” Leppert said.

Parker Cardwell, an employee of a California-based cloud seeding company called Rainmaker, testified before lawmakers in Louisiana and asked that an amendment be made to the legislation to avoid impacts to the industry.

The practice is an imprecise undertaking with mixed results that isn’t widely used, especially in Louisiana, which has significant natural rainfall. According to Louisiana's Department of Agriculture and Forestry, a cloud seeding permit or license has never been issued in the state.

Geoengineering

While presenting Louisiana's bill last week, Coates said her research found charts and graphics from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration on spraying the air with heavy metals to reflect sunlight back into space to cool the Earth.

The Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2022 directed the Office of Science and Technology Policy, with support from NOAA, to develop an initial governance framework and research plan related to solar radiation modification, or SRM. A resulting report, which Coates holds up in the House session, focuses on possible future actions and does not reflect decisions that had already been made.

SRM “refers to deliberate, large-scale actions intended to decrease global average surface temperatures by increasing the reflection of sunlight away from the Earth,” according to NOAA. It is a type of geoengineering. Research into the viability of many methods and potential unintended consequences is ongoing, but none have actually been deployed.

Taking focus

In recent years, misinformation and conspiratorial narratives have become more common during the debates and committee testimonies that are a part of Louisiana's lawmaking process.

And while legislators say Louisiana's new bill doesn't really have teeth, opponents say it still takes away time and focus from important work and more pressing topics.

State Rep. Denise Marcelle, a Democrat who opposed Louisiana’s bill, pointed to other issues ailing the state, which has some of the highest incarceration, poverty, crime, and maternal mortality rates.

“I just feel like we owe the people of Louisiana much more than to be talking about things that I don't see and that aren't real,” she said.

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GUK

Political leaders love an empty statement or proclamation, but when Louisiana’s state house of representatives moved against “chemtrails” last week, they were literally seeking to combat something that does not exist.

It was an act of political symbolism that delved deep into the sort of anti-government conspiracy theories that have flourished under Donald Trump and are taking rooting in some US legislative chambers across the US.

Known to less conspiratorially minded as aircraft contrails, or the white vaporous lines streaming out of an airplane’s engines at altitude, chemtrails are a longstanding conspiracy theory.

Believers in chemtrails hold that the aircraft vapor trails that criss-cross skies across the globe every day are deliberately laden with toxins that are using commercial aircraft to spray them on people below, perhaps to enslave them to big pharma, or exert mind control, or sterilize people or even control the weather for nefarious motives.

Despite the outlandishness of the belief and the complete absence of evidence, a 2016 study showed that the idea is held to be “completely true” by 10% of Americans and “somewhat true” by a further 20%-30% of Americans.

At least eight states, including Florida and Tennessee, have now introduced chemtrail-coded legislation to prohibit “geo-engineering” or “weather modification”. Louisiana’s bill, which must pass through the senate before reaching Governor Jeff Landry’s desk, orders the department of environmental quality to record reported chemtrail sightings and pass complaints on to the Louisiana air national guard.

While there are no penalties for violations, the bill calls for further investigation and documentation. Opponents fear it could be used to force airlines to re-route flights, challenge the location of airports and bring legal action against carriers.

The US Environmental Protection Agency states that the plumes of aircraft exhaust vapor are a natural result of flight and pose no risk to weather patterns, while the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa) has publicly denied undertaking or planning any weather modification experiments.

But the theories abound, including that last year’s Hurricane Helene stalled over and devastated parts of western North Carolina as a result of government weather interference that was designed to force North Carolinians off their land and then exploit it for rare earth mineral mining. Federal emergency managers set up a webpage to dispel false information.

But government weather programs have existed in the past.

For two decades, from 1962 to 1983, Project Stormfury conducted experiments to release a silver iodide compound into “the belt of maximum winds” to reduce the strongest winds. And cloud-seeding occurs in western states to induce rain or snow fall.

“It’s increasingly clear that humanity isn’t merely subjected to whatever weather a cloud portends – we also create and influence it through our everyday actions,” says Nevada’s Desert Research Institute. “Scientists now regularly harness their moisture and pull it to Earth, bringing water to parched communities and landscapes around the world.”

Nor has the government always been entirely straightforward in its use of aerial-dispersed chemicals. The US military dropped 19m gallons of herbicide, including the cancer-linked Agent Orange, during the Korean and Vietnam wars, leading to potential long-term health problems related to exposure and spina bifida in children of veterans.

Efforts to stop geo-engineering are gaining support in the administration where conspiracy-minded politicians now hold office or wield powerful influence.

“We are going to stop this crime,” the health secretary, Robert F Kennedy Jr, posted on X in August. Georgia representative Marjorie Taylor Greene said in a post before Hurricane Milton struck in October: “Yes they can control the weather. It’s ridiculous for anyone to lie and say it can’t be done.” Even Donald Trump has spread the conspiracy theory that Joe Biden is dead and has been replaced by a robotic clone.

A recently published book, The Ghosts of Iron Mountain, traces at least some responsibility for current conspiratorial thinking to 1960s radicals, including the 1967 anti-war satire Report from Iron Mountain by Leonard Lewin, written at the suggestion of future Nation editor Victor Navasky, which posed as a leaked government study about the necessity of continuous war for social stability.

In The Ghosts of Iron Mountain, author Phil Tinline traces how a leftwing hoax was adopted by the right, absorbing much of the former’s anxieties about a military-industrial complex and elite control and repurposing it around “the deep state” with its attendant spin-offs in QAnon and militia thinking.

This mischief-making, Tinline writes, acts as a “warning about the consequences that await if you don’t keep an eye on the line between your deep story and how power works, and what the facts support”.

Timothy Tangherlini, a professor at the Berkeley School of Information who studies the circulation of folklore, says the chemtrails conspiracy theory has a potent history because, like all folktales, it begins with a kernel of history truth – programs like Agent Orange – and speaks to potent contemporary fears.

“There are certain things that were sprayed by airplanes that did have a massive impact on the environment and on people’s health,” he says, pointing out that Vietnam veterans had fallen sick and the US was revealed as having exposed them to cancer-causing agents and then covering it up.

“Fast-forward 50 years, there’s a deep suspicion of the government and things that fly,” he said.

Fear of things in the sky was evident in the hysteria late last year in the panic over drones that appeared over New Jersey, close to a nuclear power station and a military arsenal, which prompted a federal investigation that has yet to release its findings.

Tangherlini called the cross-fertilization of theories, whether around chemtrails, vaccination hesitancy or any number of other fringe beliefs that have made their way into the American mainstream via the internet and social media, “the wall of crazy”.

“Jets flying though the air and contrails of condensed water should not in any way be linked to disease, viruses, mind control, but you look at some of the extractions we get from our mining social media, and if it wasn’t real you’d think your code wasn’t working or in hysterics.”

But narratively, Tangherlini pointed out: “It’s a very interesting thing to do – you can create this totalizing threat everywhere you look. What is the strategy for dealing with it? Call the FAA. No, the FAA is in on it. What can we do to protect our health? Well, the doctors and big pharma are in on it. So there is a siege mentality.”

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Former GOP gubernatorial nominee and state Sen. Doug Mastriano (R-Franklin) has introduced legislation seeking to ban conceptual geoengineering techniques he falsely links to the “chemtrail” conspiracy theory.

In a pitch for his bill, Mastriano associated the theoretical techniques aimed at combatting climate change have been falsely associated with the baseless conspiracy theory that some condensation trails, or contrails, left by high-flying aircraft are being used to introduce toxic substances into the atmosphere.

The “Clean Air Preservation Act” would outlaw “solar radiation modification or sunlight reflection methods” in Pennsylvania and impose strict penalties on violators. Sen. Camera Bartolotta (R-Washington) is a cosponsor of the bill.

Joshua Horton, project manager at the Harvard Solar Geoengineering Research Program, told the Capital-Star that research behind solar geoengineering aims to identify ways to mitigate climate change by reflecting sunlight back into space. Solar geoengineering methods are largely conceptual and there is little evidence to suggest these methods would harm the environment or public health.

“To be clear, there is no geoengineering going on. There’s no solar radiation modification going on,” Horton said. “So to the extent that this bill is premised on the belief that it’s happening, it’s just factually incorrect.”

IFrame Content

In a memo in December seeking support for the bill, Mastriano said the “release of unknown, experimental, and potentially hazardous substances into the atmosphere without the consent of the people of Pennsylvania is a clear violation of Article 1, Section 27 of the PA Constitution.” He has previously proposed similar legislation.

Mastriano’s memo also cited a 2023 White House report on potential future solar geoengineering research, falsely claiming it proves the federal government “may conduct solar radiation modification or geoengineering experiments involving the release of air contaminants into the atmosphere, and those activities may occur within the Commonwealth.”

That report “focused on potential research and its governance, not authorizing any deployment or specific activities,” according to Michael Thompson, managing director at the nonprofit Alliance for Just Deliberation on Solar Engineering. “The report explicitly aimed to guide how research could be approached and managed, emphasizing transparency and risk assessment, and to reduce the risk that research is perceived as a step towards inevitable deployment.”

Thompson’s organization seeks to promote “just and inclusive deliberation” on the research and possible future employment of solar geoengineering. He told the Capital-Star that controversy surrounding the theoretical practice is “amplified when state-level discussions wrongly link scientific inquiry into solar geoengineering with debunked ‘chemtrail’ hoaxes.”

“For solar geoengineering, public concern is understandable,” Thompson said. “People rightly want to know what is being researched and would be alarmed by pollutants being added to the skies for nefarious reasons, but that’s just not happening.”

A spokesperson for Mastriano did not respond to requests for comment.

On May 31, Mastriano held a virtual roundtable to rally support for the bill, which is awaiting consideration in the Senate Agriculture & Rural Affairs committee.

Jolie Diane, who runs a website called Zero Geoengineering, called in from California to give a presentation riddled with falsehoods on “weather modification policy and the governance of geoengineering experimentation.”

Diane has a history of lobbying state legislatures to ban solar geoengineering. She does not hold any scientific credentials, despite Mastriano calling her a “leading expert in weather modification.”

During the roundtable, which garnered thousands of views across social media platforms, Mastriano rallied against theoretical methods such as stratospheric aerosol injection.

Horton explained that stratospheric aerosol injection, or SAI, is a conceptual solar geoengineering method that would involve aircraft introducing aerosols into the upper atmosphere to “reflect a small fraction of incoming sunlight back to space.”

“It’s pretty simple technology, but it doesn’t exist yet. It’s been explored almost exclusively through computer models,” he said. “The research tends to show it would produce net benefits globally.”

Mastriano also spoke against cloud seeding, a common practice employed for decades to increase rainfall that would be banned under the bill. A 1967 state law already requires anyone who wants to try cloud seeding to apply for a license from the state Department of Agriculture.

No one has ever applied for this license, nor has the state’s agriculture department ever investigated unauthorized cloud seeding, press secretary Shannon Powers said in an email.

While cloud seeding is not practiced in Pennsylvania, “there are … cloud seeding weather modification activities that have been ongoing for 75 years, and involve putting silver iodide in clouds to enhance rainfall,” Horton said. “A lot of small counties all over the west, and places beyond the U.S., pay for services for pilots to go up there and spray this stuff.”

Mastriano and Diane both alluded to the debunked “chemtrail” conspiracy theory, which alleges that nefarious actors are spraying toxic substances into the atmosphere via contrails created by high-flying aircraft. He claimed that normal contrails should dissipate within minutes, falsely suggesting that if contrails are visible for longer, it’s an indication they are infused with toxic substances.

According to the National Weather Service, contrails form as hot, moist air from an aircraft’s engine mixes with freezing outside air. That moisture condenses and forms a contrail, which can be visible for hours depending on factors like humidity and wind.

“These clouds are not part of a global conspiracy,” Thompson said. “Lawmakers know better than this and should do minimal homework before bringing bills to their legislative bodies.”

Mastriano has a history of sharing “chemtrail” misinformation. In a November 2022 Facebook post, he shared a photo of contrails with the caption, “I have legislation to stop this … Normal contrails dissolve / evaporate within 30-90 seconds.”

“When these bills appear, given there is no active nefarious geoengineering taking place

… one has to assume they are brought forward primarily for political reasons, rather than a misunderstanding of the facts,” Thompson said.

“We worry that these kinds of politically motivated legislative efforts, by fostering confusion and fear, make such nuanced and forward-looking consideration far less possible.”

Similar legislation restricting solar geoengineering has been proposed in more than two dozen states. Tennessee lawmakers passed a law banning the practice last year.

“We are concerned generally that legislation aimed at governing or banning non-existent activities, such as non-existent chemtrails, disempowers and distracts rather than enabling citizens to engage with decisions being made now that will impact them in the future,” Thompson said.

Pennsylvania Capital-Star is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Pennsylvania Capital-Star maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Tim Lambert for questions: info@penncapital-star.com.

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MMA

Right-wing media use a controversial geoengineering program to undermine tried and true climate solutions

Right-wing media are citing a new U.K. geoengineering experiment aimed at cooling the planet to frame other climate change solutions as extreme.

Special ProgramsClimate & Energy

Written by Ilana Berger

Published 05/16/25

On April 22, The Guardian reported that the United Kingdom’s Advanced Research and Invention Agency is set to launch a series of outdoor experiments using “solar radiation management,” or SRM, to “cool the Earth” by redirecting the sun’s heat into space. ARIA has cited the United Nations International Panel on Climate Change’s finding that “the pace and scale of what has been done so far, and current plans, are insufficient to tackle climate change” as the driving force behind these experiments.

Many scientists have criticized geoengineering proposals, saying they fear that investing heavily in such projects would give oil and gas companies a pass to keep polluting and warning that the technology could have severe consequences for biodiversity and human rights.

Right-wing media and conspiracy theorists quickly attacked the new program, calling it “openly evil” and scary while also using the opportunity to generally oppose renewable energy sources and other feasible climate change solutions and amplify misinformation as part of a long-running campaign against transitioning from fossil fuels.

## What we know about ARIA’s geoengineering project

- Solar radiation management refers to a group of geoengineering techniques aiming to redirect the sun’s heat into space, rather than back down to Earth.When too much solar radiation gets absorbed by greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, it causes the Earth to heat up. Scientists have been trying to remove greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide from the atmosphere to ease this heat-trapping effect, but SRM seeks to manage the sun’s rays directly by increasing the reflectivity of clouds, building mirrors in space to shield the Earth and help deflect some radiation from the sun, or thinning out certain types of clouds to allow more radiation to escape into space. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, [10/3/24]

- ARIA has outlined potential approaches to experimenting with various types of SRM, but the program appears to still be in the early stages of planning. ARIA lists the techniques mentioned above as possibilities for “small, controlled, geographically confined outdoor experiments” that “are presented throughout this thesis for constructive feedback.” ARIA, accessed [4/28/25]

- Experts say transitioning away from fossil fuels would combat climate change.In 2023, the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change wrote with “high confidence” that burning fossil fuels at our current rate “will lead to increasing global warming, with the best estimate of reaching 1.5°C in the near term.” The IPCC added: “Every increment of global warming will intensify multiple and concurrent hazards. … Deep, rapid, and sustained reductions in greenhouse gas emissions would lead to a discernible slowdown in global warming.” Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, [3/20/23]

## Right-wing media and conspiracy theorists seized on the story to attack renewable energy and dismiss climate change

- Climate denier Marc Morano claimed on Fox that the “billionaire class” is funding geoengineering because “they want to prove a point, I think, in the end, that global warming is man-made or climate change is man-made. And it’s because governments are injecting these chemicals into the sky.” Earlier in the segment, Jesse Watters Primetime, guest Rachel Campos-Duffy said, “We know green policies are nothing but a Trojan horse — sinister pieces of legislation wrapped up nicely in solar panels and bird- and whale-killing windmills.” Fox News, J*esse Watters Primetime*, [4/25/25; Media Matters, 11/14/22]

- Discussing ARIA’s project on Fox, renewable energy opponent Bjorn Lomborg said that geoengineering could be helpful “if global warming becomes a real problem,” but claimed that other solutions are “not actually fixing climate change right now.”Fox Business, *The Bottom Line*, [4/25/25;Fox News, The Will Cain Show, 4/24/25]

- Right-wing influencer Russell Brand said that he doesn’t “know enough about ecology” to determine whether humans are warming the planet, but “what I can tell you with absolute certainty is that the people who are making the claims that they’re going to help you by dimming the sun are working for Satan.”Twitter/X, [4/24/25]

- Discussing the program on Fox’sGutfeld!,podcaster Michele Tafoya said that “the sun was supposed to be a good thing. I thought the sun was going to solar-power the world.”Fox News, *Gutfeld!*, [4/24/25]

- OnHannity, Fox contributor Joe Concha complained, “We were told that solar panels fight climate change and defuel energy. So, now the plan is to block out the sun so the solar panels don’t get, you know, energy? We’re truly governed by children.”Fox contributor and guest host Jason Chaffetz claimed, “This is where government funding goes.” Concha added that “the whole climate change thing” is “a scam, basically.” Fox News, *Hannity*, [4/24/25]

- Far-right influencer Carl Benjamin (known as Sargon of Akkad) called it “openly evil” to consider “blocking out the sun,” adding that solar panels in England are “a dramatic and just incredible waste of money that future generations will laugh at us for even attempting.” YouTube,[]

- Discussing the ARIA experiment, conspiracy theorist Naomi Wolf claimed that a geoengineering technique called cloud seeding is “causing wildfires to burn hotter in California” and “damaging the ecosystems in Australia.” Twitter/X, [4/28/25, The Atlantic, 9/12/23]

## Right-wing media and conspiracy theorists have long spread misinformation about renewable energy

- Fox News has spread falsehoods about offshore wind for years, such as calling windmills “bird murderers” and “whale murderers,” priming the technology as a target for President Donald Trump.Trump has now paused permitting and leasing for new projects and recently issued a stop-work order for a major offshore wind project in New York that was slated to provide power for 500,000 homes starting in 2026. Media Matters, [2/4/25; The Associated Press, 4/16/25; Fox News, Fox & Friends Weekend, 1/25/25]

- :{:{Fox repeatedly attacked the Inflation Reduction Act — which included a historic $369 billion in climate and energy funding, among other provisions — in the two years after it was signed into law, regularly and falsely branding the policy as the Green New Deal, a proposal the network has spent years demonizing as “totalitarian” and a “takeover.” Media Matters, [8/21/24, 2/25/19, 2/14/19]}:

- Right-wing media attempted to politicize a major power outage that hit Spain, Portugal, and parts of France at the end of April by making it a symbol of the dangers of decarbonization and renewable energy. In the U.S., opponents of renewable energy claimed the power outage exposed the irreconcilable shortcomings of wind, solar, and storage batteries and used it to validate Trump’s hostility toward these technologies and to justify his “drill, baby, drill” agenda of oil and gas expansion. But power outages have also long impacted fossil fuel energy grids, and renewable energy has proved resilient in the face of past extreme weather. Media Matters, [4/30/25]

- Conspiracy theorists have spread debunked claims that geoengineering caused hurricanes and wildfires.Some have claimed that climate-fueled extreme weather events are a result of weather manipulation and not of burning fossil fuels, or falsely conflated atmospheric phenomena such as aircraft contrails with geoengineering efforts. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has clarified that “no technology exists that can create, destroy, modify, strengthen or steer hurricanes in any way, shape or form,” and decried the “large amount of disinformation about nonexistent weather manipulation technology” that is spread online. Media Matters, [10/9/24; CBS News, 1/16/25; CNN, 3/25/25; BBC, 7/3/24; National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, 10/3/24]

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MTG govt controls weather hurric BS

an 1 25

Chemtrail conspiracy theorists sway Republicans to support ban on geoengineering

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pbs nova? 112/20 rerun?

Can Geo-Engineering Fix Earth's Climate? | Full Report ...

Stream Full Episodes: to.pbs.org/2IaW1h3 | #RetroReportPBS. Scientists are worried that soon, simply ...

Nov 11, 2019 · Uploaded by PBS

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https://www.ecowatch.com/climate-study-greenhouse-gas-emissions-2648886531.htm

1120

A controversial new climate study has found that, even if greenhouse gas emissions were halted tomorrow, it might not be enough to stop temperatures from continuing to rise.

The study, published in Scientific Reports Thursday, was conducted by two researchers at the BI Norwegian Business School. They used the ESCIMO climate model to determine that, even if emissions ceased tomorrow, the permafrost would continue to thaw for hundreds of years.

"According to our models, humanity is beyond the point-of-no-return when it comes to halting the melting of permafrost using greenhouse gas cuts as the single tool," lead author and professor emeritus of climate strategy Jorgen Randers told AFP. "If we want to stop this melting process we must do something in addition – for example, suck CO2 out of the atmosphere and store it underground, and make Earth's surface brighter."

However, other scientists have pointed to the simplicity of the model Randers and his colleague Ulrich Goluke used and cautioned against misinterpreting their findings as a reason to give up on climate action.

"This paper clearly may be cited in support of a misleading message that it is now 'too late' to avoid catastrophic climate change, which would have the potential to cause unnecessary despair," University of Exeter climate scientist professor Richard Betts said in response. "However, the study is nowhere near strong enough to make such a frightening message credible."

So what exactly does the study say? The researchers used their model to see what would happen by 2500 if emissions stopped today and if they slowly declined to zero by 2100, as AFP explained. In the first scenario, temperatures would still rise to around 2.3 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels within the next 50 years, taper off, then rise again starting in 2150. By 2500, the world would be around three degrees Celsius warmer and sea levels would rise by around three meters (approximately 9.8 feet). In the second, temperature and sea level rise would end up in the same place, but the temperature increase would be much faster.

The reason for the persistent increase comes from three feedback loops, the model found.

The melting of sea ice, which means that the sun's heat is absorbed into the darker ocean instead of reflected back by the bright ice.
The thawing of permafrost, which releases more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.
Increased moisture in the atmosphere, which in turn raises temperatures.

The only way to have prevented runaway climate change would have been to have stopped burning fossil fuels between 1960 and 1970, the model found, as USA TODAY reported. In order to stop temperatures and sea levels from rising now, we would have to remove at least 33 gigatons of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere every year starting this one.

The study authors were the first to admit their findings were limited to one model.

"We encourage other model builders to explore our discovery in their (bigger) models, and report on their findings," they wrote.

However, Betts noted that their model was not the model used by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and did not realistically simulate how the climate works.

Penn State University meteorologist Michael Mann agreed. He told USA TODAY that it was not very complex and did not accurately reproduce atmospheric and ocean circulation systems.

"While such models can be useful for conceptual inferences, their predictions have to be taken with great skepticism. Far more realistic climate models that do resolve the large-scale dynamics of the ocean, atmosphere and carbon cycle, do NOT produce the dramatic changes these authors argue for based on their very simplified model," he said. "It must be taken not just with a grain of salt, but a whole salt-shaker worth of salt."

That said, even the models used by the IPCC show that we will need to draw down carbon dioxide from the atmosphere to reach the Paris agreement goal of limiting warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, even if we achieve zero emissions by 2050.

"What the study does draw attention to is that reducing global carbon emissions to zero by 2050 is just the start of our actions to deal with climate change," University College London climate professor Mark Maslin said in response.

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ucsc 10/19

sikina jinnah

"hidden politics" of climate engineering were partially revealed earlier this year at the fourth United Nations Environment Assembly (UNEA-4), when Switzerland proposed a resolution on geoengineering governance. The ensuing debate offered a glimpse of the first discussion in a public forum of this "third rail" of climate change, according to Sikina Jinnah, an associate professor of environmental studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and an expert on climate engineering governance.

In a commentary that appears in the current issue of Nature Geoscience, Jinnah and coauthor Simon Nicholson of American University describe the politics and players who appear to be shaping the discussion. Their analysis, "The Hidden Politics of Climate Engineering," concludes with a call for transparency to help resolve questions of governance and "ensure that the world has the tools to manage these potent technologies and practices if and when decisions are ever taken to use them."

sorta? 1st foray?

Indonesia Seeds Clouds After Flooding Kills 43

CLIMATE CRISIS

After nearly 15 inches of rain fell in one day and caused flash floods and landslides in Jakarta, the Indonesian capital, that destroyed 60,000 homes and killed at least 43 people, the Indonesian Air Force sent two planes to drop salt on approaching rain clouds to break them up before they reached the city, according to Reuters:{:{.}::{}:

etcgroup.org?

geo-engr monitor (vs watch bogus)

https://kpfa.org/episode/terra-verde-november-1-2019/

geoengineering 101: An Introduction to a Dangerous Techno-Distraction

An interview with program and research staff from the ETC Group regarding current dynamics around the surreptitious push by the fossil fuel industry and their political allies to advance geoengineering technologies under the guise of climate action.

swiss conf 1019

jinnah uscsc uber1

https://webbrain.com/brainpage/brain/6950F840-FB80-FCB0-D505-8AB1FA685F08

919 desmog UK

BS delay tactic

2019, I think it's safe to say that humans are capable of wreaking great and terrible changes upon Earth's systems. To name a few: acid rain, deforestation, and climate change. Reversing such problems is, on its face, quite simple. Stop releasing smog-forming pollution. Stop cutting down forests. Stop burning fossil fuels.

In some cases, humanity has risen to these challenges, and for example, greatly reduced acid rain in North America since the 1970s, 80s, and 90s. But when it comes to climate change, there's a growing chorus, often bolstered by the fossil fuel industry, who support a controversial set of approaches to mitigating global warming, not by directly addressing the primary source of the problem — continuing to combust great volumes of oil, gas, and coal — but by further inducing massive changes to planetary systems.

I'm talking about geoengineering, and specifically solar geoengineering, which seeks to lessen global warming's greenhouse effect by reflecting sunlight, and heat, back out to space.

https://www.ecowatch.com/outlandish-ideas-to-cool-planet-2548497056.html

http://desmogblog.com/2013/08/20/geoengineering-silver-bullet-climate-change david suzuki

m specter

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2012/05/14/the-climate-fixers

The Central Intelligence Agency is funding a scientific study that will investigate whether humans could use geoengineering to alter Earth’s environment and stop climate change. The National Academy of Sciences will run the 21-month project, which is the first NAS geoengineering study financially supported by an intelligence agency. With the spooks’ money, scientists will study how humans might influence weather patterns, assess the potential dangers of messing with the climate, and investigate possible national security implications of geoengineering attempts.

The total cost of the project is $630,000, which NAS is splitting with the CIA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and NASA. The NAS website says that “the U.S. intelligence community” is funding the project, and William Kearney, a spokesperson for NAS, told Mother Jones that phrase refers to the CIA. Edward Price, a spokesperson for the CIA, refused to confirm the agency’s role in the study, but said, “It’s natural that on a subject like climate change the Agency would work with scientists to better understand the phenomenon and its implications on national security.” The CIA reportedly closed its research center on climate change and national security last year, after GOP members of Congress argued that the CIA shouldn’t be looking at climate change.

The goal of the CIA-backed NAS study is to conduct a “technical evaluation of a limited number of proposed geoengineering techniques,” according to the NAS website. Scientists will attempt to determine which geoengineering techniques are feasible and try to evaluate the impacts and risks of each (including “national security concerns”). One proposed geoengineering method the study will look at is solar radiation management — a fancy term for pumping particles into the stratosphere to reflect incoming sunlight away from the planet. In theory, solar radiation management could lead to a global cooling trend that might reverse, or at least slow down, global warming. The study will also investigate proposals for removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

The NAS has held two previous workshops on geoengineering, but neither was funded by the intelligence community, says Edward Dunlea, the study director for the latest project. The CIA would not say why it had decided to fund the project at this time, but the U.S. government’s apparent interest in altering the climate isn’t new. The first big use of weather modification as a military tactic came during the Vietnam War, when the Air Force engaged in a cloud seeding program to try to create rainfall and turn the Ho Chi Minh Trail into muck, and thereby gain tactical advantage. Between 1962 and 1983, other would-be weather engineers tried to change the behavior of hurricanes using silver iodide. That effort, dubbed Project STORMFURY [PDF], was spearheaded by the Navy and the Commerce Department. China’s “Weather Modification Office” also controversially seeded clouds in advance of the 2008 Beijing Olympics, hoping to ensure rain would fall in the Beijing suburbs instead of over the Olympic stadiums.

Although previous efforts to manipulate weather and climate have often been met with mockery, many geoengineering proposals “are fundamentally doable, relatively cheap, and do appear to be able to reduce climate risk significantly, but with risks,” explains David Keith, a Harvard researcher and top geoengineering proponent.

But if geoengineering is cheap and “fundamentally doable,” as Keith claims, that suggests foreign countries, or even wealthy individuals, could mess with the climate to advance their own ends. “This whole issue of lone actors: Do we need to be concerned about China acting unilaterally? Is that just idle chatter, or is that something the U.S. government should prepare for?” asks Ken Caldeira, a geoengineering researcher at the Carnegie Institution’s Department of Global Ecology and a member of the current National Academy of Sciences panel.

At least one individual has already tried modifying the climate. Russ George, the former head of Planktos, a company that works to develop technology to deal with global warming, seeded the Pacific Ocean off western Canada with iron to generate a plankton bloom that, in turn, was supposed to suck up carbon dioxide from the air. George’s effort was widely condemned, but at present there’s little to stop other individuals or countries from trying it or something similar. That’s part of what has the U.S. intelligence community interested.

The CIA’s decision to fund scientific work on geoengineering will no doubt excite conspiracy theorists. The last time the government tried to do cutting-edge research related to the atmosphere — with theHigh Frequency Active Auroral Research Program, which aimed to protect satellites from nuclear blasts — people speculated that it might be a death ray, a mind control weapon, or, worst of all … a way to control the weather.