Climate Change Geoengineering: Philosophical Perspectives, Legal Issues, and Governance Frameworks

Cambridge University Press, 7/22/2013
EAN 9781107023932, ISBN10: 1107023939

Hardcover, 328 pages, 22.9 x 15.2 x 1.9 cm
Language: English

The international community is not taking the action necessary to avert dangerous increases in greenhouse gases. Facing a potentially bleak future, the question that confronts humanity is whether the best of bad alternatives may be to counter global warming through human-engineered climate interventions. In this book, eleven prominent authorities on climate change consider the legal, policy and philosophical issues presented by geoengineering. The book asks: when, if ever, are decisions to embark on potentially risky climate modification projects justified? If such decisions can be justified, in a world without a central governing authority, who should authorize such projects and by what moral and legal right? If states or private actors undertake geoengineering ventures absent the blessing of the international community, what recourse do the rest of us have?

Part I. Ethics and Philosophy
1. Ethics, geoengineering and moral schizophrenia
what's the question? Stephen M. Gardiner
2. The ethical foundations of climate engineering Clive Hamilton
3. The psychological costs of geoengineering
why it may be hard to accept even if it works Gareth Davies
Part II. Law and Governance
4. Geoengineering and climate management
from marginality to inevitability Jay Michaelson
5. Climate engineering and the anthropocene era Lee Lane
6. Political legitimacy in decisions about experiments in solar radiation management David R. Morrow, Robert E. Kopp and Michael Oppenheimer
7. Geoengineering and the myth of unilateralism
pressures and prospects for international cooperation Joshua B. Horton
8. International legal regimes and principles relevant to geoengineering Albert C. Lin
9. Climate geoengineering
solar radiation management and its implications for intergenerational equity William C. G. Burns
10. Ocean iron fertilization
science, law, and uncertainty Randall S. Abate
11. Ocean iron fertilization
time to lift the research taboo Kerstin Güssow, Andreas Oschlies, Alexander Proelss, Katrin Rehdanz and Wilfried Rickels
12. Remaking the world to save it
applying US environmental laws to climate engineering projects Tracy Hester.