Costly and controversial, yes. But we may be running out of choices.
“We’re getting much more attention because of how dire thing are,” says inventor and engineer Leslie Field, founder of Ice911, a nonprofit exploring arctic ice restoration who featured prominently at the climate restoration conference and in the strategic report organizers released.
“The ice melting is a critical game changer that we need to stop as fast as possible,” says Rick Parnell, CEO of the Foundation for Climate Restoration, the organization behind the forum at the UN. One 2018 report concluded that geoengineering polar glaciers would slow sea level rise and buy significant extra time to tackle climate change. “Stopping arctic melt is key,” Field says. “This shouldn’t be an afterthought.”