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• Brad Arnold – September 28 2007

  It is very unlikely that mankind will cut their greenhouse gas emissions so drastically, and so fast, as to avoid either abrupt climate change or runaway global warming. The energy infrastructure in place now is enough to put us past the tipping point-what are we going to do dismantle it?
  
  Instead, I suggest removing the excess carbon from the air using a low cost method called "biosequestration."
  
  I advocate the technically feasible and highly scalable method of seeding a GMO into the ocean.
  
  Mr Doerr is obviously correct, a rapidly growing population recklessly expanding economically is going to increase their emissions, not severely decrease them. Furthermore, soon carbon sinks will become carbon emitters bigtime on this warming planet. Finally, the rapid temperature rise is going to quickly destroy some ecosystems that now remove carbon from the air.
  
  There is a Stark Choice: either risk unexpected consequences by seeding an extensively tested GMO into the environment, or the certain return to the hothouse of 55 million years ago that killed most life.
  
  I have written many articles on this subject. Feedback loops are going to speed up climate change much faster than the IPCC has predicted. Furthermore, since all the oil and natural gas that is recovered is burned immediately, what are the odds that massive amounts of coal won't be burned too (coal is 1/6th the cost of either oil or natural gas, and is a stable domestic source of energy).