大象传媒

At a recent press conference on the new US budget questions were asked about funding for climate change initiatives. The answer was stark. 鈥淲e鈥檙e not spending money on that anymore,鈥� reporters were told, they鈥檙e a 鈥渨aste of your money鈥�. The new administration is sceptical about man-made climate change. Most of the world鈥檚 scientists and governments, however, are not. The Paris Agreement committed the world to prevent global temperatures from rising more than two degrees over pre-industrial levels. That target looked close to impossible even before the election of Donald Trump. So 鈥� our question this week 鈥� do we need a 鈥榩lan B鈥�? Scientists have been developing some very ambitious ideas to re-engineer our climate. They have created materials that could suck carbon dioxide out of the air and a scheme to pump reflective particles into the atmosphere. But 鈥� if 鈥榩lan A鈥� fails 鈥� might any of these last-ditch ideas actually work?

(Photo: The smoke stacks at American Electric Power's Mountaineer coal power plant in New Haven, West Virginia. Credit: Getty Images)