This is in part due to the fact that regulating pollutants put out by cargo ships (who in the past used the cheapest, dirtiest fuels) has led to a decrease in clouds known as ‘ship tracks’. These are real clouds seeded by pollutants from cargo ship emissions, and now that we’ve cut down on their dirty, toxic emissions (which is a good thing!), we’ve also cut down on those ship track clouds that were helping keep light and heat from hitting the ocean and warming it up.
We’ve been geo-engineering with carbon emissions, we were unknowingly geo-engineering by seeding clouds with cargo ships, and now we need to figure out how to engineer our way out of this mess. Generating clouds with inert seed material like salt from the ocean might be part of that solution.
This is in part due to the fact that regulating pollutants put out by cargo ships (who in the past used the cheapest, dirtiest fuels) has led to a decrease in clouds known as ‘ship tracks’. These are real clouds seeded by pollutants from cargo ship emissions, and now that we’ve cut down on their dirty, toxic emissions (which is a good thing!), we’ve also cut down on those ship track clouds that were helping keep light and heat from hitting the ocean and warming it up.
We’ve been geo-engineering with carbon emissions, we were unknowingly geo-engineering by seeding clouds with cargo ships, and now we need to figure out how to engineer our way out of this mess. Generating clouds with inert seed material like salt from the ocean might be part of that solution.
Links for anyone interested: https://www.science.org/content/article/changing-clouds-unforeseen-test-geoengineering-fueling-record-ocean-warmth
https://youtu.be/dk8pwE3IByg