Depressing Study Shows a Big Issue With Using Cloud Seeding to Solve Global Warming - ScienceAlert

"Hence, elevated greenhouse gas concentrations may trigger substantial global warming by reducing the cooling effect stratocumulus clouds provide," the authors of the new study write, "even when all or much of the effect of greenhouse gas at the top of the atmosphere is compensated by solar geoengineering." .

Today, stratocumulus clouds cover huge swathes of the subtropical ocean, and recent evidence suggests they are responsible for reflecting about 5 degrees Celsius of global warming back out into space.

Even under modest warming scenarios, the results show subtropical stratocumulus clouds gradually thin out and break apart.

"Solar geoengineering is not a fail-safe option to prevent global warming," the authors conclude, "because it does not mitigate risks to the climate system that arise from direct effects of greenhouse gases on cloud cover."

But while growing research has tied increased greenhouse gas emissions to a potential tipping point of thinning cloud cover that's often overlooked in climate models, it's still not clear at what concentration those clouds begin to thin or how that impacts their light-reflecting abilities.