War game of solar geoengineering talks ends in mistrust between US and China

Left · 2A first-of-its-kind war game, titled Exploring Geopolitical Tipping Points and Climate Cooling Strategies, brought a couple dozen foreign-relations experts, scientists, military personnel and former government officials to Queen Mary University of London to test how the world might respond to solar geoengineering. 1 2 Left · 2Participants played national governments, climate NGOs, indigenous groups and tech companies. The scenario was a hastily convened UN committee, and it ran over three simulated meetings: the present, September 2027 and September 2028. The scenario was arranged by Danielle Young, an assistant professor in international relations at Leeds University. 1 2 Left · 2The technologies at issue, known as solar radiation modification, would reflect sunlight away from Earth, for example by spraying sulphur dioxide into the atmosphere. The article says the cooling effect is widely accepted, but that models predict drying in sub-Saharan Africa and more intense Atlantic tropical storms. It also says temperatures could rebound sharply if the intervention stopped. 1 2

Left · 2The reporting presents the game as a response to fast-moving real-world interest. It notes that the US-Israeli startup Stardust Solutions raised $60 million last year, and that Elon Musk wrote on X in August that massive geo-engineering "will be needed or it will be game over." Cynthia Scharf, a former UN advisor, said governance decisions are due "in the next decade, easily." 1 2 Left · 2In the first session, the US and China players each said they could not sign a deal that constrained research in their "national interest" or let the rival take the technological lead. Jeffrey Nielsen, a US Army major who played a US national security attaché, summarised the position as "worse than no deal at all is any deal that favors China." 1 2 Left · 2Tensions rose when organisers gave the Russian delegates an "intelligence report" about a plane near the Bering Strait believed to be part of a US research programme. The US team, which was flying research missions, accused Russia of disinformation. The US also became convinced that China was running its own programme, after Beijing's representatives sought language shielding past experiments from retroactive punishment. 1 2

Left · 2When China floated a technology-sharing idea to the player representing SpaceX, that player reported it to the US team at once. The US demanded an international investigation, and countries abandoned the talks. The Canadian representative called it a "humiliating defeat." 1 2 Left · 1Nielsen called the outcome a "humungous victory" for the Americans within the game. Young, who designed the scenario, said China was not in fact conducting experiments, and that mutual suspicion left every party believing the others were racing to build capability. 1 Left · 2Nielsen said the session reflected "the likelihood, in my opinion, of the geoengineering arms race," and spoke in a private capacity, not for the US government. A former British diplomat who was not in the game said the fear of falling behind drives research but "is not at all the same thing as deployment." The diplomat added that it is "not an inherently zero-sum game." 1 2

Left · 1Scharf, who played the US government alongside Nielsen, said a "scientifically transparent international collaboration" between China and the US might be the best available option. She said she could not imagine it happening under the Trump administration. 1 Left · 2Colleen Golja, the climate researcher assigned to give technical advice, said she was largely ignored. Her prepared "emulator" of regional weather effects went unused, and she said she was surprised "how little anyone actually cared about the science." Frequent notifications of climate disasters barely registered with participants. Late in the game, a simulated aerosol plume from a joint US-Saudi test of Stardust's technology made scientific advice urgently needed. 1 2