We are getting better at predicting the weather.

Modern 72-hour predictions of hurricane tracks are more accurate than 24-hour forecasts were 40 years ago, giving sufficient time for evacuations and other preparations that save lives and property. Similar improvements in forecasting tropical cyclone tracks have been achieved by other leading agencies worldwide. (ref)

But why should we care? Well… this improved accuracy is valuable!

Investment in weather forecasting pays large dividends, ranging from 3 to 10 times the costs. A 2009 study, for example, found that the value of weather forecasts to U.S. households is US 31.5 billion, from public expenditures of just US 3.4 billion and private expenditures of US 1.7 billion. (ref)

This shouldn’t be surprising, at least in hindsight. Knowledge of an incoming hurricane can allow us to evacuate thousands of people before it arrives, or to preemptively send aid. Knowledge of a likely drought means water can be rationed or even bought and delivered. Saving crops and people.

I see this research as a step towards “measuring the world”. Currently we are considering the weather. But we could also measure and predict ecosystems! Populations and locations of different species of birds, of coral, of native flora, …

Combining these dataset we might be able to answer questions such as;

  • will the likely flood effect a population of flora?
  • will the likely heat wave effect the reproductive cycle of crops?
  • will the likely change in ocean currents change whale migration?

Causal attribution

A next step would be to go from correlation to causation! I am imagining statements such as;

@Climate_Canary Yesterday’s flood in Kerala is estimated to be 3 times more likely given the extra CO2 in the atmosphere.

@Weather_Whistle The hurricane that passed through Cuba would have been 45% less likely to occur if we hadn’t released 100 ppm of CO2 into the atmosphere.

I am imagining an algorithm that simulates weather with and without the CO2 released into the atmosphere by humans in the last 100 years. Using these simulations it should be possible to estimate (with a few caveats) how much more likely it is that (say) a flood occurs in India, that a hurricane hits the Caribbean, … etc.

Happily, this could also give us the ability to fairly quantify the damage being done by climate change. If we know that the release of CO2 is 40% of the sufficient cause of the flood and that the flood did 2 billion in damage, then the cost of that CO2, just in this case, was -0.8 billion.

Engineering

The final step in our understanding. Going from observation to control! I would define engineering as;

taking scientific knowledge and wielding it for a purpose.

What if we wanted;

  • to stop the incoming hurricane?
  • the water laden clouds to dump their water (see this for a recent example)?
  • to eradicate malaria?
  • a consistent source of wind power?
  • to protect an endangered species?
  • to redirect a current to protect a reef from acidity?

In theory these are possible, but there are many complications. The two main ones I can think of are safety and ownership.

Safe engineering

Engineering is often accompanied by a set of accepted rules. Whether it is civil engineering with a set of standards for constructing earthquake resistant buildings, or electrical engineers that follow guidelines to ensure people are not killed from electrical shocks or fires …

These rules are used to keep people safe and to protect the things we care about. Climate engineering would need a similar set of rules and regulations.

We would want the ability to;

  • predict the likely effect of an intervention (allowing us to rule out many types of intervention from the start),
  • assign credit if someone does effect negatively a natural habitat (and accurately value the damage done).

Ownership

Who owns the rights to rain or wind or sunlight or currents …?!? What are the different ways it could be allocated?

  • proportional to land ownership (gifted)
  • to those with the incentive / ability to exploit the resource (e.g. via auction)
  • give the rights to those who ‘deserve’ it (the equivalent of a beauty contest…)
  • ???

I can imagine this being quite a nasty affair. These resources are potentially worth trillions. And we have already seen this, countries claim ownership of rivers and cut off their neighbors supply of clean / fresh water.

I can imagine an exciting future of environmental engineering! But first, we need to master measuring the world.