Prudence alone should lead you to ask the scientific
establishment to study new, less costly methods of dealing with
a global problem—the possibility of climate change. It is time
to require more inventive thinking on this issue. In his recent
letter to you, William Calvin pointed out that shifting ocean
currents could trigger big shifts in weather. Rather than fixate
on controlling greenhouse gases, which are politically hard to
suppress, I suggest a new, innovative research program directed
at the central global problem: warming. A partial cure can come
from simple methods, until now little studied. 1) Increase the
overall reflection of sunlight from the planet as a whole. Here
simple methods may work well. Trigger more cloud cover over the
tropical oceans. Color rooftops and blacktop roads lighter, to
lessen absorption. These ideas are fairly simple, and some field
work on them has been done. They do need study to make them
efficient and effective. 2) Hide carbon in the deep oceans. This
keeps it from maki