It seems to be a lose-lose situation. Leave the pollution in and accelerate climate change or take it out and cause rapid ocean heating.
The article indicates that the ship pollution does increase reflective cloud cover, but also exceeds the clouds saturation point. So excess pollution past this point does not continue to increase cloud reflection and would be a negative. It doesn’t really indicate where that tipping point is. But I’d read that as less pollution is still the better overall choice. They also indicated the same effect could be achieved with non pollution methods. Again suggesting less pollution is probably still the better option.
The article also doesn’t really indicate if this pollution cloud cover is net positive over the CO2 emissions of said ships. Certainly interesting regardless.
I’m a layperson so I may be reading it wrong but that was my takeaway.
Past the tipping point. Could we make non-pollution clouds?
That’s actually the notion raised in the article. This negative outcome of our actions helps us understand our ability to very directly influence a key result. We now know we can brighten clouds on a scale that can rapidly mitigate temperature increases.
It’s not ideal, as it is adding more pollution, but it’s something. Kind of like hiding under the dead bodies for shelter.
