Benefits

This project brings many benefits, both to the global climate, and also to the local communities and regions where schemes are implemented.

Global Benefits

• Rapid impact on climate This project does not depend on reducing greenhouse gas emissions, which will take decades to have a significant effect. As soon as clouds are formed, they will start having a cooling effect. Regional cooling impacts will be measurable within 15 years.
• Low risk, low cost. The project involves much less risk, pollution and spending than would be required by other suggested global cooling / geo-engineering strategies.
• Easy to adopt, uncontroversial. As this involves working with water, soil and clouds, cooling impacts do not depend on political agreements about CO₂ emissions, or getting large numbers of people to change their energy consumption patterns.
• Gives us more time to adapt. The project will not solve the problem of global warming, but it can delay the effects by 10 years. Reducing our greenhouse gas emissions is still something we will need to pursue vigorously, but this project will buy us more time, and ease our transition to a low-carbon economy.

Local and Regional Benefits

In addition to the global benefits, there will be numerous local and regional benefits. The exact benefits will be location dependent. In Africa, the benefits will include:

• Increased rainfall
• Better water supply
• Longer growing season
• Improved agriculture and forestry
• Reduced soil erosion
• Reduced frequency of floods
• Reduction in maximum temperatures
• Reduced desertification
• Increased biodiversity
• Improved human well-being and food security
• Local employment creation and project control
• Low cost, simple and quick to implement
• Local benefits are measurable within 2 years

What are the downsides?

Whenever there is a change in the local climate, there will be some positive and some negative effects. For instance, in some areas, there may be an increase in mosquitos. Any possible negative consequences will be assessed and quantified in relation to the specific locations chosen for implementation.

Further information

• Read an overview of the project.
• Read more detail about the phases of the project.
• Read more about the science behind the project.
• Support the project with a donation.