The risky science of geoengineering, and other stories
Welcome to Ramin’s Space, the newsletter from science writer and editor Ramin Skibba. You can read more about the newsletter here. If you like it, please consider subscribing and sharing this post.
First, I want to share some good news: I just won some awards from the San Francisco Press Club! My WIRED piece on the light pollution of satellites won in the environmental reporting category, and my WIRED coverage of SpaceX’s Starship won in the breaking news category. My Undark piece about researchers and humanitarian groups tracking the devastation in Gaza was runner-up in the investigative reporting category.
Science is political, as Sabrina Imbler writes in Defector, and that’s as true today as it ever was. Back in 2020, I was glad to see Laura Helmuth tapped as editor in chief of Scientific American, as she’s a leader of the science journalism community (and a former president of the National Association of Science Writers), and I’m disappointed seeing her pressured to step down in November. Helmuth played a major role in Sci Am’s only two presidential endorsements, of Biden and Harris, since the magazine’s founding nearly 180 years ago. It was unwise of her to post frustrated comments on Bluesky about Trump supporters immediately after the election, calling them “mean,” “dumb,” and “fucking fascist,” but those were clearly her own opinions, and journalists are allowed to have opinions. Then Elon Musk drew attention to those posts, ramping up the pressure campaign against her. No one should be ousted from their job just because of a couple ill-advised posts on social media.
Science journalists have an important job today, especially during this continuing Trump era. Over the next four years, journalists will need to watch for climate denialism and efforts to water down climate policies that are already insufficient to reach Paris Agreement targets. We’ve seen how Trump’s nominees to lead the Energy and Interior Departments have close ties to the fossil fuel industry, and the EPA nominee is an ally of the industry as well. Trump’s public health policies should draw scrutiny as well, especially after 1.2 million American have died of COVID, and when mpox and bird flu are spreading. Science journalists could and should weigh in on a wide range of issues, including famine and health crises in Gaza and Sudan, risks to nuclear power plants in Ukraine, and even presidential pardons, considering the inhumanity of the death penalty and the thousands of people in prison over cannabis offenses in the US, for example. Trust in the news media remains low, but it’s critical that journalists continue their watchdog role.
Geoengineering Could Alter Global Climate. Should It?
Many researchers and a couple companies today advocate for solar geoengineering, schemes designed to alter the world’s climate and reflecting some sunlight to counteract the worsening effects of global warming. Earlier this year, one such experiment was started and then canceled here in the Bay Area, near where I live. Geoengineering was once anathema to scientists and environmentalists, but it has gained support and now divides these communities.
Read all about these people and issues in my latest feature for Undark. It’s part of a new series on risky science published by the magazine, and I recommend checking out the whole package.
Finally, come follow me on Bluesky! I’m still on Twitter/X, but looks like Bluesky seems to be less profit-driven and less tethered to a single billionaire (Jack Dorsey left the company earlier this year), and it’s growing faster than I thought it would. But we’ll see. No one should trust tech companies.
In other writing…
AI Scams Are the Point, by Edward Ongweso Jr. in The New Republic
The Seventy Percent, a Harper’s magazine essay by Yiyun Li that surprisingly resonated with me, about minor characters, human possibility, and War and Peace. Personally, if I were editing it, I’d be tempted to cut the last section, but it does clarify her argument. I also recommend The Painted Protest, a piece by Dean Kissick in the same magazine.
Death in Nogales, an essay by S. C. Cornell in the New York Review of Books about the dehumanization of immigrants at the US-Mexico border. Also in the NYRB, I recommend Where Will We Live? by Bill McKibben about human and wildlife climate migration.
You Had to Be There, by Zöe Hu in The Baffler, about war correspondents and the Civil War movie
The Lizard King of Long Island, by Ben Goldfarb in the New Yorker
Can 70 Moms Save a Species?, about endangered North Atlantic right whales, by Catrin Einhorn in the New York Times
When a Telescope is a National-Security Risk, a piece about the new Vera Rubin Observatory in Chile, by Ross Andersen in The Atlantic
Does Space Need Environmentalists? by Nathaniel Scharping in Noema magazine
Gift Thinking, by Robin Wall Kimmerer and Jenny Odell in Orion magazine
Hakai Magazine is joining bioGraphic, an environmental and biodiversity-focused magazine published by the California Academy of Sciences. They need funding, so please support them as they make this transition.
What I’m reading: Study for Obedience, by Sarah Bernstein
Looking back: Three years ago, I write this short feature for Nautilus magazine about marine archaeologists from Puerto Rico and elsewhere trying to save coastal cultural heritage from the ravages of climate change.
More about me: I’m a science writer and journalist based in the Bay Area. I was WIRED magazine’s space writer until December 2023, and before that I worked as a freelance writer and an astrophysicist. You can find me at my website, raminskibba.net, and on Twitter and Bluesky. I’m also former president of the San Diego Science Writers Association (SANDSWA) and on the board of the National Association of Science Writers (NASW), though the opinions I express are mine alone. If someone has forwarded this email to you, you’re welcome to subscribe too.
Congratulations, Ramin, on your recent awards!