Filling the Skies with Sulfur

A scientist named Paul Crutzen from the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry, in Germany, suggests filling the stratosphere with excess sulfur, in the form of sulfate, in an attempt to stop global warming. Sulfur gas blocks the sun's rays and theoretically would have a cooling effect. His method for doing this would be to fire artillery shells filled with the element and dropping sulfur from high altitude balloons. Large natural deposits of sulfur mainly occur when volcanoes erupt, like the situation of the Philippines' Mount Pinatubo's 1991 eruption, which cooled the earth's temperature by .9 degrees Celsius. Other scientists have reached the same conclusion- that drastically altering the Earth's current natural state is the way to counteract global warming. Unfortunately, like any change, it has negative aspects as well. Too much sulfur could potentially damage the ozone layer and whiten the sky, and such a treatment would cost between twenty-five and fifty billion US dollars.

stratosphere- the upper layer of the atmosphere

Sulfur always makes me think of a rotten egg smell, so the idea of adding excess sulfur to the atmosphere seems like it would make our air smell really bad. I also thought that sulfur is a component of acid rain, so having more sulfur than usual might make acid rain happen. It seems to me that overall, the idea needs to be thought out a lot more before time, money, and the environment is irreparably committed to it.

Kate Ravilious, "Extreme Global Warming Fix: Fill The Skies With Sulfur," National Geographic Magazine, August 4, 2006. http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/08/060804-global-warming.html (Accessed November 5, 2007.)