Any geo-engineering project would necessarily be enormous, and would therefore cause plenty of disruption to ecosystems.
For this reason, if geo-engineering is to be done properly, it must be regulated properly.
There are no international laws regulating geo-engineering, so any nation could start emitting sulfur into the atmosphere.
FORBES: Techonomy 2012 Asks: Can Geo-Engineering Help Lower the Earth's Temperature?
In other words, the IPCC is considering whether it should support calls for expanding funding of geo-engineering research.
Consider, for example, what could happen if China decides launch a geo-engineering campaign, Parker suggested to the audience.
FORBES: Techonomy 2012 Asks: Can Geo-Engineering Help Lower the Earth's Temperature?
For this reason, approaches to geo-engineering that merely reflect heat back into space need to be viewed cautiously.
The technology of geo-engineering is both financially and technically doable, the panelists insisted.
FORBES: Techonomy 2012 Asks: Can Geo-Engineering Help Lower the Earth's Temperature?
"I started doing this work in an attempt to show that geo-engineering was a bad idea, " says Mr Caldeira.
Many of the groups that signed the letter were instrumental in securing a moratorium on geo-engineering research under the U.N.
And yet, the effects of geo-engineering would rarely be restricted to a single country that is, after all, the whole point.
This study attempts to rank the likely effectiveness of various geo-engineering proposals.
As the majority of coral is in the waters around developing countries, they may be inadvertently performing a type of geo-engineering on the reefs.
BBC: Particles from fossil fuels 'affect the growth of corals'
Even its advocates think geo-engineering is not to be approached lightly.
And if all else fails, Harvard professor David Keith, proposes geo-engineering as a way to combat global warming with his plan to refreeze the Arctic.
In the wake of this troubling new data about ocean carbon absorption, a range of geo-engineering solutions are being hotly debated in the scientific community and piloted by eco-businesses.
There have been a couple of international agreements (at the UN biodiversity convention last year, for example, when governments agreed there should be no geo-engineering schemes that damage nature).
Several models have been put forward as to how such a feat of "geo-engineering" might actually be achieved, most involving the positioning of a reflective shield of some sort out in space.
CNN: The shield of Ra: Could solar reflection save the planet?
Nevertheless, Brian Launder of the University of Manchester, who edited the Royal Society papers, argues that the sort of geo-engineering schemes they describe might buy the world 20 to 30 years to adjust.
Ironically, while geo-engineering has provoked strong objections from environmental groups, it has simultaneously been embraced by politically conservative organizations like the American Enterprise Institute, which have historically opposed a strong policy response to climate change.
The field of implementing technical climate fixes, or geo-engineering, is full of controversy, and even those involved in researching the issue see it as a last-ditch option, a lot less desirable than constraining greenhouse gas emissions.
If it is, the social and political discussions that need to happen and reach conclusions around the topic of geo-engineering ought to be happening now - in parallel with the technical research, if not ahead of it.
The other fear is of moral hazard the possibility that people would see the promise of geo-engineering their way out of trouble, despite its risks and uncertainties, as an excuse to continue to pollute the atmosphere as usual.
Scientists tend now to see geo-engineering research as a form of insurance policy against the effects of continued global warning, not as an excuse for downplaying the problem, nor for tolerating more carbon emissions in the meantime.
The hurdles that CCS and especially geo-engineering present, along with the finance question, are almost certainly more challenging than the technical ones presented by carrying one end of a hosepipe up on a balloon and spraying some water out.
Because geo-engineering is a new field, the researchers chose to ignore trifles such as cost or practicality, and focused instead on the sheer physical limits on what can be done and how much good the different schemes would do.
He finds that research into geo-engineering, which might slow or check the temperature increases, languishes under-examined, and that the international problems such technology would raise seem no more likely to be sorted out wisely than the problems of climate change itself.
"Investments in geo-engineering research are almost certainly the biggest bang for the buck that one could get in terms of addressing catastrophic climate change - a much, much bigger return than, for example, trying to control carbon emissions at the moment, " he says.
It would be a mistake to think of geo-engineering as a substitute for curbing carbon-dioxide emissions not merely because of the acidification of the oceans, but also because if you ever stop fertilising the oceans or spraying the atmosphere or whatever, the problem will rapidly return.
Despite its unique size and location, the tunnel is "not of massive engineering significance", according to geo-technical engineer Prof David Richards from the University of Southampton.
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