Over the past three years the climate science community has begun to call
for research on purposeful manipulation of the climate system to avoid the
impacts of climate change - sometimes called geoengineering.  They are
concerned about an increase in the rate of CO2 emissions as developing
countries increase their productivity, the lack of progress on international
agreements for emissions reductions, as well as increased evidence of
substantial climate impacts.  Even the prospect of research on this topic
has raised concerns about many important issues:  risk management,
governance, ethics, commercial interest, economics, to name but a few.  With
calls for research by the American Meteorological Society, the American
Geophysical Union and the UK Royal Society, these issues will have to be
considered by governments and other sources of research funding that
consider this topic.