Speaker 1: Welcome to brain Stuff from house stuff works dot com
Speaker 1: where smart Happens. Hi Am Marshall Brain with today's question,
Speaker 1: will space mirrors really be able to cool the planet?
Speaker 1: Carbon dioxide and methane are two common greenhouse gases. Human
Speaker 1: consumption of fossil fuels releases billions of pounds of carbon
Speaker 1: dioxide gas into the atmosphere every day, and a wide
Speaker 1: variety of natural processes create methane. One of the problems
Speaker 1: with the rising level of these greenhouse gases in the
Speaker 1: atmosphere is that it causes the atmosphere to trap more
Speaker 1: of the heat that arise from the sun, so the
Speaker 1: Earth is getting warmer. One way to solve this problem
Speaker 1: might be to put mirrors or sunshades in space that
Speaker 1: would block some of the sunlight that would normally reach
Speaker 1: the planet. With less sunlight, the planet would get cooler.
Speaker 1: Three approaches have been suggested. First, we could loft a
Speaker 1: single huge mirror. Depending on its design, it might need
Speaker 1: to be as large as six hundred thousand square miles.
Speaker 1: This is hard to imagine with current technology. Second, we
Speaker 1: could use thousands of large satellites, which might come in
Speaker 1: the form of space solar power satellites to block sunlight
Speaker 1: and generate electricity. Third, we could use a swarm of
Speaker 1: millions of smaller mirrors. One approach uses lunar materials to
Speaker 1: create the mirrors that orbit far from the Earth. In
Speaker 1: another approach, millions of smaller satellites form a ring in
Speaker 1: low Earth orbit, much like the rings around Saturns, to
Speaker 1: shade the tropics. Be sure to check out our new
Speaker 1: video podcast, Stuff from the Future. Join how Stuff Work
Speaker 1: staff as we explore the most promising and perplexing possibilities
Speaker 1: of tomorrow the house Stuff Works. I Find app has
Speaker 1: a ride down at it to day on iTunes