Do small outdoor geoengineering experiments require governance?

Abstract

In March 2024, Harvard University publicly announced the cancellation of its proposed Stratospheric Controlled Perturbation Experiment (SCoPEx), which would have been the world’s first outdoor stratospheric aerosol injection (SAI) experiment. SAI, a type of solar geoengineering (SG), seeks to cool the planet by releasing aerosols into the stratosphere to reflect sunlight. The co-authors here are members of the independent advisory committee (AC) convened by Harvard in 2019 to develop a research governance framework for SCoPEx. We frame below the importance of SCoPEx and SG governance and summarize the governance framework developed by the AC [detailed in (1)]. We then move beyond the report to reflect on the process of developing that framework, the challenges we encountered, and the sources of tension encountered in its implementation.