Initiative
Even if the world stopped emitting greenhouse gases tomorrow, the climate would continue to warm for decades. The warming already locked in by past emissions is not a failure of future policy. It is the consequence of a century of industrialization.The question, then, is not only how we stop making things worse — but how we protect the people already living with the consequences. That is the animating conviction behind the Climate Systems Engineering initiative (CSEi).
CSEi is building a new field to provide an open and inclusive research environment to explore approaches and technologies that may be needed to manage the effects of greenhouse gases already in the atmosphere, as well as vigorously debate the human and governance challenges surrounding these potential innovations — guided by the University’s core beliefs of free expression and open discourse. Applying insights from systems engineering and climate science, the scope of CSEi will include open-systems carbon removal, sunlight reflection methods, and local interventions to prevent glacial melting. Its goal is to advance understanding of the potential benefits and risks of using these technologies to inform decision-makers and to educate students who will face the challenges of managing industrial civilization on a fragile planet.