CSM EDITORIAL

One might be forgiven for thinking that His Majesty’s Government has taken leave of its senses–or at the very least, been spending too much time in the rarefied air of Petty France’s lesser think tanks. News reaches us that £50 million of public money is to be lavished upon experiments to dim the sun, all in the noble pursuit of cooling the planet.

A bold strategy, no doubt, and one that would make even the most ambitious Bond villain blush.

Yet, in a twist of irony so rich it could only be conjured by our presently-suicidal ruling class (10,269,051 votes in 2019 for Labour, 9,706,217 votes in 2024, thanks Nige), this grand solar tampering coincides with the relentless industrialisation of the British countryside–where fields, meadows, and hedgerows are being smothered under sprawling solar farms. The logic, if one can call it that, appears to be thus: 

The sun is too fierce–let us block it! But also, the sun is too precious–let us hoard its every ray!

One wonders if the architects of these policies have ever set foot beyond the M25. If they had, they might notice that the bucolic landscapes they so casually sacrifice to the great god of Net Zero are the very same that sustain our wildlife, our agriculture, and, not least, our national soul. To trade them for vast plains of glinting panels–while simultaneously plotting to reduce the sunlight that makes them function–is a contradiction of almost artistic proportions.

The proposed methods of solar dimming–spraying aerosols into the stratosphere, brightening clouds–sound less like serious science and more like the fevered scribblings of a Professor Branestawm novel. The experts assure us, of course, that all will be done safely and reversibly. A comforting notion, until one recalls that these are the same experts who once told us that diesel was green, that biofuels would save the world, and that covering every south-facing slope in silicon was a harmless enterprise.

Meanwhile, the rural communities forced to live beneath these solar monoliths are treated as little more than an afterthought–collateral damage in the grand crusade against carbon. Farmers, already squeezed by Byzantine regulations, are now encouraged to forsake food production altogether in favour of becoming glorified landlords for energy firms. The countryside, once a living, breathing thing, is fast being reduced to a patchwork of sterile installations, all in service of an energy policy that seems to change direction with the wind.

And what of the risks? The scientists admit, with admirable understatement, that meddling with the heavens might have unintended consequences–a phrase that, in this context, carries the same ominous weight as “the Titanic may encounter some ice.” One shudders to imagine the parliamentary inquiry a decade hence, when some poor minister is forced to explain why the Midlands have acquired the climate of Spitzbergen.

In the end, one is left with the uneasy suspicion that these grand geoengineering schemes are less about saving the planet and more about saving face–a desperate bid to maintain the illusion of control over forces we barely understand. The sun, after all, has been rising and setting quite reliably for some four billion years without our assistance. Perhaps, before we try to fix it, we might first pause to consider whether it is we who need adjusting.

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