Collaborative proposal: Workshop on ecological impacts of solar radiation management geoengineering; February, 2020; Port Jefferson, NY; October, 2020; Minneapolis, MN

这个工作坊奖项将讨论环境地球工程对地球生命系统的影响。地球工程是为应对环境变化的影响而精心设计的一系列活动。在未能限制温室气体排放到大气中的情况下，它受到了越来越多的关注。这些想法在科学家和普通民众中都存在很大争议。尽管如此，已经提出了许多地球工程方案，其中一些已经使用复杂的气候模型进行了广泛的研究。研究最多的地球工程方案是太阳辐射管理，它将通过增加地球-大气系统的反照率(反射率)来冷却地球表面，减少进入地球的太阳辐射。这种地球工程管理选项对自然生活世界既有已知的风险，也有未知的风险。然而，关于实施、延续或终止对自然系统、其功能及其生物多样性的潜在影响，几乎一无所知。讲习班的目标是制定一个研究议程，以了解和预测自然系统的生物多样性和功能将如何受到太阳辐射管理的影响。讲习班将为政策和公众讨论提供信息，提供知识以纳入教学和宣传，并使不同的受众参与关于生命系统对太阳辐射地球工程的反应的讨论。这一讲习班奖的一个主要目标是建立一个框架，使人们能够了解和预测太阳辐射地球工程将如何影响自然系统的生物多样性和功能。尽管越来越多的文献关于谨慎和管理具有全球范围影响的不确定过程的战略，但关于地球工程对生态系统的影响的研究很少，甚至根本没有。研讨会将讨论这种地球工程方法如何改变环境变化对自然系统的预期影响。讲习班的一个主要成果将是一个研究议程，它将列出一系列生态影响研究的高度优先问题，考虑挑战并讨论如何应对这些挑战，并为更广泛的相关科学界发起和宣传研究议程。这些问题包括：缩小尺度，估计生物多样性热点地区或怀疑范围限制/扩大的关键地点的植物、鸟类和两栖动物的多样性，并将这些数据与地球工程情景下的气候预测联系起来。讲习班将支持一组生态学家和气候科学家的合作，从研究生到高级学术和联邦实验室研究人员，以制定关于这种地球工程方法的生态影响的研究议程。他们将研究气候变化对自然系统的影响，而不是未来的人为环境变化。拟议的讲习班将包括两次面对面会议和面对面会议之前、期间和之后的定期电子会议。这个高度跨学科的专业协作团队将由大气科学家和研究广泛生态领域的科学家组成，包括来自其他学科的研究人员，为该领域的未来研究做出贡献。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This workshop award will address the impacts of environmental geoengineering on the living systems of earth. Geoengineering is a set of activities deliberately designed to counter the impacts of environmental change. It has received increasing attention in the face of failure to limit inputs of greenhouse gases to the atmosphere. These ideas are highly controversial among both scientists and the general public. Nevertheless, many schemes for geoengineering have been proposed and some have been extensively studied using complex climate models. The best-studied scheme for geoengineering is solar radiation management, which would cool Earth's surface by increasing the albedo (reflectivity) of the Earth-atmosphere system, reducing incoming solar radiation. This geoengineering management option presents both known and unknown risks to the natural living world. Yet almost nothing is known about the potential impacts of implementation, continuation or termination on natural systems, their functions, and their biodiversity. The goal of the workshop is to develop a research agenda to understand and predict how the biodiversity and functioning of natural systems would be affected by solar radiation management. The workshop will develop information to inform policy and public discussion, provide knowledge to incorporate into teaching and outreach, and engage a diverse audience in discussions on the response of living systems to solar radiation geoengineering.A major goal of this workshop award is to develop a framework that will enable understanding and predictions of how the biodiversity and functioning of natural systems would be affected by solar radiation geoengineering. Despite the growing literature of caution and strategies for managing an uncertain process with planetary-scale implications, there has been little to no research on the implications of geoengineering for ecological systems. The workshop will address how this geoengineering approach could change predicted effects of environmental change on natural systems. A major product of the workshop will be a research agenda that will lay out a series of high priority issues for research on ecological impacts, consider the challenges and discuss how they might be met, and initiate and publicize a research agenda for the wider relevant scientific communities. Such issues include: downscaling, estimating diversity for plants, birds, and amphibians in biodiversity hotspots or at critical sites for suspected range limitations/expansions, and connecting those data with climate projections for geoengineering scenarios. The workshop will support the collaboration of a group of ecologists and climate scientists, ranging from graduate students to senior academic and federal laboratory researchers, to develop a research agenda on the ecological impacts of this geoengineering approach. They will examine how natural systems would be impacted by the climate modification, in contrast to future anthropogenic environmental change. The proposed workshop would consist of two in-person meetings and regular electronic meetings before, during and after the in-person meetings. This collaborative team of highly interdisciplinary specialties will consist of atmospheric scientists and scientists studying a wide range of ecological areas, including researchers from additional disciplines to contribute to future research in this area.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.