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

这个研讨会奖项将解决环境地球工程对地球生命系统的影响。地球工程是一系列旨在应对环境变化影响的活动。在未能限制温室气体进入大气层的情况下，这一问题日益受到关注。这些想法在科学家和公众之间都有很大的争议。然而，已经提出了许多地球工程方案，其中一些方案已经使用复杂的气候模型进行了广泛的研究。地球工程学研究得最多的方案是太阳辐射管理，它将通过增加地球-大气系统的反射率来冷却地球表面，减少入射的太阳辐射。这一地球工程管理方案对自然生物世界既有已知的风险，也有未知的风险。然而，几乎没有人知道实施、延续或终止对自然系统、其功能和生物多样性的潜在影响。讲习班的目标是制定一个研究议程，以了解和预测太阳辐射管理对生物多样性和自然系统的运作将产生何种影响。讲习班将编制信息，为政策和公共讨论提供信息，提供知识，纳入教学和外联，该研讨会奖项的一个主要目标是建立一个框架，使人们能够理解和预测自然系统的生物多样性和功能如何受到太阳辐射的影响地球工程学尽管越来越多的文献谨慎和策略管理一个不确定的过程与行星尺度的影响，有很少或没有研究地球工程对生态系统的影响。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测影响。研讨会的一个主要成果将是一个研究议程，其中将列出一系列关于生态影响研究的高度优先问题，审议各种挑战并讨论如何应对这些挑战，并为更广泛的相关科学界提出和公布一个研究议程。这些问题包括：缩小尺度，估计生物多样性热点或疑似范围限制/扩展的关键地点的植物，鸟类和两栖动物的多样性，并将这些数据与地球工程情景的气候预测相联系。研讨会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，制定一个关于这种地球工程方法的生态影响的研究议程。他们将研究自然系统将如何受到气候变化的影响，与未来的人为环境变化形成对比。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。这个高度跨学科专业的合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知识价值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.