Mar 15, 2023 · 22m · green-blueprint
A rogue geoengineering startup sparks worry
Stephen Lacey · 7m spoken Alejandro de la Garza · 6m spoken Dr. Holly Buck · 2m spoken Dr. Kevin Surprise · 1m spoken Luke Iseman · 59s spoken
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gold bands on the timeline = statements, start to end. Hover to read, click to jump. CC turns on captions
In this investigative episode of The Carbon Copy, host Stephen Lacey and Time reporter Alejandro de la Garza examine Make Sunsets, an amateur startup conducting unauthorized solar geoengineering balloon launches in Nevada. Climate scientists and policy experts analyze the grave ecological risks, unverified cooling credit monetization, and alarming regulatory voids surrounding rogue climate interventions.
How this conversation actually went
Every chapter scored 0–10 on four independent dynamics. Hover any point for the reasoning behind the score. How this is scored →
The hosts as informed peer 4.7 Guest teaching 3.0 Guest disagreement 1.2 The hosts pushing back 1.3
speaking balance: gold is the hosts, purple is the guest (3 minute bins)
Sharpest disagreement ▶ 19:02 Luke Iseman dismisses academic researchers
Founder Luke Iseman disparages academic scientists as armchair thinkers who need startup operators like him to act as guinea pigs to get anything done.
Hardest push from the hosts ▶ 8:51 Lacey highlights lack of scientific credentialsStephen Lacey sharply points out that nowhere in the founders' Silicon Valley hype bios is there any mention of atmospheric science expertise.
Biggest teaching moment ▶ 15:51 Dr. Holly Buck on tropospheric vs stratospheric aerosolsDr. Holly Buck provides scientific clarity on particulate residence times and the danger of unmasking warming when tropospheric air pollution is cleaned up.
The host holds their own ▶ 5:52 Lacey explains planetary roulette risksHost Stephen Lacey demonstrates clear technical command by breaking down the exact mechanics and hazards of stratospheric aerosol injection.
the scores for every segment, with the reasoning behind each
| Chapter | Topic | The hosts as informed peer | Guest teaching | Guest disagreement | The hosts pushing back | Why |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Live Show Announcement at Greentown Labs | 3 | 1 | 0 | 0 | The episode opens with host Stephen Lacey setting the scene of Make Sunsets cooking sulfur dioxide in a hotel room, followed by conversational reporting from Alejandro de la Garza. | |
| The Reno Dog Park Balloon Launch | 4 | 2 | 0 | 1 | Alejandro recounts the Reno dog park balloon launch and the legal void that allowed it. The tone is collaborative journalism without adversarial tension. | |
| Meet the Startup Behind Stratospheric Aerosol Injection | 6 | 2 | 1 | 2 | Lacey provides deep context distinguishing CDR from solar geoengineering risks, highlighting the absence of any atmospheric scientists on Make Sunsets' team. | |
| Monetizing Geoengineering with Dubious Cooling Credits | 5 | 4 | 1 | 2 | The segment dissects Make Sunsets' $10 cooling credits model, bringing in academic experts Dr. Kevin Surprise and Dr. Holly Buck to explain why the scientific link is dubious. | |
| Moral Hazards, Geopolitical Conflict, and Termination Shock | 5 | 5 | 0 | 1 | Lacey, de la Garza, and expert clips unpack moral hazard, termination shock, and geopolitical fallout if geoengineering alters regional rainfall unevenly. | |
| Climate Stunts, Startup Hubris, and Regulatory Voids | 5 | 4 | 5 | 2 | Dr. Buck dismisses the launches as stunts rather than research, while founder Luke Iseman combatively dismisses academic research culture as needing test monkeys like him. |
Statements from this episode (15)
Make Sunsets launched geoengineering balloons in Nevada after Mexican government pushback
“Their first experimental launch in the Mexican state of Baja resulted in a swift regulatory response from the Mexican government, but undeterred, they were ready to run another test, and a few weeks ago, they launched some more balloons just outside of Reno, N…”
Iseman: Inhaling sulfur dioxide hurts less than a massive bong hit
“Like, if you've ever done a massive bong hit, like, it's, let's, it's not, it sounds, it's, a bong hit is worse than, you know, what you're gonna inhale in terms of the pain.”
Iseman: Make Sunsets received FAA clearance and a NOTAM for launch
“So we got, got clearance by the FAA. Like, we just got issued a NOTAM.”
De la Garza: No US federal regulations prohibit launching sulfur balloons
“There's no federal regulation that prohibits someone from putting some of that burned sulfur in a balloon and letting it go.”
De la Garza: All solar geoengineering researchers oppose Make Sunsets
“Any single person you talk to in solar geoengineering research, whether they're the most bullish on it or the strongest against it, they all think that what Make Sunset's doing is a bad idea.”
De la Garza: Make Sunsets founder Luke Iseman led hardware at Y Combinator
“Luke Eisman is a serial entrepreneur. He worked at Y Combinator for a while as their head of hardware, director of hardware.”
Make Sunsets Sells $10 Stratospheric Sulfur Dioxide Cooling Credits
“So for 10 dollars, you can buy a promise from Make Sunsets that they're going to inject one gram of sulfur dioxide into the stratosphere. And also that one gram of sulfur dioxide, they say, will offset the emissions of one ton of carbon dioxide for a period of…”
Surprise: Make Sunsets' $10 cooling credits are scientifically dubious marketing
“They really, at this point, don't have any way to measure whether or not they're actually releasing the proper amount of sulfur if it's making it into the stratosphere, and it's, you know, easy, like, these just round, easy numbers of correlation from, well, o…”
Surprise: Academics cannot control real-world geoengineering deployment despite self-imposed safeguards
“The experts who are researching this stuff are well-meaning and well-intentioned and are attempting to be very careful, but even with those safeguards that they're trying to impose on themselves, they are not going to have control over how this technology actu…”
Buck: Rogue geoengineering initiatives risk shutting down legitimate scientific research
“I mean, the main danger is that it inhibits the very real research that we need, because people are too alarmed from the whole topic, or they just write it off, and then the scientists, who I hope would be doing the good work on this, can't continue their work…”
Surprise: Geoengineering risks becoming an excuse to delay fossil fuel emissions cuts
“They are the potential for Solar geoengineering to become a kind of techno fix that is, ah, latched onto by particular economic and political actors to delay, ah, mitigation and energy transitions, the fossil fuel industry, and in so doing, that becomes a kind…”
Dr. Buck: Tropospheric Air Pollution Masks at Least Half a Degree of Warming
“We have Air pollution in the troposphere that's currently masking quite a bit of warming by some calculations, you know, half a degree, perhaps even more.”
Buck: Make Sunsets is a provocative performance stunt, not real geoengineering
“I don't really see this effort as relating to geoengineering. Actually, like it's basically performance. You could call it performance art. I don't know if it meets the threshold of art, but it's more of like a performance that is meant to be A provocation or …”
Iseman: Academic geoengineering scientists need startup operators to execute real-world testing
“I've worked with PhDs before in previous roles, and, you know, I get what they do. They're very challenging, smart. They can look very far into the future, but at the end of the day, when the rubber meets the road, they need someone like me to actually The sci…”
De la Garza: Environmental opposition no longer stops rogue outdoor geoengineering
“Some kind of critical mass has been reached where two years ago, a strongly worded letter from indigenous groups and Greenpeace and other environmental organizations was enough to dissuade the researchers at the time from Doing this kind of thing from, in that…”