A picket of the Royal Society (6-9 Carlton House Terrace, London near St. James Park) happened today (08/11/2010) in the cold and the rain to coincide with the opening of the conference “Geoengineering: taking control of our planet' s climate”
 http://royalsociety.org/Geoengineering-taking-control-of-our-planets-climate/
Geoengineering proposals include creating an artificial volcano effect to black out the sky by blasting a massive amount of sulphate-based aerosols into the stratosphere (known as Solar Radiation Management); or changing the basic life chemistry of the oceans to increase plankton blooms.

Picket participants unfolded a big banner saying "Our planet is not your experiment" with a Hands off! Stop Geoengineering logo & planet earth picture and tied it on the fence of the Society for all to see as they arrived at the conference. Flyers explaining why the picket was happening and asking scientiists to consider how they felt about geoengineering were given out to about a third of the participants arriving at the conference (see below for text of flyer).

Picket participant Alex Ludd made the following remarks, “Hopefully some scientists are here to argue against this. A simple and socially just solution already exists: We can cut carbon emissions now. Royal Society participation in the geoengineering lobby** is bringing the topic in from the science fiction margins into climate change policy discussions. Geoengineering is a diversion (especially of money) from urgent adaptation and mitigation needs.

“What we need is a thousand candles of brilliant research, not a new Manhatten project. The Royal Society has been very good at standing up for climate science, but it would be terrible for them to blow their reputation by catering to the fantasy of oil companies and climate change deniers that some kind of magic band-aid will make the problem go away. "

“While the United Nations has banned experiments that endanger biodiversity and the life systems of the earth OECD nations are investing research money into geoengineering schemes. The rich polluter nations have tried to ignore the rest of the world and replace a UN climate treaty with their own phony agreement.  We need to let them know that we won't let them do this with our planet and our life support systems.”

Text of the flyer:
-We are here to oppose GEOENGINEERING (even if not directly the conference itself). We hope that many scientists will speak out against these science fiction schemes. Geoengineering is an irresponsible diversion from urgent adaptation and mitigation needs to prepare for climate crisis.
-The Royal Society has been very good at standing up for climate science. It would be terrible for them to now blow their reputation by catering to the fantasy of oil companies and climate change deniers that some kind of magic band-aid will make the problem go away.
-Scientists must consider whether they are in danger of being politically naive. What for scientists is an interesting hypothetical problem and at best a plan of last resort will quickly become the only plan for oil companies, climate change deniers and right wing politicians. Are you being paid to build their next rhetoric?