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Coral reefs, cloud forests and radical climate interventions in Australia’s Wet Tropics and Great Barrier Reef [1]

['Benjamin K. Sovacool', 'Center For Energy Technologies', 'Department Of Business Development', 'Technology', 'Aarhus University', 'Aarhus', 'Science Policy Research Unit', 'Spru', 'University Of Sussex Business School', 'Brookline']

Date: 2023-10

Abstract Given the inadequacy of current patterns of climate mitigation, calls for rapid climate protection are beginning to explore and endorse potentially radical options. Based on fieldwork involving original expert interviews (N = 23) and extensive site visits (N = 23) in Australia, this empirical study explores four types of climate interventions spanning climate differing degrees of radicalism: adaptation, solar geoengineering, forestry and ecosystems restoration, and carbon removal. It examines ongoing efforts to engage in selective breeding and assisted adaptation of coral species to be introduced on the Great Barrier Reef, as well as to implement regional solar geoengineering in the form of fogging and marine cloud brightening. It also examines related attempts at both nature-based and engineered forms of carbon removal vis-à-vis ecosystem restoration via forestry conservation and reforestation in the Wet Tropics of Queensland World Heritage Area, and enhanced weathering and ocean alkalinization. This portfolio of climate interventions challenges existing categorizations and typologies of climate action. Moreover, the study identifies positive synergies and coupling between the options themselves, but also lingering trade-offs and risks needing to be taken into account. It discusses three inductive themes which emerged from the qualitative data: complexity and coupling, risk and multi-scalar effects, and radicality and governance. It elucidates these themes with an attempt to generalize lessons learned for other communities around the world considering climate interventions to protect forests, preserve coral reefs, or implement carbon removal and solar geoengineering.

Citation: Sovacool BK, Baum CM, Low S, Fritz L (2023) Coral reefs, cloud forests and radical climate interventions in Australia’s Wet Tropics and Great Barrier Reef. PLOS Clim 2(10): e0000221. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pclm.0000221 Editor: Laurence L. Delina, The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, HONG KONG Received: February 6, 2023; Accepted: June 19, 2023; Published: October 4, 2023 Copyright: © 2023 Sovacool et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. Data Availability: Due to ethical restrictions the data underlying the results of this study are only available upon request to Universitetsledelsens Stab. Nordre Ringgade 1 8000 Aarhus C E-mail: [email protected] http://www.au.dk/om/uni/austab/. Funding: The authors received no specific funding for this work. Competing interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

1. Introduction Given the inadequacy of both current patterns of climate mitigation and adaptation, calls for rapid climate protection are beginning to endorse more radical options. Morrison et al. [1] recently state that meaningful climate action requires such interventions. Sovacool and Dunlap [2]write that climate policy implementation seems woefully insufficient to tackle rising emissions, and that even daring, obstinate, transformative options need to be considered by scientists, policymakers, and even activists. Capstick et al. [3] argue in favor of urgent climate action via the civil disobedience of researchers and scientists. Perhaps nowhere on earth are radical climate protection pathways being put into practice with as much urgency as on the Great Barrier Reef in northeastern Australia. Stopping climate change in practice is critically important for coral reefs, given that by 2070, all the coral reefs in the world could be gone due to global heating [4]. Moreover, they note that from 1998 to 2018, heatwaves have bleached or killed more than 90% of the coral reefs listed in global World Heritage sites. In the Great Barrier Reef, the largest reef ecosystem in the world, half of corals died between 2016 and 2017 –though it is also the case that mostly shallow water corals were affected and that, for the most part, there has subsequently been a rapid recovery in coral health [5] Nonetheless, the long-term stability and resilience of coral reefs in response to recurring bleaching events is in question. The loss of coral reefs would be devastating environmentally, but the socioeconomic consequences would also be significant. Although coral reefs cover only about 0.5% of the ocean, they support about 30% of marine fish species globally [4]. Moreover, approximately 400 million people depend on reefs for food and protection from storms and floods across more than 100 countries, and coral reefs serve as a source of tourism revenues and of nonmaterial contributions of nature to people [6]. Deforestation and land use change is another significant climate change concern. Forests cover about one-third of global land area, storing 683 billion tons of carbon, more than the total amount of carbon contained in the atmosphere, and through the carbon cycle, forests remove an additional three billion tons of carbon dioxide each year through growth [7, 8]. Yet when forests are cleared, harvested, or catch fire, their stored carbon is emitted back into the atmosphere. Much of the world’s farming, livestock production, and changes in land use have taken place in former forests and tropical forests, with about half of global useable land now in pastoral or intensive agriculture [9, 10]. About 36 percent of the carbon added to the atmosphere from 1850 to 2000 came from the elimination and conversion of forests [11], along with 13–21% of global total anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions in the period 2010–2019 [12]. Thus, forests can be a sink as well as a source of emissions, depending on how they are managed. The most recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report notes that the land use, agriculture, and forestry sector can provide 20–30% of the global mitigation needed for a 1.5°C or 2°C pathway towards 2050 [12]. However, the ability to achieve these reductions is highly variable and contingent on strong mitigation strategies backed by robust governance mechanisms. Based on extensive original data collection and field research, this paper explores a distinct portfolio of four radical options being implemented to protect coral reefs and tropical forests in Australia: adaptation via assisted evolution (genome sequencing and selective modification of coral reefs), regional solar geoengineering (fogging and shading through cloud brightening), forest and ecosystem restoration (community forestry conservation and reforestation), and carbon removal (enhanced weathering). The study asks: how are these four radical options being implemented? What are their benefits and barriers? Moreover, what are their potential couplings to the use of other forms of technology to promote the protection (and restoration) of coral reefs, and what multi-scalar risks may emerge? In addressing these questions, the study aims to make multiple contributions. The first is empirical, although with an eye towards informing theory. Within the discourse on climate interventions and pathways, typologies and distinctions abound, notably, between the aims of mitigation from adaptation and “geoengineering” approaches [13], and around the need for split consideration of carbon removal vis-à-vis solar geoengineering [14, 15]. Other studies draw important distinctions between “natural” carbon removal options versus “chemical” or “engineered” options [16–19]. Still other work distinguishes between “hard,” centralized, scale-driven approaches versus “soft,” distributed, bespoke approaches [20]. These distinctions, while useful, do not necessarily capture the reality of how some interventions are being assessed and implemented in practice, where they form a part of a portfolio or cocktail of interventions [21–23]. In practice, the lines between these categorizations become blurred, and pathways become mixed, an important finding that provokes further theory building and assessment. Second, and conceptually, our study applies a recent typology of radical climate interventions, which identifies a set of positive synergies and couplings between radical options when it comes to climate protection and ecosystems restoration, but also lingering tradeoffs and risks [1]–see Section 2 for further detail. We build upon reviews and studies of in situ experiments and pilot projects for climate interventions [24], novel interventions in terrestrial [25, 26] and marine environments [27, 28], and efforts specific to Australia and its iconic ecosystems, such as the Great Barrier Reef [29–31]. In doing so, we attempt to generalize lessons learned for other communities around the world where the use of potentially radical interventions could be considered in portfolio–to protect denuded forests of cultural-ecological value, preserve, restore, and assist the adaptation of coral reefs, or generally maintain important ecosystems. We aim to inform multi-disciplinary, multi-sectoral assessments of such interventions–on land [32, 33] and in coastal regions and the high seas [34–36], including those that focus on direct engagement with local actors and conditions [37, 38], as well as efforts to evaluate initiatives that pose co-benefits for climate, ecosystems, and local development [39, 40]. In this regard, the ongoing trials and insights gleaned in Australia serve as a crucial test laboratory, both conceptually and practically, for the onset of future and deeper efforts, if the pace of climate mitigation remains insufficient.

2. Background and context: World Heritage ecosystems, climate protection, and radical interventions The two focal points of the study are both critically important ecosystems, as well as World Heritage Sites, one involving tropical cloud forests, and the other coral reefs. The first is the Wet Tropics of Queensland World Heritage Area. This Heritage Area sits on the northeastern part of Queensland’s Great Dividing Range in Australia, occupying almost 9,000 square kilometers at elevations up to 1,600 meters. It encompasses both National Parks and State Forests in the high rainfall region of north Queensland, stretching from near the Bloomfield River in the north to Townsville in the south [41–43]. It was granted its World Heritage status in 1988 for four reasons: (i) offering outstanding examples representing the major stages of the Earth’s evolutionary history; (ii) outstanding examples representing significant ongoing ecological and biological processes in the evolution and development of terrestrial and fresh water ecosystems and communities of plants and animals; (iii) superlative natural phenomena or areas of exceptional natural beauty and aesthetic importance; and (iv) offering the most important and significant habitats for in situ conservation of biological diversity, including those containing threatened species of plants and animals of outstanding universal value from the point of view of science and conservation [44]. The forest area is also rich in biodiversity, such that more than 80 species of trees can be found within a 0.25-hectare size of the park [45]. As Fig 1 (Panels A-D) indicates, it is home to beautiful rivers and waterfalls, and dense forest canopies. The biodiversity within the Heritage Area is lush with more than 3,300 species of plants, of which more than 700 are endemic, along with more than 700 vertebrate species, of which 88 are endemic. Of the 26 different lineages of flowering plants in the world, 15 are found within this Heritage Area, amounting to the highest concentration in a single protected area on the planet. The Wet Tropics region also hosts a diverse array of ecosystem types, from low-lying coastal areas and inland plains to subcoastal ranges and savannas. These ecosystems are a natural habitat for freshwater crocodiles, rhinoceros cockroaches, and python snakes. The Heritage Area protects the world’s oldest continuously surviving tropical rainforest dating back more than 130 million years. It also is home to one of the oldest indigenous cultures on the planet, the Rainforest Aboriginal Peoples, who have been living there for more than 5,000 years. The International Union for the Conservation of Nature has assessed it as the second most irreplaceable natural World Heritage site on Earth; that is, it is one of the 0.1% of the most important protected areas in the world [46]. PPT PowerPoint slide

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TIFF original image Download: Fig 1. The Wet Tropics of Queensland World Heritage Area in Australia. Source: All photographs taken by the authors during field research. Note: A is the Wallaman Falls, B the Wooroonooran National Park, C the Crater Lakes National Park, and D the Barron Gorge National Park. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pclm.0000221.g001 The second is the Great Barrier Reef, the largest coral reef system in the world spanning more than 348,000 square kilometers, which makes it the largest living organism on the planet [47, 48]. It was given its World Heritage status in 1981 as the world’s most extensive coral reef. In comparative terms, the Great Barrier Reef is approximately the size of Italy or Japan. It offers instrumental ecosystem services including a keystone marine habitat, shoreline protection, the provision of fisheries, and a popular location for tourism [49]. It thus generates more than AUD$6.4 billion in annual reef tourism revenues (supporting more than 64,000 full time jobs) [47] and an additional AUD$500 million in fishing revenues. As Fig 2 (Panels A-E) partially illustrates, the Great Barrier Reef also protects more than 1,500 species of marine wildlife including anemonefish, red bass, coral trout, snapper, sharks and sea turtles. This is in addition to more than 400 different species of coral, and more than 4,000 mollusk variations. PPT PowerPoint slide

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TIFF original image Download: Fig 2. The Great Barrier reef in Australia. Source: All photographs taken by the authors during field research or used with Permission from Reef Magic. Note: A shows a Barramundi cod on Moore reef, B sea turtles at Arlington Reef, C an aerial view of Michaelmas Reef, D an aerial view of Oyster Reef, E a clown fish on Moore reef. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pclm.0000221.g002 Both the Wet Tropics of Queensland World Heritage Area and the Great Barrier Reef are threatened by climate change, among other issues. The Wet Tropics will be sensitive to heat stress, drought, flooding, and more intense cyclones. The Great Barrier Reef is at risk from accelerated crown-of-thorns starfish outbreaks, more severe tropical cyclones, heat stress leading to more aggravated coral morality, and mass bleaching events [50]. Other parts of the reef are susceptible to environmental stressors in the form of pollution, flood plumes, and ocean acidification [50]. These threats have motivated a portfolio of climate interventions intended to stabilize the cloud forests and protect the reef. Our study focuses on four of these in particular: climate adaptation, solar geoengineering, forest and ecosystems restoration, and carbon removal. These operate as a potential suite or portfolio of techniques aimed at preempting future impacts of climate, with Lockie [51] warning that the longer policymakers take to act, the more expensive and difficult interventions will be, at any scale, and the greater the risk that windows of opportunity will close. Collectively, these options are being supported in Australia through a variety of programs and schemes. On land and near the Wet Tropics, the Wet Tropics Conservation Strategy outlines actions from the government and private sector to achieve the conservation and rehabilitation of the Heritage Area. It builds on earlier advances from the Community Rainforest Reforestation Program. Furthermore, an ongoing project of the Leverhulme Centre for Climate Change Mitigation (LC3M) has been piloting terrestrial carbon removal and enhanced weathering since 2018. LC3M assumes the mantle of the first high-profile project on enhanced weathering in the world, and potential co-benefits for local agriculture underpins its decision to conduct trials on working sugarcane plantations in Queensland [24]. In terms of the reef, the Reef Trust Partnership (an AUD$443 million program administered by the Australian Government’s Reef Trust and the Great Barrier Reef Foundation) promotes reef restoration, community reef protection, and adaptation science. The Reef Restoration and Adaptation Program, or RRAP, is an AUD$120 million collaboration between government and multiple universities and conservation institutions to help the Great Barrier Reef recover from, and adapt to, the effects of climate change. As Fig 3 indicates, the RRAP has given consideration to more than 160 distinct interventions to protect the reef, and it has three intersecting goals: to protect and cool reefs most at risk to bleaching and heatwaves; to adapt and strengthen the tolerance of corals to climate change; and to restore and promote the recovery of degraded reefs. Two of the four radical options that we explore in this paper—adaptation and assisted evolution of coral reefs and solar geoengineering—are being researched and tested in small-scale feasibility trials by RRAP. PPT PowerPoint slide

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TIFF original image Download: Fig 3. The structure and goals of the reef restoration and adaptation program in Australia. Source: [51] and republished under a CCBY license. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pclm.0000221.g003 Finally, we term our interventions radical because they fit into a recent typology articulated in Morrison et al. [1]. Morrison et al. argue that climate interventions can span a spectrum of radicality, ranging from having limited, slow change (phase 1, palliative, and phase 2, hopeful), deeper or faster change (phases 3 and 4 of tactical and partial, respectively), and deep and transformative change (phase 5, strategic, and phase 6, deep radical). Palliative interventions, according to the authors, encompass “extreme” or “unproven” technological solutions with the express purpose of responding to climate change such as carbon removal and solar geoengineering. By this definition, we could place engineered carbon removal (enhanced weathering) and regional solar geoengineering (fogging and cloud brightening), and assisted evolution and genetic modification (of coral reef) into this category, given their general focus on urgent harm reduction. Hopeful interventions are seen to address the climate emergency through soft economic changes such as carbon accounting schemes, renewable energy targets, and nature-based solutions to store carbon. By this definition, we place nature-based ecosystem restoration and forestry in this category, although we note the potential for greater radicality (i.e., deep radical) if coupled with deeper changes to prevailing systems and power structures. Tactical interventions represent radical options that seek to be disruptive and raise awareness about the root drivers of climate change. We would place coral reef regeneration into this category, especially where linked to broader attempts to raise awareness about climate change and the Great Barrier Reef. We will explore the degree to which a portfolio of such interventions can climb higher on the ladder of radicality, approaching strategic and deep radical actions, in Section 5.3.

5. Discussion: Complexity, risk, and radicality Treating adaptation, solar geoengineering, community reforestation, and carbon removal as prospective parts of an integrated portfolio for climate intervention yields insights related to complexity, risk, and radicality. 5.1 Complexity, coupling and land-sea interactions Even though they are being deployed in the same geographic region (Queensland) and with the same stated goal (climate protection), the four radical interventions have invariably different actor coalitions, drivers, and dynamics related to timing, distribution of costs and benefits, sectoral incidence, and their relationship to uncertainty. As Table 4 indicates, adaptation in the form of coral reef regeneration holds costs for planners now, with benefits accruing mostly to later generations, whereas solar geoengineering, which acts more quickly, sees costs incurred now along with benefits occurring now. Nature-based restoration via forestry only accrues its benefits over decades given the time it takes for new trees to grow and because emissions reductions must outlast risks related to forest fires, logging, and disease, with the former especially germane in Australia. Enhanced weathering, like adaptation, has long term benefits in carbon storage (over the next millennia) but incurs costs now–although possible co-benefits in the present should also be kept in mind. Moreover, the distribution of where costs and benefits will accrue is skewed, with some of the methods (adaptation, geoengineering, and nature-based restoration) having benefits primarily at the local level (the reef, the forest) whereas carbon removal predominantly benefits the planet through general carbon storage and emissions displacement. Furthermore, all the approaches involve different sectors—spanning fisheries (adaptation, geoengineering), tourism (adaptation and reforestation), shipping and aviation (solar geoengineering), forests (reforestation), agriculture (reforestation, enhanced weathering), and the extractive industries (enhanced weathering). Lastly, they all have different relationships with uncertainty. Some (adaptation) demand action be taken now despite uncertainty, whereas others (geoengineering, for example) could lend themselves to action being taken later only after uncertainty and risks are reduced. PPT PowerPoint slide

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TIFF original image Download: Table 4. Complex interactions and governance dynamics in radical climate interventions. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pclm.0000221.t004 Interesting couplings emerge with our four radical interventions as well. R22 noted how the nozzle technology being developed for solar geoengineering could also see widespread use in the “humidification of greenhouses”, in the “distribution of pesticides”, in “industrial mining applications”, and even in “pollution control via sprayers to tamp down coal dust on coal trains.” R08 also added that solar geoengineering vis-à-vis cloud brightening need not be limited to the coral reef, and that it could be used to reduce temperatures and manage heat stress within forests, helping assist with nature-based ecosystem restoration, or even to reduce the heat island effect in urban environments. This sees a crossover between land-sea interactions of a kind that is an emergent issue in such discussions, where cloud brightening or fogging can come to protect forests and enhance land-based management and, more generally, demand greater attention be paid to these coastal and littoral areas. Enhanced weathering, as previously noted, can assist with reef management and reducing ocean acidification. R09 and R10 both commented how enhanced weathering can lead to alkalinity, which keeps moving dissolved bicarbonate through the ecosystem. Given that carbon dioxide is a weak acid, when it dissolves in water, one of its main effects is ocean acidification. But enhanced weathering has the potential to enable the opposite of that process, i.e., alkalinization. It can thus become a tool of climate adaptation in addition to its role vis-à-vis engineered carbon removal, not to mention representing a compelling “boundary object” [70] whereby land-based measures can intersect and interact with sea-based measures. 5.2 Risk, system-risk, and multi-scalar effects Our data in Section 4 revealed both myriad benefits for climate protection, but also that these are counterbalanced—at the individual technology level—by myriad risks. In other words, for every benefit a form of climate protection might offer, it comes with a collection of risks as well. We conceptualize and wrestle with these through Fig 12. No option is free of risks, but no option either has only risks (that is, these also have real, albeit prospective, benefits). Moreover, any risks that do exist must also be considered along with the risks that would eventuate from doing nothing [71], e.g., from failing to address the damages from crown-of-thorns starfish outbreaks and repeated bleaching events. Moreover, some technology-level risks are common across multiple radical options, such as difficulty in scaling (coral reef regeneration, fogging and cloud brightening, and enhanced weathering), lack of public understanding and social acceptance (fogging and cloud brightening, enhanced weathering), and lack of funding or finance (fogging and cloud brightening, reforestation, coral reef adaptation). Similarly, some benefits are common across different options, including the ability to export the technology for climate protection elsewhere (coral reef regeneration, fogging and cloud brightening) and specific protection of the Great Barrier Reef (coral reef regeneration, fogging and cloud brightening, enhanced weathering via alkalinization). To be clear, not taking action also has consequences and should be considered as part of a risk assessment, so these findings need juxtaposed with counterfactual scenarios comparing deployment vs. non-deployment. PPT PowerPoint slide

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TIFF original image Download: Fig 12. Conceptualizing technology-level risks for four radical climate protection Measure. Source: Authors, based on the qualitative data described in Section 4. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pclm.0000221.g012 The multifaceted nature of these technology-level risks maps well onto recent examinations of risk by Lockie [51], who assessed the RRAP (which involves three of our four radical climate interventions). Lockie noted that some forms are closely tied to business risk–any threat to the operation of a business or project including finance and markets, regulatory issues, health and safety, reputation, and interaction with stakeholders and communities. Others pose social risks–threats to individuals and groups that arise because of social change precipitated by the decisions of external actors. Still others present biocultural risks–threats to the interplay of cultural and biological diversity generative of the full diversity of life. Interestingly, risks do not only exist at the level of the technology. Intersecting, systems-level risks could also emerge due to deployment of all four options as part of a portfolio. As shown in Fig 13, fogging and cloud brightening could negatively impact cloud forests by changing precipitation patterns, and have negative impacts on coastal ecosystems, water tables, and weather on land (affecting agriculture as well as the processes upon which the effectiveness of enhanced weathering is incumbent). Coral reef regeneration through assisted evolution and genetic modification could adversely impact public support, not only of such activities, potentially through cross-over associations with the use of genetic engineering for food production, but of other kinds of efforts which might come to be seen as similarly “interventionist” on the Great Barrier Reef [72, 73]. Done poorly, enhanced weathering could entail the release of toxic pollution which can interfere with both reef restoration and reforestation, and if scaled up, facilitate the industrialization of agriculture with bigger machines and increased traffic, which could degrade forests. Conversely, reforestation, by demarcating certain plots of land as “off limits”, could set restrictions that preclude their use for enhanced weathering. PPT PowerPoint slide

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TIFF original image Download: Fig 13. Conceptualizing system-level risks for four radical climate protection measures. Source: Authors, based on the qualitative data described in Section 4. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pclm.0000221.g013 Risks moreover have the potential to compound when radical climate interventions are combined in a portfolio. R08 hinted at this possibility, noting that “the larger the scale of intervention, the more technologies you involve, the greater the potential for positive impact, but the greater the risk.” R22 also spoke about the risk that, when you add “multiple interventions together, risks aggregate and become even more unpredictable, and perhaps insurmountable.” Condie and colleagues [47] noted as much in their study of multiple reef protection measures, concluding that “the effectiveness of any intervention in protecting the Great Barrier Reef will depend on many system interactions and may only become apparent over multi-decadal timescales.” 5.3 Radicality and governance Aggregating different radical climate protection measures not only leads to technology-level and systems-level risks, it also, perhaps paradoxically, climbs up the ladder of radicality proposed by Morrison et al. [1]. Morrison’s typology suggests that deep transitions, or those at the highest scales (i.e., 5 and 6) on the spectrum of radicality, must attempt to correct power asymmetries and restore some degree of accountability, legitimacy and effectiveness in governance in order to be deserving of being called “radical”. We do see such degrees of radicality in our integrated portfolio of reef regeneration, fogging and cloud brightening, reforestation, and enhanced weathering, albeit often in a nascent or not fully fleshed-out form. R08 spoke about how using some of these measures could be “deeply radical and transformative”, especially when evaluated in relation to the capacities and structures of other countries, going on to note that: “I don’t underestimate how radical it is what Australia is trying to do. And, Australia already had radical forms of governance when it came to protecting the Great Barrier Reef with multiple interconnected sociotechnical systems. I mean, the state already had a reef trust as a vehicle for multiple levels of government to invest in reef protection, research agencies basically leveraged the trust and put a joint submission to the commonwealth government. They’re funneling upwards of AUD$1 billion into reef protection over the next decade. And they are firing on all cylinders, using a mosaic of different climate interventions cutting across reefs, clouds, land-based measures, and even climate mitigation.” R14 similarly evaluated the governance of climate interventions in this part of Australia as “best practice, best in the world, as good as it gets, with fully delegated regional agencies that are well resourced and well-staffed, with state-of-the-art monitoring and cutting-edge science.” R19 spoke about the specific involvement of Aboriginal and Indigenous groups as well, commenting that: “We really support free prior informed consent among Traditional Owners within our climate protection efforts. Moving corals from one sea country to another is not done without extensive consultations, to ensure the science is sound, that there is enough variability and thermal tolerance, but also that everyone is respected. The community is very collaborative, on the front foot, with a proactive approach, built in all the way through, from managers to regulators and tricky areas like the involvement of Traditional Owners.” Driving this point home, R01 sketched out the kinds of changes in terms of decision-making processes and regulatory approaches which would be necessary for ongoing efforts to be successful. In particular, they noted the broad need to engage with and create space for Traditional Owners and their understanding of ecosystems, specifically asserting that “self-determination and indigenous knowledge are two sides of the same coin”. The limitations and challenges observed by some interviewees with regard to the inclusion of indigenous communities remind us that putting those principles and ideals in practice requires engagement with diverse values and assumptions of actions, as well as acknowledgement that also engagement processes and participatory schemes can be imbued by power relations [58]. R20 added that even though “the restoration regulation space is very nascent, what’s going on in the Great Barrier Reef is super-duper compared to everywhere else, it has a restoration policy, adapting fisheries policies to accommodate for restoration, strong educational and outreach programs, and a platform that facilitates the respectful inclusion of 72 Traditional Owner Groups in the region that have a claim to owning sea country or forest territory.” Other respondents spoke about the ability for climate interventions to lead to new forms of ethics and ways of valuing nature, thereby promoting a deeper re-valuation in society at large. R08 specifically stated that: “As wonky as the technology is for some of these interventions, I don’t think it’s really about the technology. It’s about something deeper. It’s about changing the way we relate to seascapes and landscapes that are important to us, technology is just a set of tools that might help us. The critical step is that we’re willing to interact with seascapes in a different way, to see them as something different. This leads to a profoundly different way of thinking about ecosystems.” R06 added that Australia is leading a vanguard of “different ethics and climate priorities here; we’re very much a coastal society, very much a society used to living with natural resources, it’s creating an opportunity space for experiments and trials that doesn’t exist anywhere else on earth.” Both statements imply that Australian efforts have elements approaching Morrison’s final two levels of strategic and deeply radical actions, for they to change the fundamental values and drivers contributing to climate change.

6. Conclusion Radical climate interventions are often separated into categories that avoid any overlap in peer-reviewed research. For example, studies convened by the National Academies of Science of carbon removal are increasingly split from solar geoengineering [74–76], and interventions on land (such as reforestation) are treated as distinct from efforts to protect coral reefs in the sea or preserve ocean biodiversity. Within the scientific literature, this neglects synergies, both positive and negative, and justice tradeoffs among the different climate-intervention options (e.g., [77]). Yet, studies on such interventions in the Australian [29–31] and marine contexts [35] continue to buck this trend–perhaps because concrete national or issue-based agendas bring together options that are technically dissimilar but share a common purpose or impact a common environment or polity. Our study builds on these literatures and draws from expert interviews and extensive site visits to reveal the integrated drivers and dynamics of deploying reef regeneration, fogging and cloud brightening, community reforestation, and enhanced weathering as a portfolio for tackling an urgent problem, namely, the damage and destruction of the Great Barrier Reef. While acknowledging important distinguishing features of individual approaches, systemic perspectives are needed that account for the multiple interrelations between a variety of potential climate interventions. Treating such options as a portfolio reveals previously unidentified technology-level benefits and prospectively positive couplings, but also technology-level and systems-level risks. But a portfolio approach also creates opportunity for more transformative forms of change, particularly in combination with existing management approaches. Whereas some options such as solar geoengineering, engineered carbon removal or forestry may not be deeply radical in isolation, they become closer to representing the deeper forms of radicality when put into a portfolio. What is more, such a portfolio, if coupled with appropriate levels of governance, has the potential to improve the performance and effectiveness of more conventional approaches. The whole becomes greater than the sums of its parts—and the potential for compounded risks are juxtaposed with the chance of equally important rewards. Finally, by focusing on one of the only places where a portfolio of radical climate interventions is being assessed and employed, the current study scopes novel subjects and issues which might become increasingly important in the future. In particular, we elucidate the importance of considering land-sea interactions. Such interactions are germane both to a fuller range of potential risks (and benefits), especially considering the unique “biocultural” [51] importance of the ecosystems involved. In a similar vein, the lessons to be learned from the trials on the Great Barrier Reef establish it as a test laboratory, conceptually and practically, with relevance for other future efforts. Indeed, a number of experts underscored the intention and desire for those efforts that are successful to be translated to other contexts, e.g., threatened coral reefs in develop countries, where similar challenges are being confronted. In sum, we build upon Morrison et al. [1] to show that radicality might also emerge as a consequence of a range of climate interventions being undertaken together. When it comes to engendering public awareness of the extent of the threat to cherished ecosystems such as the Great Barrier Reef, perhaps the willingness to explore such radical options instills a sense that the problem is more severe than realized. The language of R22, is instructive here, to give the Reef a “fighting chance”. Expanding alongside the severity of the climate crisis, it could well be that the kinds of solutions considered send a message of their own.

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