andyjsong

MakeSunsets has raised ~$1.8M from angels + VCs and another ~$133K in Cooling Credit sales over the past 12 months from individuals [1]. These purchases directly fund stratospheric aerosol injection — bringing awareness and cooling the Earth.

We’ve applied to SBIRs, explored DAOs, crowdfunding platforms, and are in conversations with family offices and UHNWI.

Most of our closed deals? They’ve come from Twitter and Substack. The key: talking directly to decision-makers — not committees.

[1] Climate dads: https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0685/0042/2976/files/Make_...

What took you so long? :) The book came out in 2021. He's even written about Make Sunsets in his substack: https://x.com/MakeSunsets/status/1871734075008115081

Augment and repair are not the right words here. Since the Industrial Revolution, we've already been cooling the Earth by influencing radiative forcing; we're just doing it the worst way possible, by applying sunscreen at the wrong altitude (troposphere) and using too much of it.

Here's further reading if you'd like to learn more https://www.keepcool.co/p/no-one-is-coming-to-save-us-time-t...

TL;DR India should be hotter, but due to sulfur dioxide emissions at ground level the rate of warming is a third less. For reference, the current rate of warming is ~0.25C per decade.

Risk vs. Benefits: https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2025/01/ma...

Or the scientist Bill Gates calls when he wants to learn about climate change: https://makesunsets.com/blogs/news/optional-climate-change

If you want to understand the risks of doing vs. not doing SAI check out this recently published paper: https://climate.uchicago.edu/insights/comparing-the-benefits...

The next step is to redeploy the SO2 that has unintentionally cooled Earth and do it better in the stratosphere with a fractional amount that we've tolerated since the start of the Industrial Revolution.

Here's an article I recently wrote if you want to understand from a macro-level: https://www.keepcool.co/p/no-one-is-coming-to-save-us-time-t...

The last point about "fossil fuels can continue" is also called moral hazard. Regardless of SAI or not, we're going to keep using whatever is the cheapest and accessible fuel we have available, and right now, it's hydrocarbons pulled from the ground. We've already gotten good at recklessly warming our planet and unintentionally cooling it, so we might as well get good at cooling intentionally.

The specific experiment mentioned in the article was halted due to a lack of community engagement. The organizers failed to inform or invite the local mayor to the deployment event, leading to public backlash when residents learned about it from the New York Times. Much of the misunderstanding came from a perception that the experiment involved risky technology, though in reality, it was as simple as using a patio mister mounted on a retired warship.

What I was referencing, however, is Stratospheric Aerosol Injection (SAI), which differs significantly from MCB in both the type of aerosol used (typically sulfur dioxide, SO₂) and the location of the injection (the stratosphere, rather than the lower atmosphere). If you're interested in learning more about SAI, here's an excellent primer: https://unchartedterritories.tomaspueyo.com/p/so2-injection

Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/09/climate/ozone-hole-restor...

The impact of SO2, including its effectiveness and atmospheric residence time, varies based on its deployment location (latitude, longitude, altitude), concentration, and particle size.

For instance, the International Maritime Organization (IMO) 2020 regulations have reduced SO2 emissions from cargo ships in the troposphere, leading to decreased respiratory illnesses near ports and less acid rain. However, this reduction in SO2 has also warmed ocean shipping lanes, prompting discussions about reintroducing sulfur into the troposphere. [1]

Deploying SO2 in the stratosphere, above most of the atmospheric water vapor and where winds reach speeds of 200kph, allows it to spread globally and remain airborne longer (1 to 3 years). This higher placement necessitates less frequent applications for the desired reflective effect. The 1991 eruption of Mt. Pinatubo demonstrated this, injecting 20 million tons of SO2 into the stratosphere [2], cooling the Earth by 0.5°C and, according to some models, temporarily reversing decades of warming.

Stratospheric aerosol injection (SAI) is likened to Earth's sunscreen, [3] a temporary measure to reflect the Sun's energy and mitigate warming while we address the larger challenge of removing over a trillion tons of greenhouse gases emitted since the 1850s and transitioning away from fossil fuels.

Climate change demands immediate action, and SAI offers us the critical time needed to live in a world with fewer catastrophic climate events.

[1] https://docs.google.com/document/d/1vGEDuEn6uikvGZpR9oZplPPh...

[2] For reference, estimates suggest that global SO2 emissions were around 131 million tons in 1970 and continued to rise, peaking at approximately 150 million tons by the late 1980s in the troposphere.

[3] https://twitter.com/MakeSunsets/status/1741336520366444822

Cool regards, Andrew Song Co-founder of Make Sunsets

There is a land war in Europe, what makes you think the world can "come together" if we should or should not experiment with stratospheric aerosol injection? Most likely what will happen is the US or some other developed nation will unilaterally decide we need to do this without any governance, and they will choose us as the deployment partner.

>Instead of that rhetoric, let's hear you stand up for people coming together and getting things done

So far our customers have been law profs, SW engineers, IT professionals, accountants, retired pharma exec, students, and other white-collar jobs. This supports my theory that only the people who have time to worry about global warming is a privileged class, and this comment thread further proves that we have the luxury to discuss such topics.

We deeply respect what scientists have been sounding alarm for years, but more people are worried about putting food on table than catastrophic weather events that might happen in the future.

Totally open to hearing another way to slow down global warming that isn't as fucking crazy as dimming the sun, but we're all addicted to burning dead dinos. Unless we put the environment over profits and scale up CO2 sucking tech, our children will have incredibly shitty lives.

> Why did they choose Mexico? They couldn't get away with it in the US, so it's ok to do experiments with the atmosephere of the people of Mexico? After they were forced to stop,

We chose Mexico as our initial launch site because deployment in the tropics have greater cooling per gram via increased particle residence time [1] (another source)[2]. Luke also bought land in Mexico a year ago prior to starting Make Sunsets to build his primary residence. The company was incorporated in October 2022. The US/Mexico does not have a ban on deploying sulfur dioxide in the atmosphere, if there was, all commercial air flights would be banned as well. Here is the original press release from the Mexican government: https://www.gob.mx/semarnat/prensa/la-experimentacion-con-ge... and our response: https://makesunsets.com/blogs/news/mexico

[1] https://presentations.copernicus.org/EGU21/EGU21-12131_prese...

[2] https://www.pnnl.gov/sites/default/files/media/file/Sensitiv...