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  • NEWS FEATURE

Can artificially altered clouds save the Great Barrier Reef?

Australian scientists are rushing to develop new technologies — such as ways to block sunlight — to help preserve corals in the face of climate change.
  1. Jeff Tollefson
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A boat using the sea-spraying cloud brightening system over the Great Barrier Reef in Australia during a 2021 trial.

During a field trial, a turbine generates plumes of seawater droplets that rise into the sky. Credit: Brendan Kelaher/SCU

In place of its normal load of cars and vans, the repurposed ferry boat sported a mobile science laboratory and a large fan on its deck as it left Townsville, Australia, in March. Researchers dropped anchor in a coral lagoon some 100 kilometres offshore and then fired up the cone-shaped turbine, which blew a mist of seawater off the back of the boat. What happened next came as a welcome surprise: after briefly drifting along the ocean surface, the plume ascended into the sky.

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Nature 596, 476-478 (2021)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-021-02290-3

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