Asklemmy

You’ve heard of the greenhouse effect right? And how it’s named after greenhouses? You know what a greenhouse is? A glass building.

Those domes would be like ovens inside.

So instead of letting all our methane and CO2 escape into our atmosphere, you want to check notes create a bubble filled with farts and car emissions that can never escape?

Ever fry an ant under a magnifying glass? That.

Theoretically, this could stop global warming. Because we would all be dead.

Pretty sure this would make things worse. The dome would block out the jet stream making any rain minimal, and, even if tinted, the dome might actually focus the sun's energy on the city.

I think it was in SuperFreakanomics where they explored the viability of releasing the equivalent to volcano smoke into the atmosphere to shade the earth. The research was based on earth cooling after certain types of volcano eruptions.

I think the scientist conclusion was that it was pretty viable but introduces way too many other issues. The biggest being, who gets to control the earth thermostat.

EPA... EPA

There are probably better ways to block out the sun. Glass is heavy and would cause a lot of problems. Something that floats high in the sky would be better, but it would unfortunately move with the wind and weather. If you could get something big enough to space, in a geosynchronous orbit, it just might work...

I feel like this will just accelerate warming even more, just even more concentrated. You're basically making smaller greenhouse effect situations instead of the entire planet.

Is this a viable solution to way to avoid the effects of climate change? It's unrelated. The whole thing is to emit less carbon. If the dome does that, then yes.

Would it be cooler in the dome? Dude, domes are very cool. That's why chrome-dome is such a compliment. In terms of temperature, probably not. Heat needs to dissipate, and any sealed area is going to maintain thermal momentum more than an open space. Unless you started out cold, then it would stay cold for longer than an open space.

Would there be any negative repercussions? Yes. But you'll have to be more specific. It would be a huge undertaking that probably wouldn't be possible, emit lots of carbon, probably be protested by a lot of people, huge waste of resources, etc etc. Not to mention this experiment has been attempted many times and never been successful.

Would clouds form inside the dome? Could it rain in the dome? If it was big enough, and therefore yes.

Would the rain be more toxic than usual because car fumes wouldn’t dilute as well? How big do you want this dome to be?? It would have to be absolutely massive to make it worth having cars inside.

Could outside lightning break the dome if it got struck? Well, it's going to be pretty thick isn't it, so unlikely. It would blacken and melt the glass over time. But at the scale you're suggesting, it's essentially a mountain that would peak above the clouds.

Would there be a single point in the dome that the sunlight would be directed to that everyone would just have to avoid, else they just burst into flame? As .. fun as it would be to be smitten by the sun, I expect the glass would be so thick, it would be quite dim inside so, I don't think so.

Would they also have the ability to be launched into space?

Yeah, it would definitely rain inside the dome.

Source: my dad. He was in the Air Force, and once worked in a giant aircraft hangar that was big enough to accommodate an airship. He told me that the hangar had its own “weather”, and conditions inside the hangar were announced like weather forecasts.

That was only one hangar. Even though it was uncommonly large, it wasn’t nearly as big a city block.

On an unrelated note, I wonder how long it would take the inside of the dome to get filthy from things like exhaust.

My friend made a podcast episode exploring this idea in detail: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xj5r6HLGfcM

Disclaimer: I edited it.

I would say no because you would still cause a heat island effect from the glass. You would however reduce solar radiation.

They tried it in Big O. Led to giant robot attacks if I recall.