Opening up the societal debate on climate engineering: how newspaper frames are changing

Figures & data

Table 1 Frame elements on geoengineering.

Frame elements	Sentences or phrases referring to...
Risks and uncertainty	Anticipated risks but also to the “unknown unknowns”, doubts about the effectiveness of the technology
Scientific discoveries	Creator of wonderful things, cool ideas, benefits of the technology, it is cheap and easy
Catastrophe	Catastrophe, disaster, we are running out of time, dangerous climate change, runaway climate, points of no return
Ambivalence	A pro and con argument, trying to form a balanced opinion on the matter, risks versus benefits
Mitigation	Relationship between climate engineering and mitigation, moral hazard dilemma, climate engineering is not an alternative
Call for science	The need of sound science, the wish to treat the technology such as any other science, we need to know more
Current approach is failure	How current strategies to tackle global warming are failing, mitigation will not be sufficient and is going too slow
Benefits for society	How the technology will solve the problem and help society, it can buy us time, offer us an escape route
Necessity	The need for the technology to save us, it is our only hope, there may be no other option
Ethical principles	Questions about right or wrong, is it acceptable, relationship between man and nature, belief in technology, hubris, (un)naturalness climate
No trust in science	How science is in over its head, it will never happen, it's just false hope, pie in the sky ideas, mad and wacky scientists
Governance/public accountability	A call for (international) control, who gets to turn the knobs, who controls, how will the public be involved?
Afraid of science	Concerns about science taking a wrong turn, science making things even worse, opening Pandora's box, runaway science
Out of proportion	“Extreme”, “radical” or “drastic” measures. This is like Dr Strangelove, or pushing the panic button
Man can change nature	Man's ability to control nature, technological fix, quick-fix, we have changed nature and we can do it again, we can play god
Conflict	Conflict between different interests, groups within society, there is a debate, it's a battle, who is going to win?
Economic prospect	Economic investments, by both markets and government, competitiveness, funding of climate engineering
Last resort	Climate engineering only as a last ditch solution, last resort, if all else fails
Science fiction	Science fiction, fantastical ideas (although often it is said that these technologies used to be science fiction)
Climate is complex	Climate as a complex system, complex machine, we do not understand it enough
Political risk	Political conflict, fears about unilateral action, “rogue states”
It's serious	The fact that climate engineering is gaining attention, it is serious people who are talking about it seriously

Table 2 Factor analysis of frame elements.

Frames	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9
Ambivalence (n = 128)
Ambivalence	0.768
Call for science	0.619
Risk and uncertainty	0.528
Avoiding catastrophe (n = 96)
Necessity		0.681
Last resort		0.658
Catastrophe		0.639
Pragmatism (n = 74)
Science fiction			0.686
Current approach is failure			0.593
It's serious			0.520
Norms and values (n = 108)
Afraid of science				0.690
Mitigation				0.621
Ethical principles				0.519
Benefits for society (n = 76)
Economic prospect					0.744
Benefits for society					0.643
Controversy (n = 36)
Climate is complex						0.842
Conflict						0.667
Techno-fix (n = 82)
Scientific discoveries							0.836
Man can change nature							0.580
Governance (n = 51)
Political risk								0.754
Governance/public accountability								0.731
Out of proportion (n = 27)
Out of proportion									0.888
No trust in science									0.426
Eigenvalue	3.008	1.726	1.493	1.421	1.325	1.269	1.204	1.113	1.100
R ^2	0.137	0.078	0.068	0.065	0.060	0.058	0.055	0.051	0.046

Figure 1 Amount of leading English-speaking newspaper articles with geoengineering as main topic, over time.

Figure 2 Percentage of frames over time (2006–2011).