According to Geophysical Research Letters, the Earth warmed half a degree last year due to reduced soot and sulfate particles. This was due to the pandemix quarantines. [Study Here](https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1029/2020GL091805)
So I’m genuinely asking: could increasing clean energy also cause global warming? Are we in a lose/lose situation?
In: Earth Science
According to [this graph](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/a2/Radiative_forcing_1750-2011.svg/1218px-Radiative_forcing_1750-2011.svg.png), soot makes the earth cooler but the effect is an order of magnitude lower than how much carbon dioxide is heating it up by.
So while, yes, putting less soot into the atmosphere *will* warm the planet up further, it would also prevent it from getting much worse than that – and the majority of the change is from already-existing CO₂ in the atmosphere.
It’s certainly a lose/lose situation, but I’d say it’s a lose slightly / lose severely situation.
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