Applying the multi-level perspective to climate geoengineering: sociotechnical bottlenecks for negative emissions and cloud seeding technologies

Carbon dioxide removal and negative emissions technologies, such as bioenergy with carbon capture (BECCS) and direct air capture with carbon storage (DACCS), may have an important role to play in reducing greenhouse gas emissions (GHGs). Cloud seeding (CS), a controversial form of weather modification, might also help to reduce the severity and intensity of storms and address widespread drought from climate change. Nevertheless, costs, technical complexity, social acceptance, and other unknown risks have so far kept these climate geoengineering interventions at uncertin levels of research and deployment in the response to climate change. Although a large corpus of literature sufficiently deals with the technical aspects underlying such interventions, the nontechnical and social aspects of geoengineering mark fertile research territory. This study applies the sociotechnical concept of the Multi-Level Perspective (MLP)—commonly used for analysis of sustainability transitions—to explore the risks, costs, uncertainties, and complexities of rolling out BECCS in the United Kingdom, DACCS in the United States, and cloud seeding in Australia. We examine the interaction of the MLP across three levels (niche, regime, and landscape), then explore windows of opportunity and technological transition bottlenecks. Specifically, we show that BECCS align with the “stretch-and-transform” transition, DACCS can be construed as “fit-and-conform”, and CS can be seen as within the “stretch-and-conform.”