technology evaluations

We’ve spent the past decade testing, developing and evaluating different material approaches that could be used to make the Arctic more reflective.

While we are continuing to evaluate various technologies, a major focus for our team is reflective hollow glass microspheres.

This most-promising material choice can be thought of as a kind of small, fine, white beach sand that floats. In a sense, the material is a lot like snow. The reflective beads stick to ice and water on contact, and their chemical composition ensures they don't attract oil-based pollutants.

So far our evaluations indicate that these reflective microspheres are safe, effective, and practical.

A Natural Cycle

The most-promising material is made from a glass which is mostly silicon dioxide (“silica”). Silica is a compound made of two of the earth's most abundant materials: silicon and oxygen. The mass of Earth’s crust is 59% silica, the main constituent of more than 95% of the known rocks, and is the major constituent of sand.

This is a safe choice for animals and ecosystems because it has been extensively tested, and we will continue to  test it. All life on Earth has co-evolved with it in various forms on land, in our rocks, and dissolved in our oceans.

It’s a safe form of the material, large, amorphous and round enough to not cause harm to living creatures or the environment. Most importantly, because we've all co-evolved with silica, it does not bioaccumulate (i.e. it doesn’t become concentrated inside the bodies of living things).

Once dispersed in limited, strategic locations, the material would act as a thin reflective layer on Arctic ice.

The material breaks down to become a part of the 2.8 billion million tonnes that currently exist in the ocean, feeding the natural silica cycle on which so many organisms depend:

Sand silica can actually be a boon to the global silica cycle and ecosystems as long as they're over the size threshold that’s deemed harmful to life when breathed in, 10 micrometers. The silica microspheres average between 35-60 micrometers, well above that 10 micrometer threshold.

Spring Season

Our climate modeling research that takes into account weather patterns in the Arctic over the long- and short-term, indicates that Spring is likely the best time to deploy. This will help ice last longer into the summer months and can help to eventually rebuild multi-year reflective ice.

Interestingly, because snow is extremely reflective, if snow did cover our material it would actually be beneficial. When the snow eventually melts, the material is able to take over reflecting the sunlight, protecting the less-reflective ice underneath.

Fast Facts

• Floatable: each silica microsphere is hollow inside and fills up with air. As the ice melts, the microspheres float to the top allowing for continued reflecting radiation.

• Chemically unreactive: not prone to chemical reaction

• Wettable: sticks to ice and water the second it hits the surface

• Hydrophilic: doesn’t attract oil-based pollutants

• Perfectly spherical: no jagged edges