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Geoengineering technologies such as injecting sulfur into the atmosphere to offset carbon dioxide will begin to seem less like science fiction and more like a reasonable solution, argues David Keith of Harvard Kennedy School. Not everyone's convinced that's a good idea, though. "Solar climate engineering is a flawed idea seeking an illusory solution to the wrong problem," counters Mike Hulme of King's College London.

Recent studies have shown, for example that the loss of important predators - from wolves in boreal forests to sharks in seagrass meadows - can lead to growing populations of terrestrial and marine herbivores, whose widespread grazing reduces the ability of ecosystems to absorb carbon.