What Drydess said and I do completely agree that it's something that needs further exploration.
engineering the solution is honestly a far more realistic option than trying to cap existing industry
figuring out a way to suck up a specific resource is what humans are great at. i'm willing to bet that with sufficient funding we could come up with something that can significantly augment the environment's ability to consume CO2
and ~in the scenario~, not necessarily ~inevitably when~ this actually becomes an overwhelmingly obvious issue - to the point where mainstream deniers like Annoying Orange would capitulate and join the fight against climate change, a united human effort will easily reverse climate change. when humanity manages to unite, it can, does, and has done amazing things.
we turned fire - the symbol of destruction - into the core mechanism of all industry. we turned electricity - a mysterious force of unknown cause and, much like fire, a symbol of power and destruction - into the core mechanism of modern technology. we were born without wings, and so we built aircraft. we unlocked the secrets of the atom, and created weapons of war whose seismic shocks are detectable globally. we have engineered a highly autonomous and cognitively diverse human hivemind which we downplay as the internet.
our scientists and engineers nowadays are working on, among other things:
-replacing body parts with mechanical alternatives
-unlocking the secrets of the atom once more - through fusion, this time, rather than fission
-harnessing quantum mechanics, a field of research whose discoveries largely contradict conventional understanding of physics and chemistry
-automating low-level labor entirely - this would be the first step to a post-scarcity world
-inventing a medicine that can end age-based mortality
simply scrubbing the air and sea is, in light of our other achievements, rather simple.
scale is the only real issue, but... mass production is what created all the CO2 in the first place, and we weren't even trying to make the CO2.
the irony of it all is that climate change is only a significant threat so long as we deny it.
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