As the world continues to grapple with the challenges of an environment that has been greatly changed by pollution, scientists have continued to work on projects aimed at manipulating and shaping the world in unexpected ways.

The most controversial and hotly debated of all these topics (aside from climate change itself) has been that of geoengineering, a topic many news sites dare not breach for fear of being labeled as conspiracy theorists.

But now, the cat is officially out of the bag, as even Forbes recently dropped a bombshell on its website: a new plan from Harvard scientists to “tackle climate change through geoengineering by blocking out the sun,” an admission that strangely enough has managed to stay off the radar screens of most major online media publications.

Harvard Announced Gates-Funded Project to Block Out the Sun

Mimicking the effects of a huge volcano eruption, the $3 million Harvard plan, which announced it would be funded by Bill Gates, is called the Stratospheric Controlled Perturbation Experiment (ScoPEx).

The experiment was expected release launch small particles of calcium carbonate in the air sometime in spring 2019, and is based on the effects of large volcanic eruptions and their effects on the planet’s temperature, the Forbes article said.

In February of this year, it was announced that the project was being delayed yet again, however. Its June 2022 launch date has been delayed yet again, according to Harvard’s Solar Geoengineering Research Program.

Sun Blocking Effect Expected to Mimic a Volcanic Eruption 

One example is the 1991 eruption of Mt. Pinatubo in the Philippines, which released 20 million tons of sulfur dioxide into the stratosphere. The resulting effect was a cooling of the entire planet by .5 degrees Celsius for a year and a half.

In the case of this pending project, the Gates-Funded Harvard team has been planning to use a balloon suspended 12 miles above the Earth to spray the tiny chalk particles across a kilometer-long area, which the goal of reflecting the Sun’s rays away from the planet, The Independent reported.

These scientists contend that mimicking such an effect on a planet-wide scale could save the planet from global warming and stop sea ice from melting.

Critics of the plan argue that it could potentially have devastating effects on food crops for locals and natives in the region.

Team member and research David Keith disagreed saying the benefits may outweigh the potential negative impacts.

“Despite all of the concerns, we can’t find any areas that would be definitely worse off,” he told Nature.

“If solar geoengineering is as good as what is shown in these models, it would be crazy not to take it seriously.”

In summer 2020, the website WBUR out of Boston shared an update on the project. The Harvard scientists, Keith and atmospheric chemistry professor Frank Keutsch, were working on the experiment in a laboratory setting, and planned to release aerosol into the stratosphere to see how it behaves.

Can We Really Trust Bill Gates With the Health of Our Planet?

But to some, the plan sounds eerily reminiscent of a famous episode of The Simpsons in which local billionaire and nuclear power plant owner C. Montgomery Burns (aka Mr. Burns) causes darkness to envelope the town of Springfield, which the famous family of Homer, Marge, Bart, Lisa, Maggie and a host of others call home.

“You must be very proud,” Burns’ assistant Waylon Smithers asks in the video clip below from the show.

“No, not while my greatest nemesis still provides our customers with free light, heat and energy. I call this enemy, the sun,” Burns says.

You can also learn more about the patents Gates and oil corporations have on Geoengineering in the 3-minute interview below with Clive Hamilton, author of the book ‘Earthmasters: The Dawn of the Age of Climate Engineering,’ from Yale University Press:

While most people don’t associate Gates with greed because of the sheer amount of money he’s given to through his philanthropical arm the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, others question where his true allegiances lie, given his longtime support for Monsanto, GMOs, and other controversial technologies and corporations over recent years.