it could take something as simple as iron supplements to combat the spectre of global warming. It was John H Martin, an ocean scientist who had first suggested that fertilising the seas with thousands of tonnes of iron compounds could result in the sudden spurt of marine plant organisms called phytoplanktons (example algae) which would gobble up huge amounts of carbon dioxide ( co 2 ) dissolved in sea water, not unlike terrestrial plants removing co 2 from the air. Reducing co 2 , a prime greenhouse gas in the atmosphere, would lead to a cooler world, the proposal surmised.

A panel of the National Research Council, deciding to put to test this suggestion, first undertook a small-scale experiment in 1993. However, this experiment failed before the