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Short abstract:

This paper explores the idea of science-based speculative futures through a reflection on the AmazonFACE experiment, currently being developed in Brazil. The experiment makes use of Free Air CO2 Enrichment as a proxy for climate futures wherein climate change has run its course.

Long abstract:

This paper explores the idea of science-based speculative futures through a reflection on the AmazonFACE experiment, currently being developed in Brazil. The experiment makes use of Free Air CO2 Enrichment as a proxy for climate futures wherein climate change has run its course. Through large-scale infrastructures, the experiment helps coordinate and coproduce (Jasanoff, 2004) international ‘big science,’ international scientific and climate cooperation, and global horizon work (Petryna, 2018; Petryna, 2022) in and about the Amazon. I will explore the first perceptions of my ongoing engagement with the project, as both a direct participant and a would-be ethnographer of the experiment. I explore the idea of science-based speculation as ways of theorizing how this experimental system helps to produce and materialize climate futures, as well as present (and future) climate governance for Brazil and beyond. I want to explore how science-based speculation is a futuring practice being leveraged for the ongoing labor of making the experiment viable and making it relevant for science and for policy. I also sketch some of the challenges of doing ethnographic work in large-scale experimental systems as part of the work of engaging with the project.