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‘Climate geoengineering’ is becoming an increasingly prominent focus for global discussion and action. Yet, in academic, policy and wider political discourse, the frequent shorthand term ‘geoengineering’ is routinely used in very broad, ambiguous and multivalent ways. This study aims to contribute to understandings of these divergent current framings of ‘geoengineering’ and their implications. It asks not only about disparate understandings of geoengineering itself, but also what these reveal about deeper political dynamics around climate change, science and technology. To this end, the paper applies Q methodology to analyse geoengineering as a subjective discursive construct, the bounds of which are continually negotiated and contested. Thirty-five participants from a variety of political and institutional backgrounds in the UK, US, Canada and Japan undertook a ‘Q sort’ of 48 statements about geoengineering …