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Good News on Global Warming

Posted by michael on from the fewer-cow-farts dept.

TheSync writes "OK, CO2 levels are rising, but iAfrica has a report that atmospheric methane concentrations are leveling off. Methane is the second most important greenhouse gas, accounting for one fifth of total warming. Researchers don't know why this is."

2 of 128 comments (clear)

  1. Projecting future methane concentrations by 2marcus · · Score: 2, Interesting

    "Although we can't be certain why methane concentrations have levelled out, we think it is in response to emissions declining due to better management of the exploration and use of fossil fuels and the increasing recovery of landfill methane.

    "If this global decline in methane emissions continues, global atmospheric methane concentrations will start to fall."

    The stabilizing of methane concentrations is great news! However, I think that it is overly optimistic to assume they will stay stable.

    First, the authors of the article admit they don't understand why concentrations have leveled off. We are not very good at determining methane emission inventories, because they aren't nearly as easy to track as carbon based fuels. Cows emit different amounts of methane if they are grass or corn fed, rice paddies are hard to monitor, there are many poorly understood natural sources like wetlands and warming tundra, etc. And the methane sink is hard to calculate, since it is a chemical reaction depending on temperature and hydroxyl radical concentrations, and we cannot directly measure OH radicals so those are very uncertain. So our estimates of emissions are uncertain by a factor of 2 or more.

    So when we see a pause in concentration increase, it is possible that it is due to long term structural changes in our economies (optimistic view).

    But I actually think it is due to the collapse of the Russian economy, since leaking Russian pipelines were a major source of methane, and with their disuse of course methane emissions dropped. But this is a one-time drop, I would expect other sources to continue to increase in the absence of major policy actions... (Pessimistic view)

    Or it could be some other complicated interaction. So I say, good news but hold on before assuming that the good news will continue...

  2. Re:Global warming is a crock by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting
    But if we blindly follow the environmentalists, we'll be reduced to squatting in ditches, poking berries up our noses. I'd personally like to see a move to nuclear energy and a hydrogen-based economy, but if and when that happens, the environmentalists will probably find a way to bitch about that too.

    Now Rush, Don't you have more serious things to worry about right now than trolling Slashdot? What with the narcotics squad investigating you and all? Why, you may be going to prison soon just as you've advocated for other drug addicts. It is a shame that it will be to minimum security facility though as I rather enjoyed the idea of you becoming someone's bitch. Maybe if you write George Bush and ask him real nicely he might give you one of those last minute pardon thingys after he gets shitcanned in '04. Also, have you ever thought about eating at Subway? Look what it did for Jared.

    Oh, and by the way, the study you referred to but evidently didn't read only pointed out the danger of relying too heavily on localized weather records to make global estimates (just as a warmer Greenland a millenia ago does not mean we are entering a new ice age.)