Emissions of Key Greenhouse Gas Stabilize 244
brian0918 writes "Multiple news sites are reporting that levels of the second most important greenhouse gas, methane, have stabilized". From Scientific American: "During the two decades of measurements, methane underwent double-digit growth as a constituent of our atmosphere, rising from 1,520 parts per billion by volume (ppbv) in 1978 to 1,767 ppbv in 1998. But the most recent measurements have revealed that methane levels are barely rising anymore — and it is unclear why." From NewScientist: "Although this is good news, it does not mean that methane levels will not rise again, and that carbon dioxide remains the 800-pound gorilla of climate change."
Water Vapor? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
Why?
First of all the sun remains constant. Secondly the evaporation from shallow channels would be much higher then deep colder bodies of water like lakes, rivers or the ocean.
Finally virtually every arable square inch of the planet is under cultivation for one thing or another.
Certainly that would add a substantial amount of water vapor into the atmosphere over and above what is already happening in the oceans and lakes.
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I meant that when you are considering the sun it's effects on the oceans and the irrigation areas constant.
"AGAIN you couldn't be more wrong. evaporation has nothing to with with depth, and everything to do with SURFACE AREA, of which the ocean clearly dwarfs our irrigation."
It has to with the temprature. Shallow waters heat up
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
That's because it's complete bollocks. You have it backwards: volcanoes produce a tiny fraction of the greenhouse gases humans cause to be emitted. Feel free to try to find a source for your "facts".
Re: (Score:2)
There are a lot of positive and negative feedbacks associated with it. For one thing, planting trees (a very "poplar" form of carbon sequestration) tends to increase water vapor, as the leaves transpire to keep themselves cool. Also, as oceans heat up (which might be kicked off by an increase in CO2), water vapor increases. This both traps more heat (positive feedback) and incr
Re: (Score:2)
Realclimate has an interesting discussion about the missing methane [realclimate.org].
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
The atmospheric lifetime of carbon dioxide is difficult to define because it is exchanged with reservoirs having a wide range of turnover times; IPCC 2001, (page 38 [grida.no]) gives a range of 5-200 years.
The lifetime of excess atmospheric carbon dioxide [agu.org] (Global Biogeochemical Cycles - American Geophysical Union)
If one assumes a terrestrial biosphere with a fertilization flux, then our best estimate is that the single half-life for excess CO2 lies within the range of 19 to 49 years
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Well, I guess it was good while it lasted!
Arctic (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Arctic (Score:5, Insightful)
The ice that is there may come and go (freeze and thaw) with the seasons, but it is indisputable that there is a hell of a lot more going than there is coming back.
Satellite imagery from the 70's to now is shocking and disappointing, even bordering on the scary (beyond scary, I think).
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Let me reference nasa.gov:
"While recent studies have shown that on the whole Arctic sea ice has decreased since the late 1970s, satellite records of sea ice around Antarctica reveal an overall increase in the southern hemisphere ice over the same period."
Get your stories straight or don't post..misinformation doesn't benefit anyone
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
http://www.gsfc.nasa.gov/topstory/2002082
Re:Arctic (Score:5, Interesting)
Not sure what your point is here since the GP didn't mention Anatartica, Arctic ice comes from the Arctic (north), Antartic ice comes from Antartica (south). Since the mid 1950's the Arctic ice cap has lost ~60% of it's volume (although one "skeptic" belives the missing ice is hiding behind Canada somewhere).
There has been very little change in the volume of the Antartic ice cap, however both the Antartic penninsula and Greenland have experinced a +3C rise in average tempratures compared to the +1C global average (accurately predicted by climate models I might add).
Re: (Score:2)
(Turns around) Nope, don't see it.
Behind us? What does this skeptic think we're doing? Hiding it in the freezer so we can lob snowballs across the 49th parallel next summer?
...or maybe our Northwest Passage defense force has hidden it in his pickup truck?
No, no, I know what it is. With all of our urban expansion, we've used up so much snow to build our igloos, mother nature just can't keep up!
Re: (Score:2)
The point is that they don't, also the total volume of ice that matters a lot more than the area it covers. The volume of Antaric ice has changed very little if at all, the increased sea ice in the Antartic may be due to Antartic glaciers moving into the sea at a slightly faster rate, however increased snowfall more or less balances the loss (unlike greenland and the Antartic pennisula where increased snowfall can not keep up with the loss)
Re: (Score:2)
Uh, link please?
Re: (Score:2)
If the predictions are right then this is the calm before the storm. If the Arctic melts, which it is, it'll release vast amounts of methane.
Uh, perhaps this is a naive question, but the frozen Arctic is, well, ice. Where is the carbon going to come from to make CH4? Now, there are probably some levels of CO2 trapped in ice bubbles, but speaking naively I don't see how this is a hugely significant contribution to global atmospheric carbon levels?
Not that a thawed Arctic wouldn't suck for other reaso
Re:Arctic (Score:5, Informative)
Much of that land is comprised of old peat bogs and other partially decomposed plant life.
As it is exposed and thaws it releases huge amounts of methane. This has already been observed and written about at length [google.com].
IIRC it's one of the greatest potential contributors to the "tipping point [google.com]".
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
It is suprising that methane has stabilized. There was a paper published this summer stating that melting permafrost was releasing methane at a much higher rate than expected. This would mean that some other source of methane would have to be slowing. If this is true it is good news indeed. Methane is a far more potent greenhouse gas than
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
But he's confused. Meth
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
His point is that we can't just burn the methane, because that would produce water vapor and carbon dioxide, which hardly makes the problem better...
I'm sorry? Methane has a forcing potential of up to 24 times as much of CO2.
Re: (Score:2)
It's a moot point unless we are talking huge releases over a short time (eg: Hydrates from the ocean floor), compared to CO2, Methane degrades rapidly in the atmosphere.
And that is also incorrect (Score:3, Informative)
Sources of methane (Score:4, Funny)
Does the stabilization of methane levels mean they're now feeding beano to cattle?
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Just in case bozos out there actually believe it: The IPCC estimates that 60% of methane produced comes from our agriculture, industry, and waste. Humans are the biggest single source of methane. In North America and Europe, the largest single source of methane comes from landfills. The largest source of natural methane comes from wetlands.
Re: (Score:2)
I have a relative who is an engineer for a company that produces bricks. A current strategy that this company uses is to build brick factories, which consume enormous amounts of power in their kilns, next to large landfills. This burns methane, reducing the amount in the atmosphere, and reduces the amount of fossil fuels burned at power generating facilities. http://www.pwmag.com/industry-news.asp?sectionID= 7 60 [pwmag.com]
Re: (Score:2)
This would be funnier if it weren't partially true. Australian farmers have been experimenting with a "vaccine" that stimulates the immune systems of cows to kill some of the natural microbes in their digestive tracts -- the ones responsible for releasing much of the methane. Given that they're messing with cows' biology in this way, I sure hope it doesn't turn out that cow-methane isn't the problem we think it is.
Burping, not farting (Score:2)
Lots of methane comes from anaerobic activity (rotting vegetation/sawdust, landfills, waste water processing etc). Even atural swamps and forest floor decomposition produce a lot of methane and CO2.
Methane is far worse than CO2, thus it is preferable to burn off methane than let is escape into the atmosphere. Better still to bu
Obligatory (Score:2, Informative)
I'll bet global methane emissions can be shown to track the gross sales of Taco Bell.
Hmmmm... their stock has climbed steadily since August [nasdaq.com]. Perhaps the methane readings are due to their recent switch to Canola oil [marketwatch.com].
That's not as much help as you might think. (Score:4, Informative)
From the vague article, these appear to be sea-level measurements - so the density of methane in the upper atmosphere (where it actually matters) will continue to grow for maybe 10 years before it starts to level off.
We are seeing the effects of methane growth rates in the 1980's and 1990's...it'll get worse before it gets better.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Let me get this straight (Score:5, Funny)
The methane gas was coming from an 800-pound gorilla?
Re: (Score:2)
The methane gas was coming from an 800-pound gorilla?
Gentlemen, I have our solution.
We wait till wintertime rolls around... the 800lb gorillas simply freeze to death!
Re: (Score:2)
As I understand it, this 800-pound gorilla lives in the Arctic!
American beer (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
The chief cause of beer flatulence is yeast cells. The second biggest cause is complex sugar. It is something that your bowel can adjust to over time, so people who regularly drink beer with yeast in it aren't so affected by it. Ironically, the American swill beer you mention is filtered and pasteurized, so it contains no yeast at all. And anybody who's tasted a Coors Light can also tell you that the complex sugar content is practically nonexistent. So, American megaswill should be among the LEAST likely be
Scares the bejesus out of me (Score:4, Interesting)
Now, out of the blue, something *utterly* unexpected, inexplicable and major happens - the rate of methane emission levels out; and no one has a *CLUE* why.
Well, I can hear this ticking noise...
I sure hope we figure out interplanetry colonization soon.
You know - just in case.
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
The whole endevour of scientific inquiry consists of applying models to data, just because a model is not perfect does not mean it is not usefull (eg: Newtonian mechanics).
For your edification: Here are some common myths [realclimate.org] about the hockey stick from the people who created the original (Mann, et al)
CO2 (Score:2, Informative)
Actually, carbon dioxide is a small player. Water is responsible for at least 90% of the Earth's greenhouse effect. It is amazing to me how everyone is so eager to jump on a single bandwagon when it comes to global warming. Anyone who offers contradictory information is immediately dubbed as an "oil company lover" or a "right-wing anti-environmentalist." The first unfortunate truth is that science on both sides is being funded by
Re: (Score:2)
Re:CO2 (Score:4, Informative)
Re:CO2 does leave the atmosphere easily (Score:2)
Furthermore plants grow faster with the increase of CO2. This is proven and clearly obvious... obvious to any layman who can think and totally obvious to any intelligent biologist since they have been doing greenhouse studies on this for decades.
Since plant
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Last I heard, the oceans covered 2/3rd of the surface of the Earth. It should be pretty clear that, in contrast, evaporation through irrigation on arable land (a fraction of the remaining 1/3) will be a drop in the bucket.
The same can't be said for the production of CO2 from combustion of fossil fuels versus organic processes. And I have never seen spontaneous precipitation of l
Re: (Score:2)
Yes, *some* types of plants grow better in higher concentrations of CO2. Not all, some. That's important because there are a lot of different kinds of plants on this planet and they don't all react in the same way to their environments. (In fact, I seem to recall that some types of plants grow worse in higher CO2 environments. It'd be a pity if those includes grasses, wouldn't it?)
So you're "obvious" fact is, as obvious fact
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
Another thing to remember is that we're talking about climate *change*. The fact that water vapor provides most of the Earth's warm comfy blanket is less important than the fact that we're adding another layer, because the addition is what is driving the c
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
You seem to know a lot. So maybe you could then find me a single proper paper appearing in a real peer reviewed scientific journal in the last decade that says CO2 isn't to blame for global warming.
If you're going to spout off about how increasing CO2 emissions isn't a problem when the rest of the world thinks it is you could at least provide a link to your nonsense you're trying to pass as fact.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Glad to help.... (Score:2)
Water vapor, anyone? (Score:2)
Um, yeah.
The 800 pound gorilla of climate change is really water vapor, but let's not talk about that...
Re: (Score:2)
There's a difference here, and it lies in what's causing the estimating climate changes.
Is that more due to rising H20 levels or rising CO2 levels?
This is huge. (Score:2)
The Bullet In the Coffin: Accurate Stat Statements (Score:2)
And the rise of CO2 levels "does not mean that they will not descend again".
And the rise in temperatures "does not mean that they will not lower again".
No. We'll only repeatedly see:
And the fact that our models were wrong many times "does
Re:The Bullet In the Coffin: Accurate Stat Stateme (Score:2)
I lost all faith in (pseudo)-scientific (pseudo)-"studies" and the so-called media that reports them when, a few years ago, some study was published that said pregnant women should not drink water. Riiiight... Just like Sweet-n-Low will give me cancer (if I drink the equivalent of 350 soft drinks a day). These "scientific" conclusions are ridiculous. I might as well come out and say, "water must kill because 100% of all people who drink it, die." Of course, an astute person would recognize the "post ho
This Little Light Of Mine (Score:2, Funny)
"... it is unclear why ..." oh ain't it though? (Score:2)
Yes. Unclear. But one must assume it must only be a minor (and temporary) effect that will not detract from the alarming global changes that are forecast. Right? It could not possibly be revealing the fact that so much is not understood about the atmosphere that any current attempt at drawing firm conclusions about the present state (let alone future states) is pure guessing. And while
Natural gas prices and methane leaks (Score:3, Interesting)
Natural gas production [pnl.gov] is the leading source of Russian methane emissions, for instance. And in 1990, Russia leaked as much as 26 million tons of methane. It was probably worth their while to plug some of these leaks at current prices.
CowboyNeal dead ?!?! (Score:2, Funny)
NOOOOOOOOOO!
Re:Wait a minute... (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:2, Redundant)
<sarcasm>Actually, no. Our knowledge is complete. Visit the Creationism Museum to learn more.</sarcasm>
Fixed that for you...
Re:Wait a minute... (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Sarcasm aside I do worry what would happen if some one put it into the minds of the fundy Christians that Global Warming was the precursor to revelations and the like. With their collective political power in the first world I think we'd have a huge problem on our hands just like we do with their infection of the common understanding of science among the
Re: (Score:2)
Science has never been complete, and in fact complete knowledge is illusory. Anyone claiming to have complete knowledge is either a fool or thinks you are, or both. The anti-science contingent of Protestant fundamentalism, from whence springs evolution and global warming "skepticism" in the USA, pretends that science makes the claim of complete knowledge, and pretends to be shocked when it doesn't actually have it. Partly it's a cynical, spec
Re: (Score:2)
Using their patties for biofuel is something I think North Americans aren't looking at closely enough. There's definately fosssil-type fuel to be had from their back end production.
Re: (Score:2)
I believe it is the latter. They are a significant contributor to the methane problem AND we should be harnessing every bit of methane we can as fuel.
For the record, cows produce a lot of methane from both ends. Their 4 stomachs and digestion produce a fair amount from that end, and we've all smelt the other ends productio
Re: (Score:2)
Re:I wonder if this has to do with BSE (Score:5, Informative)
Or their crap has no methane and yet can still be used for fuel (your dichotomy is false).
Anyway, http://www.ciesin.org/TG/AG/liverear.html [ciesin.org] claims that livestock causes 15 of all organic-sourced methane "emissions". Mostly due to fermentation in their stomachs, mostly from low quality feed.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
This just got me wondering... what do you get when you oxidize (burn) methane? Oh, great, more CO2!
If only we could generate energy efficiently by partially oxidizing sugar. At least we'd have a useful byproduct.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Termites 11%
Oceans 8%
Hydrates 5%
http://www.epa.gov/methane/sources.html#natural [epa.gov]
So my first guess would be a global reduction of wetlands. Nope, I shall not look for evidence now, it is 3a.m. .
CC.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
"Scientists have discovered why atmospheric levels of methane have stabilised in recent years, but their findings are bad news for industry and agriculture where rising emissions of the greenhouse gas have been revealed.
The scientists, including researchers from France's Climate and Environment Science Laboratory and Australia's national science agency CSIRO, found that a reduction in natural emissions of methane from wetlands has been maskin
Or maybe drought (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Why has this been hidden by the mods?
This is a valid point, there
Re: (Score:2)
Anyone who disputes climate change is a moron. The debate isn't about whether climate change occurs (of course it does). It's about who caused it.
I don't care which side of the debate you're on -- at least understand what is being debated.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Unless, of course, the problem wasn't serious enough to warrent attention in the first place, as many environmental skeptics have been saying all along.
Re: (Score:2)
That would be a rather circular reasoning method, since the purpose of this is to try and prove that greenhouse gasses cause higher temperatures. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice_core [wikipedia.org] suggests that the way to tell what the temperature was at the time is to compare hydrogen and oxygen isotopes, and is backed up by http://www.gisp2.sr.unh.edu/MoreInfo/Ice_Cores_Pas t.html [unh.edu]. I believe you can also determine how cold it was when the water froze by measuring the oxygen in the i
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Weather forecasts are pretty accurate. And th
Re: (Score:2)
Climatology is not alone, string theory is another area that has made no accurate models or predictions. But string theorists aren't running round claiming they've got anything more than a very weak id
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
I am 54 years old. 44 years ago, I remeber walking home from midnight mass in a blizzard. This was in NY City, and garbage trucks had to pile snow and the end of the streets since there was no where to plow it all. We had snow mountains for a month or so. All of this is anecdotal, and certainly not a "geological" time period.
And yet, I have noticed changes which seem to be born out by hard data that something is happening over a period of 29 years, namely that in certain key areas, such as Alaska in t [noaa.gov]
Re: (Score:2)
The question is was this normal or abnormal for winter at that time. Back in the day the Thames used to freeze over and they would have a fair on the ice. But before that in the middle ages it was warm and mild.
Also, I do remember the summer of '76 in the UK, glorious warm and mild. Of course every other summer was lously and I
Re:20yrs is not a geological timeframe (Score:4, Insightful)
There is, of course, a vast difference between predicting weather - which is a local phenomena, with significant specificity - and predicting the climate trends - which is averaging general trends globally. Consider, for instance, that it is very hard to stand on a beach and predict the exact height and shape of the next wave and precisely where and when it will break. On the other hand predicting the approximate height and time of the next high tide is rather easier. GCMs are, indeed, currently rather poor at making predictions down to the level of day to day local weather. They have, however, been very accurate [realclimate.org] at predicting year on year global climate.
As noted above, contrary to your claim, the models have proved to be remarkably robust and accurate. They are also, contrary to popular perception in some circles, not just a big pattern matching machine that are "trained" on past data. They are models that are fed in physics. Yes, there are some tweakable parameters, as there should be in any model where there is some uncertainty. The greatest area of uncertainty in models currently is clouds, since they can be both a positive or negative feedback depending on the exact nature of their formation. Of course this problem is taken very seriously and there is a lot of study. The last IPCC report had considerable detail summarising that work [grida.no]. The simple reality, however, is that the models have worked pretty well, and have, in fact, made significant predictions that have since been observed [grist.org].
Historical temperatures from ice-cores are determined by ratios of hydrogen or oxygen isotopes in the ice. The guts of the issue is that when combined in water the different isotopes, being different masses, fractionate out at slightly different temperatures, thus the exact isotope ratio is a function of many things, but a very signficant factor is the prevailing temperature at the time the water became vapout before precipitting out. Thus the ratio, while not an exact indication of specific temperatures (unless the many other factors are also accounted for), is a good indicator of general temperature trends over long time scales. For more detail see here [wileywater.com]. The result is that, using ice cores, we can plot temperature and carbon dioxide independently [wikipedia.org].
Furthermore, more recent temperature reconstructions (as in reconstructions of only the past 1000 years or so) rely not on ice cores but on a wide variety of sources including coral, tree rings, glaciers, and more. Usually many of these different methods are cross referenced with each other to create any single reconstruction. The results can be seen in this plot [wikipedia.org] of 10 different reconstructions by different independent teams. The results, as you can see, while different, all show the same trend. If you're still uncertain, feel free to use the
Re: (Score:2)
Hansen's prediction was basically it's going to get warmer over the
Re: (Score:2)
But then, if they are vauge they are not helping people understand the issues.