NASA Flew Gas Detectors Above California, Found ‘Super Emitters’ • Hacker News Board

Re: NASA Flew Gas Detectors Above California, Found ‘Super Emitters’

#21

Post by empath75 » Fri, Nov 08, 2019, 4:28 PM UTC

sorenn111 wrote: post #19

mthoodlum wrote: post #16

272,000 sites surveyed. 0.2% of the sites account for 46% of emissions. 272,000 sites * 0.002 = 544 sites. 544 sites account for 46% of the state's emissions. Yet the article states, "A handful of operations are responsible for the vast majority of methane emissions."

is your contention that 46% does not constitute a majority? I think the distribution is pareto enough that the headline is not so crazy.

if it has a pareto distribution, isn't that sort of tautological? If they eliminated all of those those sites, they'd reduce emissions by 46%, but of the remaining, wouldn't the top .2% still be producing roughly 50% of emissions?

Re: NASA Flew Gas Detectors Above California, Found ‘Super Emitters’

#22

Post by azernik » Fri, Nov 08, 2019, 4:29 PM UTC

scottlocklin wrote: post #18

azernik wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Methane is produced by anaerobic decomposition; composting is defined by the regular aeration (and sometimes watering) of the compost pile, which allows aerobic bacteria to break down the pile more cleanly. You do still get some GHGs, but much less. See: https://www.agric.wa.gov.au/climate-change/composting-avoid-... https://ww3.arb.ca.gov/cc/compost/compost.htm

Your own references point out that aerobic and anaerobic composting are different processes; the latter, which is most of backyard composting (if your heap ain't hot, it ain't aerobic), produces about as much methane as a landfill does, without the ability to collect and burn off the methane. It boggles me that people emotionally or tribally react to a fact about how chemistry works, google things which support their…

The first reference does not refer to anaerobic methods as "composting", but as fermentation:

> Decomposing organic material in anaerobic conditions — by microbes in the absence of oxygen — releases methane into the atmosphere. Anaerobic fermentation is common in landfill and open stockpiles such as manure piles [azernik: Manure piles are the second big contributor to methane emissions listed in OP.]

The second one just refers to "anaerobic decomposition".

In both cases this is something they mention as the alternative to composting, i.e. they literally define composting by its use of aerobic decomposition methods.

And yes, I agree that this is a complicated biochemical process that should be done by professionals in dedicated facilities (EDIT: which is where most composting happens in California), not in people's backyards. Where did you hear me arguing for amateur backyard piles?

Re: NASA Flew Gas Detectors Above California, Found ‘Super Emitters’

#23

Post by softwaredoug » Fri, Nov 08, 2019, 4:30 PM UTC

sorenn111 wrote: post #19

mthoodlum wrote: post #16

272,000 sites surveyed. 0.2% of the sites account for 46% of emissions. 272,000 sites * 0.002 = 544 sites. 544 sites account for 46% of the state's emissions. Yet the article states, "A handful of operations are responsible for the vast majority of methane emissions."

is your contention that 46% does not constitute a majority? I think the distribution is pareto enough that the headline is not so crazy.

To be a pedant it might be a plurality (biggest one), but not a majority (>50%)

Re: NASA Flew Gas Detectors Above California, Found ‘Super Emitters’

#24

Post by ptah » Fri, Nov 08, 2019, 4:31 PM UTC

scottlocklin wrote: post #18

azernik wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Methane is produced by anaerobic decomposition; composting is defined by the regular aeration (and sometimes watering) of the compost pile, which allows aerobic bacteria to break down the pile more cleanly. You do still get some GHGs, but much less. See: https://www.agric.wa.gov.au/climate-change/composting-avoid-... https://ww3.arb.ca.gov/cc/compost/compost.htm

Your own references point out that aerobic and anaerobic composting are different processes; the latter, which is most of backyard composting (if your heap ain't hot, it ain't aerobic), produces about as much methane as a landfill does, without the ability to collect and burn off the methane. It boggles me that people emotionally or tribally react to a fact about how chemistry works, google things which support their…

most backyard heaps are hot, it's actually not hard to do

Re: NASA Flew Gas Detectors Above California, Found ‘Super Emitters’

#25

Post by lm28469 » Fri, Nov 08, 2019, 4:32 PM UTC

sorenn111 wrote: post #19

mthoodlum wrote: post #16

272,000 sites surveyed. 0.2% of the sites account for 46% of emissions. 272,000 sites * 0.002 = 544 sites. 544 sites account for 46% of the state's emissions. Yet the article states, "A handful of operations are responsible for the vast majority of methane emissions."

is your contention that 46% does not constitute a majority? I think the distribution is pareto enough that the headline is not so crazy.

It depends on how you define a "handful" (which is a terrible term in that context, we're not talking about hazelnuts..). But for sure 46% isn't "the vast majority" of anything.

Re: NASA Flew Gas Detectors Above California, Found ‘Super Emitters’

#26

Post by azernik » Fri, Nov 08, 2019, 4:34 PM UTC

Spooky23 wrote: post #5

azernik wrote: post #2

The most interesting sentence isn't the headline, but rather: > Landfills accounted for 41% of the source emissions it identified, manure management 26% and oil and gas operations 26%. i.e. perhaps the best reason to recycle or compost is to avoid the methane emissions from natural decomposition.

That sort of undermines some of the carbon arguments used against recycling.

Maybe, maybe not. Some of the things we recycle (metals and plastics) aren't biodegradable and hence won't release methane if dumped in the ground.

Re: NASA Flew Gas Detectors Above California, Found ‘Super Emitters’

#27

Post by toomuchtodo » Fri, Nov 08, 2019, 4:38 PM UTC

ars wrote: post #20

gniv wrote: post #13

So what can be done about landfills? Burying stuff seems expensive/energy intensive.

You can burn the garbage for energy instead. Then you don't need as much oil from the ground. It also takes care of the plastic problem, since it burns the plastic very cleanly.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plasma_gasification is slightly better than incineration, although more costly to implement.

Re: NASA Flew Gas Detectors Above California, Found ‘Super Emitters’

#28

Post by donarb » Fri, Nov 08, 2019, 4:39 PM UTC

TrevorAustin wrote: post #7

Some very smart friends of mine do this with airplanes to find leaks in natural gas plants and pipelines: http://kairosaerospace.com/

Here's a talk one of their guys did at the last US PyCon that described how they collected the data using airplanes then analyzed it. They sell the service to oil companies to identify leaks from capped wells.

https://pyvideo.org/pycon-us-2019/fighting-climate-change-wi...

Re: NASA Flew Gas Detectors Above California, Found ‘Super Emitters’

#29

Post by azernik » Fri, Nov 08, 2019, 4:40 PM UTC

mc32 wrote: post #14

azernik wrote: post #2

The most interesting sentence isn't the headline, but rather: > Landfills accounted for 41% of the source emissions it identified, manure management 26% and oil and gas operations 26%. i.e. perhaps the best reason to recycle or compost is to avoid the methane emissions from natural decomposition.

Manure is pretty manageable, transportable, etc., are they can they use this to produce energy rather than just let it dissipate into the atmos?

They can; this is generally referred to as "biogas" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biogas). It's equivalent to Carbon Capture and Storage, but for all of these methane releases. It's only used on a relatively small scale in rural areas, mainly to save money on natural gas (which is also basically just methane) and its related distribution infrastructure; I haven't heard of any successful projects to harvest biogas on the large scales required to really cut down agricultural and landfill emissions. The main challenge seems to be purification, as biogas has all kinds of nasty contaminants that are bad for people and machinery.

Re: NASA Flew Gas Detectors Above California, Found ‘Super Emitters’

#30

Post by archi42 » Fri, Nov 08, 2019, 4:44 PM UTC

mthoodlum wrote: post #16

272,000 sites surveyed. 0.2% of the sites account for 46% of emissions. 272,000 sites * 0.002 = 544 sites. 544 sites account for 46% of the state's emissions. Yet the article states, "A handful of operations are responsible for the vast majority of methane emissions."

"If it's only 46%, then that's OK then?" Not that you're saying exactly that, but it's pretty close... The article gives 10%/2720 of the 272000 account for >50% of the emissions, that's still pretty bad.

The 0.2% is however good, in the sense that, it's probably easier/more efficient to make a few hundred huge changes instead of a hundred thousand small ones.