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

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

#91

Post by tastyfreeze »

punnerud wrote: post #78

In Norway we place plastic over the (food) landfill, gather the methane and use it for electricity production. When there is no more methane the same landfill is used as soil for food production.

That sounds very efficient. In the US organic and non-organic "kitchen" waste is often combined. While it is becoming more common to separate compostable materials from others it is still more of an exception.

Many landfills do harvest methane from the combined heap of trash. However, after methane production ends we are still left with compost with tons of plastic.

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

#92

Post by ping_pong »

punnerud wrote: post #78

In Norway we place plastic over the (food) landfill, gather the methane and use it for electricity production. When there is no more methane the same landfill is used as soil for food production.

How is the land not contaminated with chemicals, poisons, etc? Do they test for all of that?

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

#93

Post by mytailorisrich »

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #87
bravo22 wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Per the article, most of the sites were landfills, dairy farms, and natural gas facilities. All of those are directly controlled by consumer demand.

This is demonstrably false, please stop perpetuating it. CO2 emissions are 90% down to tragedy of the commons. I can have the exactly same lifestyle in Saudi, in USA and in France, yet per capita emissions in France are 3 times lower than those in USA, and 5 times lower than in Saudi. People in Saudi do not have 5 times better lives. In fact a huge chunk of the population is an underclass, some work as slaves on cons…

France emits close to zero for electricity production but nevertheless the "American way of life" in itself is a major cause of the huge footprint the US have per capita. It's not only emissions but consumptions of all resources in general.

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

#95

Post by mogadsheu »

punnerud wrote: post #78

In Norway we place plastic over the (food) landfill, gather the methane and use it for electricity production. When there is no more methane the same landfill is used as soil for food production.

I interned for a landfill gas capture company a long time ago. Apparently it’s quite tough to make payback on the investment.

If value is applied to the degradation and GHG abatement, some groups might find it worthwhile.

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

#96

Post by m0llusk »

aphextim wrote: post #48
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.

Still waiting on Elon Musk to make "WasteX" which will take vast amounts of garbage from landfills and fly it directly into the Sun.

The state of the art high tech proposal is to grind everything to a powder, put that in a high temperature plasma furnace for demolecularization, then extract raw materials for reuse. This kind of process would in theory result in waste dumps being seen as excellent competitive sources of materials such as gold and rare earth elements.

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

#97

Post by samcheng »

hanniabu wrote: post #90
punnerud wrote: post #78

In Norway we place plastic over the (food) landfill, gather the methane and use it for electricity production. When there is no more methane the same landfill is used as soil for food production.

That's a great idea, but also requires an organized garbage collection system where items are separated at the source (consumer). Unfortunately the US doesn't have such a system in place, which is partially a social issue.

It's very common in the bay area to put biodegradable compost (paper towels, food waste, pumpkins, etc.) into the third green bin, along with the yard waste. The other two bins are for recycling and other garbage. It's not very difficult to segregate compostables, and I'm confident the rest of the US will catch up soon.

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

#98

Post by hanniabu »

thinkcontext wrote: post #41
joshvm wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are now a few startups trying to make home/DIY anaerobic digesters that you can collect the gas from. Would be interesting for e.g. keeping a greenhouse warm year-round without the electricity spend. For example (I have no idea how competent the product is): https://www.homebiogas.com/Products/HomeBiogas2

This is of no use in the developed world for a normal house. Try getting your home owners insurance to pay off a claim against an accident involving this. Also, according to its specs you can get 2hrs of cooking per day if you supply 5 gallons of animal manure. That's a tiny amount of energy compared to modern energy needs. For most people this would be a novelty, maybe you could run an outdoor grill off of it.

I'm sure most families can gather 5 gallons of organic waste per week, which would provide them enough gas to have a BBQ once a week.

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

#99

Post by ClumsyPilot »

kube-system wrote: post #73
bravo22 wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not really possible. Ultimately it is human demand that is driving climate change. Even if you have a magical technology that cuts all emissions today by 25% -- which would be truly magic -- you only need a 25% growth* in population to offset that and put us back to square one. At the current rate of 1.2% that's only ~18 years.

The comment you replied to said 'mitigated', not 'solved'. Emissions controls already have, and still can, make enormous impacts on many consumer devices. Given that emission controls are a whole lot easier to implement than eliminating a huge portion of the world's population, I'd say it's a more realistic goal to pursue.

I wouldn't claim it's difficult per se, we've done it before.

But I do suggest people advocating it join the front of the queue.

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

#100

Post by acheron »

jws wrote: post #83
lukifer wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I only recently learned the history of "anti-littering" marketing campaigns [0], conceived to push responsibility for waste onto consumers rather than producers, who were switching from metals and glass to much cheaper (but no longer reusable) plastics. Whatever individuals can do to reduce inefficiency and carbon footprint is surely a good thing; but it's no replacement for systems thinking, and applying incentives…

There is a narrative developing about the anti-littering marketing campaigns which I think tries to paint it as a cynical ploy by businesses. Just to frame things as someone alive at the time in one part of America… single serving glass bottles were not returned to the store, they had no deposit. They were thrown away. Beer cans had no deposit. They were thrown away. (Steel soda cans weren't a thing, they stayed in b…

My yard has a small stream and is near a relatively busy road. A couple times a year I go into the stream and clean up all the litter that has been washed into it. Littering is definitely still a thing.
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