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Methane may not warm the Earth quite as much as previously thought

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Re: Methane may not warm the Earth quite as much as previously thought

#51

Post by kennywinker »

shrubble wrote: post #40

This is exactly what the "deniers" have been saying - that the mathematical model is not fleshed out enough, and the data is not present in sufficiently accurate quantity, for the climate models to be accurate. This research shows that the mechanism of action was misunderstood all this time. What else hasn't been researched enough and has simplistic assumptions baked into the climate models? That shockingly simplisti…

Except climate change is happening, and there's no doubt about that because knowing it's happening isn't relying on models, it's relying on thermometers (and to a lesser extent ice cores to confirm that it's human-driven rather than a natural change).

How bad climate change will be, yeah I suppose there is a little fuzzyness there. But given how bad it COULD be (think: complete extinction of humanity, or an end of civilization) we can't really wait around not doing anything while we try to develop a perfect model.

Re: Methane may not warm the Earth quite as much as previously thought

#52

Post by jmyeet »

This stuff is complicated. Specifically you can't do a straight comparison between the greenhouse effects of methane and carbon dioxide. Why? Methane is naturally destroyed in the atmosphere [1]:

> Methane is naturally destroyed by both chemical and biological processes, including reaction with atmospheric hydroxyl [OH] and chlorine, and by methane-consuming bacteria (methanotrophs) in soil and water. This results in a lifetime in the air of 9.1 ± 0.9 years [12]. Thus, we face an important question—given methane is being removed from the air anyway, why trouble to do this artificially? It may be preferable to dedicate the cost and energy involved in methane removal to the task of stopping methane emissions, which would accomplish the same end result of lessening, halting, or reversing the growth of methane-driven climate warming, or, alternatively, simply to ignore methane and dedicate all efforts to CO2 removal. To answer this question, the specific methods of removing methane must be examined.

Re: Methane may not warm the Earth quite as much as previously thought

#53

Post by shrubble »

mstipetic wrote: post #49
shrubble wrote: post #40

This is exactly what the "deniers" have been saying - that the mathematical model is not fleshed out enough, and the data is not present in sufficiently accurate quantity, for the climate models to be accurate. This research shows that the mechanism of action was misunderstood all this time. What else hasn't been researched enough and has simplistic assumptions baked into the climate models? That shockingly simplisti…

[flagged]

Thanks for your rebuttal based on logic and rationality. Did you have anything to add in terms of, I don't know, something based on scientific or mathematical grounds?

Re: Methane may not warm the Earth quite as much as previously thought

#54

Post by KennyBlanken »

hinkley wrote: post #13

We just had a conversation the other day about climate change and methane, and some people were saying 20x as strong as CO2, and others were saying and sometimes correcting them to 28. According to this article the correct answer is 20. That’s still over an order of magnitude difference. It still doesn’t change the priorities much, it means you can leak 40% more methane from a system before it’s worse that coal, but…

The issue isn't just natural gas leaking out of the distribution system.

It's also the enormous methane output of the cattle industry. There are thirty million cows in the US alone. Each is producing 150 to 300lb of methane per year.

Re: Methane may not warm the Earth quite as much as previously thought

#55

Post by qtzaz »

brookst wrote: post #33
slackfan wrote: post #8

[flagged]

I realize you're just trolling, but science is quite settled that anthropogenic climate change is a real ting. Minutae about whether methane is 28x as bad as co2 or merely 20x as bad remains to be settled. Please don't exploit people's good faith interest in getting the exact truth to advance bad faith claims.

If it is settled based on data that is as reliable as this (40% off!) then it is not settled at all.

Re: Methane may not warm the Earth quite as much as previously thought

#56

Post by djleni »

machina_ex_deus wrote: post #50
hinkley wrote: post #13

We just had a conversation the other day about climate change and methane, and some people were saying 20x as strong as CO2, and others were saying and sometimes correcting them to 28. According to this article the correct answer is 20. That’s still over an order of magnitude difference. It still doesn’t change the priorities much, it means you can leak 40% more methane from a system before it’s worse that coal, but…

Methane naturally turns into CO2 in the atmosphere. Even if it did increase warming more than CO2, once methane emissions reach a steady level, reducing methane emissions won't change a thing, compared to CO2 emissions. This is also similar to meat production emissions. Most of carbon emissions in meat productions are of carbon which was captured from the air as a part of the production cycle, by the plants which fee…

Could you explain further?

How does:

> reducing methane emissions won't change a thing, compared to CO2 emissions.

Follow from:

> once methane emissions reach a steady level

Re: Methane may not warm the Earth quite as much as previously thought

#57

Post by _the_inflator »

hinkley wrote: post #13

We just had a conversation the other day about climate change and methane, and some people were saying 20x as strong as CO2, and others were saying and sometimes correcting them to 28. According to this article the correct answer is 20. That’s still over an order of magnitude difference. It still doesn’t change the priorities much, it means you can leak 40% more methane from a system before it’s worse that coal, but…

"Compared to what" is a common theme with studies. Thanks for pointing out.

Re: Methane may not warm the Earth quite as much as previously thought

#58

Post by hannob »

boomchinolo78 wrote: post #16
quaintdev wrote: post #11

Climate change deniers are going to have field day with this one.

Denier is such a loaded word, call them skeptic. In this case at least, seems their skepticism was warranted.

I haven't seen those "skeptics" who said "maybe methane has a slightly smaller impact and CO2 a bigger one". Can you point me to sources here?

Re: Methane may not warm the Earth quite as much as previously thought

#59

Post by orev »

machina_ex_deus wrote: post #50
hinkley wrote: post #13

We just had a conversation the other day about climate change and methane, and some people were saying 20x as strong as CO2, and others were saying and sometimes correcting them to 28. According to this article the correct answer is 20. That’s still over an order of magnitude difference. It still doesn’t change the priorities much, it means you can leak 40% more methane from a system before it’s worse that coal, but…

Methane naturally turns into CO2 in the atmosphere. Even if it did increase warming more than CO2, once methane emissions reach a steady level, reducing methane emissions won't change a thing, compared to CO2 emissions. This is also similar to meat production emissions. Most of carbon emissions in meat productions are of carbon which was captured from the air as a part of the production cycle, by the plants which fee…

Plants that feed the cattle are overwhelmingly fertilized using fertilizer derived from petroleum products, so it’s not an accurate picture that the feed plants are carbon capture methods.

Re: Methane may not warm the Earth quite as much as previously thought

#60

Post by matthewdgreen »

KennyBlanken wrote: post #54
hinkley wrote: post #13

We just had a conversation the other day about climate change and methane, and some people were saying 20x as strong as CO2, and others were saying and sometimes correcting them to 28. According to this article the correct answer is 20. That’s still over an order of magnitude difference. It still doesn’t change the priorities much, it means you can leak 40% more methane from a system before it’s worse that coal, but…

The issue isn't just natural gas leaking out of the distribution system. It's also the enormous methane output of the cattle industry. There are thirty million cows in the US alone. Each is producing 150 to 300lb of methane per year.

It is also the fact that both wetlands and melting permafrost emit methane, and both sources seem to be increasing their emissions as the world warms. This is a scary feedback loop, and that’s before we get to things like undersea clathrates.
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