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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

#71

Post by flavius29663 »

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.

How many buffalo were in the US before industrialization? I get 30 to 60 million.

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

#72

Post by mlyle »

djleni wrote: post #56
machina_ex_deus wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

If you release the same amount of methane per year for a couple dozen years, the methane reaches a steady state where it has a constant value, but CO2 continues to rise.

This is because the methane is being converted to CO2 at a relatively quick clip.

The timescale for CO2 is larger-- centuries.

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

#73

Post by Geee »

quaintdev wrote: post #11

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

Many people don't deny the first-order effects. However, the second-order effects are speculative, and there is and should be more skepticism towards them, especially when someone is suggesting authoritarian policies based on them.

Sadly, most of the green movement is just Marxism in new clothes and for them the climate change is an opportunity to push their authoritarian and dystopian policies. They use words such as 'oceans boiling' and 'extinction' as a part of their propaganda which are total and utter lies.

The goal for Marxists is to stop human progress and wealth generation. Implementing their policies would result in a way worse world than a world with climate change.

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

#74

Post by mlyle »

shrubble wrote: post #53
mstipetic wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[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?

You've been thoroughly rebutted in this thread, but you choose to engage with the one person who called a name instead of everyone else. Meh.

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

#75

Post by mlyle »

jamiek88 wrote: post #19
boomchinolo78 wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

Not really. It’s 20x instead of 28x is hardly ‘methane is actually ok’. Science is hard.

I think everyone has "always" known that methane is not a key driver of climate change. Its relatively short atmospheric life and relatively low concentration make it have a modest effect relative to CO2, even if it is more potent.

A 30% reduction serves to further show that the priority needs to be CO2 in general, and everything but the low hanging fruit for methane emissions is a distraction.

Of course, the possibility of runaway effects and short term positive feedback loops from methane release from permafrost, etc, is still a concern. I guess a 30% reduction there is somewhat good news.

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

#76

Post by replygirl »

kennywinker wrote: post #64
replygirl wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Relative to what things looked like 10-20 years ago, is there still a meaningful contingent of climate change deniers? As far as I can tell, most of those people have accepted the reality but disagree on how we should approach it. Even in the most extreme case--looking at Republicans in the US Congress, steeped in fossil propaganda and owing many of their elections to gerrymandering--and using a broad definition of c…

At this point we have to consider people who deny that climate change is caused by humans to be climate deniers, since they are advocating for no change in behavior which is the same as people who outright deny that it's happening.

I've heard these arguments: (a) that we don't have the evidence to confirm that climate change is anthropogenic, and (b) that we shouldn't change our behavior. My understanding is (b) is not tied to (a), but rather that most claims of (b) come out of different views on conservation, what "nature" is, what's achievable with technology, and how different approaches to climate change might impact human quality of life.

And (b) is not really that we _shouldn't_ change our behavior, but that the most popular ideas for how we should are varying degrees of infeasible, harmful, or fascistic.

The "right" on this issue is largely misunderstood. Those pushing for a shift to renewables and a lifestyle change in wealthier nations deserve better literature on what their opposition is advocating for and against: https://compactmag.com/article/energy-lysenkoism

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

#77

Post by junofan »

kennywinker wrote: post #64
replygirl wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Relative to what things looked like 10-20 years ago, is there still a meaningful contingent of climate change deniers? As far as I can tell, most of those people have accepted the reality but disagree on how we should approach it. Even in the most extreme case--looking at Republicans in the US Congress, steeped in fossil propaganda and owing many of their elections to gerrymandering--and using a broad definition of c…

At this point we have to consider people who deny that climate change is caused by humans to be climate deniers, since they are advocating for no change in behavior which is the same as people who outright deny that it's happening.

What behavior change should people advocate for to not be considered climate deniers? It’s starting to sound more like a temperance movement than a serious attempt to solve a problem.

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

#78

Post by shrubble »

Loquebantur wrote: post #67
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…

The reason your comment is bad isn't you pointing out some "truth". The reason is your comment being misleading. You pretend, the accuracy of climate models was insufficient for any relevant conclusions to be made. That is just nonsense. The interesting part is people clinging onto anything calling that impending climate catastrophe (or its human cause) into question. Individual subjective short-term benefits outweig…

You're talking about changing literally trillions of dollars worth of economic activity, per year, now and supposedly for the next 50 or 100 years, across the whole of Western civilization.

The requirement for the math being absolutely "spot-on" in this case is extremely high.

Is it?

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

#79

Post by linuxftw »

replygirl wrote: post #38
azan_ wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Climate deniers are not people who discuss whether methane is 28x or 20x as strong as CO2, but rather people that do not believe in global warming (or our responsibility for it) at all; that's not skepticism, that's blind faith.

Relative to what things looked like 10-20 years ago, is there still a meaningful contingent of climate change deniers? As far as I can tell, most of those people have accepted the reality but disagree on how we should approach it. Even in the most extreme case--looking at Republicans in the US Congress, steeped in fossil propaganda and owing many of their elections to gerrymandering--and using a broad definition of c…

I personally don't believe CO2 is a driver of climate change. I think the 'science' is junk. I do think pollution is a the number one issue facing humanity, and we're doing nothing about it, because all of our collective energy is being directed at a red herring.

Entire ecosystems are being destroyed by chemical and mining industries, not just ones used for batteries. We've polluted every water source on the planet. Just look at the chemicals they're spraying on crops. We're completely over fishing the oceans. We're paving the best farm land in the world to put up shopping malls.

Climate change, even if it's being caused by people, is so far down the list of concerns I couldn't are less about it.

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

#80

Post by caeril »

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.

Cattle are no different from any other herbivorous ruminant in terms of methane production, and the wild population is larger than our own herds.

Do you also propose we exterminate every wild deer, elk, moose, buffalo, hippopotamus, elephant, giraffe, etc?

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