SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:
Global emissions of methane have reached the highest levels on record. Increases are being driven primarily by growth of emissions from coal mining, oil and natural gas production, cattle and sheep ranching, and landfills.
Between 2000 and 2017, levels of the potent greenhouse gas barreled up toward pathways that climate models suggest will lead to 3-4 degrees Celsius of warming before the end of this century. This is a dangerous temperature threshold at which scientists warn that natural disasters, including wildfires, droughts and floods, and social disruptions such as famines and mass migrations become almost commonplace. The findings are outlined in two papers published July 14 in Earth System Science Data and Environmental Research Letters by researchers with the Global Carbon Project, an initiative led by Stanford University scientist Rob Jackson.
In 2017, the last year when complete global methane data are available, Earth's atmosphere absorbed nearly 600 million tons of the colorless, odorless gas that is 28 times more powerful than carbon dioxide at trapping heat over a 100-year span. More than half of all methane emissions now come from human activities. Annual methane emissions are up 9 percent, or 50 million tons per year, from the early 2000s, when methane concentrations in the atmosphere were relatively stable.
In terms of warming potential, adding this much extra methane to the atmosphere since 2000 is akin to putting 350 million more cars on the world's roads or doubling the total emissions of Germany or France. "We still haven't turned the corner on methane," said Jackson, a professor of Earth system science in Stanford's School of Earth, Energy & Environmental Sciences (Stanford Earth).
[...] According to Jackson and colleagues, curbing methane emissions will require reducing fossil fuel use and controlling fugitive emissions such as leaks from pipelines and wells, as well as changes to the way we feed cattle, grow rice and eat. "We'll need to eat less meat and reduce emissions associated with cattle and rice farming," Jackson said, "and replace oil and natural gas in our cars and homes."
Journal Reference:
Increasing anthropogenic methane emissions arise equally from agricultural and fossil fuel sources, Environmental Research Letters (DOI: 10.1088/1748-9326/ab9ed2)
Previously:
(2020-06-01) Researchers Control Cattle Microbiomes to Reduce Methane and Greenhouse Gases
(2020-04-14) Offshore Oil and Gas Platforms Release More Methane Than Previously Estimated
(2020-04-08) Deep-Sea Worms and Bacteria Team up to Harvest Methane
(2020-03-06) Methane Emitted by Humans Vastly Underestimated
(2019-10-09) Sea 'Boiling' with Methane Discovered In Siberia
(2019-08-30) Fracking In U.S. And Canada Linked To Worldwide Atmospheric Methane Spike
(2019-06-19) Seaweed Feed Additive Cuts Livestock Methane but Poses Questions
(2019-05-21) Researchers Suggest Converting Methane Into Carbon Dioxide to Fight Global Warming
(2019-05-16) U.S. Methane Emissions Flat Since 2006 Despite Increased Oil and Gas Activity
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 16 2020, @11:21PM (3 children)
And humans have decimated forests to supply our demand for lumber.
And humans have depleted fish stocks in oceans across the globe to supply our desire for yummy food.
And humans have converted large swaths of desert to irrigated farmland, so much in some places that it affects regional humidity and pollen levels.
And humans have paved over much of of the richest farmland in the world for the sake of urban expansion. (stupid!)
And humans create large dead zone algae blooms in deltas and nearly seas from intensive agriculture's fertilizer and animal waste runoff so we can have cheap produce.
And humans have created so much pollution-chemical, plastic, airborne, organic-that the the remotest uninhabited inhospitable areas have been contaminated.
And humans that don't live in western, Asian,or rich parts of Africa, India, or South America all want this American lifestyle that creates all of the problems above. They want their piece of the pie.
The thing is this. We are a/the dominant macro species. We move in and adapt the land and environment to service us. Unless humanity globally has an epiphany and we collectively decide to live in a world somewhere between the stone-age and the industrial age, or decide to reduce the human population to a more sustainable 1 billion people, all of these environmental issue will continue and get worse.
As optimistic as Star Trek is (the pre-2005 Star Trek, not the angry totalitarian stuff since that has dialog that 8-years old could have written) , it's science does not exist and never will. We will never have endless clean energy sources. Fusion, well that has been "20 years away" for the past 60 years. We've been shitting in our beds for centuries and will continue to do so.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 17 2020, @12:18AM
Oh no haven’t you heard the problem is switched, Population is declining, well not exactly now, 50 years from now, but we need to start making babies NOW /s
https://www.nextbigfuture.com/2020/07/countries-will-not-just-accept-depopulation.html [nextbigfuture.com]
https://www.bbc.com/news/health-53409521 [bbc.com]
https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/15/opinions/global-population-decline-study-us-immigration-ghitis/index.html [cnn.com]
(Score: 2) by legont on Friday July 17 2020, @02:36AM (1 child)
humanscapitalists.Most other institutions were at least an order of magnitude less efficient at killing the nature.
"Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 17 2020, @04:10AM
No, humans. Capitalism is natural and has existed from the dawn of time. Exchange of money or capital for other capital is capitalism.
China was nothing but a big poor poverty filled country before they adopted capitalism in the 1980's and in 40 years have become rivals of the US. Second biggest economy in the world now. High speed rail second to none. Huge financial centers. Manufacturer of all of the worlds products. All a result of capitalism
The Soviet Union self-destructed under communism in the late 1980's. They couldn't compete with the US and their socialist economy collapsed. Russia and other eastern European countries adopted capitalism and lifted their countries up from the brink of economic collapse.
Is even one example of a successful non-capitalistic country?
If you are even thinking that communism somehow magically immune from pollution or ecological destruction, then you need to spend some time reading about the environmental atrocities committed by the Soviet Union, China, Cuba during their hey-day! Look up the Aral Sea for instance.