Reducing Methane is the Best Quick Fix for Global Warming
A new report was released detailing the urgent need to combat climate change through limiting methane emissions, and only one presidential candidate in 2024 is even addressing the issue.
A new study, authored by more than a dozen scientists from around the world, was published on Tuesday that expresses grave concerns over global methane emissions that are “rising rapidly” at the fastest rate in decades. The report, titled The Methane Imperative explains how powerful, planet-heating methane gas is responsible for half of the heating associated with global warming currently, and how prompt attention to these emissions must be made to combat the escalating climate crisis.
Methane is a hydrocarbon that is a primary component of natural gas that is also a greenhouse gas (GHG), so its presence in the atmosphere affects the earth’s temperature and climate system. According to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Methane is emitted from a variety of anthropogenic (human-influenced) and natural sources. Anthropogenic emission sources include landfills, oil and natural gas systems, agricultural activities, coal mining, stationary and mobile combustion, wastewater treatment, and certain industrial processes.
While the world has intentionally and rightly focused on carbon dioxide as the primary driver of rising global temperatures, this latest study explains how little has been done to address the methane problem, despite it having 80 times the warming power of CO(2) in the first 20 years after reaching the atmosphere. Drew Shindell, a climate scientist at Duke University and lead author of The Methane Imperative discusses the “worrisome” growth rate of methane saying, “It was quite flat until around 20 years ago.” Shindell further explains that large methane emissions recently have “made the job of tackling anthropogenic warming all the more challenging.”
While scientists can’t name the exact causes of the rise in methane emissions, a number of factors have been pinpointed as contributing to the overall growth rate of the toxic gas. Drilling for oil and the processing of that oil contribute to methane emissions, in addition to an increase in fracking and coal mining. Methane gas is also emitted from livestock through their own internal gas emissions and increased animal agriculture has added to larger methane numbers.
The increase of rice production to accommodate growing populations is also to blame for more methane in a lesser degree, as are the fast decomposition of organic matter in the wetlands, which is a result of rising global heat levels. Compared to carbon dioxide, which can reside in the atmosphere for hundreds or thousands of years, methane gas is a much easier proposition to contend with in terms of decreasing global warming. According to the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF): “cutting methane emissions is the fastest opportunity we have to immediately slow the rate of global warming.”
“Methane is the strongest lever we can quickly pull to reduce warming between now and 2050,” says Drew Shindell, who credits a rapid response to cutting methane emissions as the best immediate action for environmental correction. “Reducing CO(2) will protect our grandchildren — reducing methane will protect us now.”
While certain initiatives are underway — specifically the Global Methane Pledge which was launched jointly by the United States and the European Union in 2021 — this latest methane report confirms that more restrictions and actions are necessary in order to establish which CO(2) and methane reductions are the most effective. The EDF credits the following sectors for causing the highest level anthropogenic methane emissions: agriculture (40%), including from livestock rearing, animal manure, and rice production; fossil fuels (35%), including through leakage from natural gas and oil production and distribution systems and coal mines; and waste (20%) from food and other organic materials left in landfills, open dumps, and wastewater.
Last week, the Biden administration hosted a Super Pollutants Summit with officials, companies, environmental organizations, unions, philanthropies, and international partners in attendance to announce new domestic and international actions to tackle climate change. Included in this list of pollutants is methane, and the Biden White House cites the need to “tackle” the methane issue worldwide in order to effectively combat global warming, an issue which Republicans “continue to deny.”
While other pollutants contribute to the worldwide emergency of global warming, lowering methane production has been established as one of the fastest ways to compensate for the ongoing rising temperatures of the globe. Moreover, it has never been more critical to support politicians and elect officials — like Democratic Nominee for President Kamala Harris — who will not only continue the valuable work started by President Biden, but who will strive to do more to address the issue of global warming and endorse the Green New Deal.
Amee Vanderpool writes the SHERO Newsletter, is an attorney, published author, contributor to newspapers and magazines, and an analyst for BBC radio. She can be reached at avanderpool@gmail.com or follow her on Twitter @girlsreallyrule.
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First mission; send Don-old to the moon.
Another timely, and informative, newsletter is HEATED by Emily Atkin. Her topic today was the Olympics and the fact that they are 5.2 degrees hotter than they would have been normally (if not for global warming). I greatly fear for the future of the planet as a whole, and humanity. Some life will find a way to continue, but will humans?
https://heated.world/p/fossil-fuels-made-the-olympics-5