Posted on 04/30/2007 8:29:12 PM PDT by NormsRevenge
BANGKOK (Reuters) - Across the globe, chickens and pigs are doing their bit to curb global warming. But cows and sheep still have some catching up to do.
The farm animals produce lots of methane, a potent greenhouse gas that gets far less public attention than carbon dioxide yet is at the heart of efforts to fight climate change.
Government policies and a U.N.-backed system of emission credits is proving a money-spinner for investors, farmers and big polluters such as power stations wanting to offset their own emissions of greenhouse gases, particularly carbon dioxide (CO2).
The reason is simple: methane is 23 times more potent than carbon dioxide in trapping heat in the atmosphere and it is relatively simple to capture the gas from animal waste, landfills, coal mines or leaky natural gas pipes.
"A fifth of all greenhouse gas-induced global warming has been due to methane since pre-industrial times," said climate scientist Paul Fraser of Australia, where ruminant farm animals belch out vast amounts of the gas.
Methane concentrations have increased about 150 percent in the air since 1750 and now far exceed the natural range of the past 650,000 years, the U.N.'s climate panel says. And human activities are largely to blame.
The panel will be focusing on ways to curb methane and other greenhouse gas emissions when it releases a major report on mitigating the effects of climate change in Bangkok in early May.
"It's been argued that the reductions from methane are potentially cheaper than from carbon dioxide," said Bill Hare, climate policy director for Greenpeace and a lead author of the mitigation report.
"A lot of policy discussion in the United States has focused on methane rather than more difficult problems such as CO2 from coal," he added.
This is because capturing methane from landfills, mines, or from fossil fuel production or natural gas lines is pretty straight forward and makes economic sense. Methane is a major component of natural gas and can be burned to generate power.
Agriculture was a greater challenge, Hare said.
A MATTER OF BALANCE
"There are more difficult areas for methane from livestock and from rice agriculture where, at best, longer time scales are required to change practices in agriculture than you might need in industrial areas," Hare said.
Rice paddies and other irrigated crops produce large amounts of methane, as do natural wetlands. Vast amounts of methane are also locked up in deposits under the ice in sub-polar regions, in permafrost or under the sea.
Hare said there are lots of options being looked at, such as additives for cattle and sheep to cut the amount of methane in their burps and moving away from intensive livestock feed lots to range-fed animals.
"And for example in rice, just changing the timing and when and how you flood rice paddies has great potential to reduce methane emissions."
For the moment, the amount of methane in the atmosphere is steady after leveling off around 1999, said Fraser, leader of the Changing Atmosphere Research Group at Australia's government-funded Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization.
This is thought to be because the drying out of tropical wetlands seems to canceling out a rise in emissions from the oil and gas industry. But how long this lasts is anyone's guess.
"Most people would agree that some time in the future methane is going to start growing again, just because of the world demand for natural gas, rice and cattle," Fraser said.
POO POWER
All the more reason why chicken manure and pig waste are hot commodities.
Under the U.N.'s Kyoto Protocol, a system called the Clean Development Mechanism allows rich countries to keep within their emissions limits by funding projects that soak up greenhouse gases in poor countries, getting carbon credits in return.
This has made huge pig farms in South America and poultry farms in India attractive investments.
The waste is put into digesters and the methane extracted and burned to generate electricity or simply flared to create CO2 -- not perfect, but a lesser greenhouse gas evil.
And interest is growing in these kinds of projects, said N. Yuvaraj Dinesh Babu of the Singapore-based Carbon Exchange, which trades Kyoto carbon credits and helps broker emissions off-setting deals.
The Kyoto system of emissions credits has proved popular and the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change, which administers it, says dozens of methane-abatement projects have been approved in recent years with more being considered.
But Stephan Singer of conservation group WWF thinks this is not the complete solution. He believes more attention should be paid to controlling carbon dioxide emissions and the sources of methane not so easily controlled.
Only about 50 percent of all methane emissions are being controlled, namely from landfills, coal mines and the oil and gas industry, said Singer, head of WWF's European Energy and Climate Policy Unit.
"What worries me is the increased methane coming out of the stomachs of ruminants, mainly for increased beef consumption within an increasingly wealthy world. The diet of the West has a big impact on the atmosphere."
In the United States, cattle emit about 5.5 million tonnes of methane per year into the atmosphere, accounting for 20 percent of U.S. methane emissions, the Environmental Protection Agency says. In New Zealand, emissions from agriculture comprise about half of all greenhouse gas emissions.
But what worries Singer most is a rapid release of methane stored in sub-polar permafrost or in huge methane hydrate deposits under the sea. While this has not happened, some scientists suggest it might occur in a warmer world.
"If methane hydrates leak, then we're gone, then it's over."
GoRebalism on Parade
Pigs wait to receive food from visitors at a farm near Brussels, January 7, 2007. Across the globe, chickens and pigs are doing their bit to curb global warming. But cows and sheep still have some catching up to do. The farm animals produce lots of methane, a potent greenhouse gas that gets far less public attention than carbon dioxide yet is at the heart of efforts to fight climate change. (Yves Herman/Files/Reuters)
Graphic showing options for reducing emissions of greenhouse gases, ahead of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change summary report for policymakers to be issued next week in Bangkok.(AFP/Graphic)
Its how Auntie powered Bartertown..
Methane concentrations have increased about 150 percent in the air since 1750 and now far exceed the natural range of the past 650,000 years, the U.N.’s climate panel says. And human activities are largely to blame.
The panel will be focusing on ways to curb methane and other greenhouse gas emissions when it releases a major report on mitigating the effects of climate change in Bangkok in early May.
Great place for the IPCC UN panel to choose to have its meeting, Bangkok.. or is it just coincidence?
will someone pay me to fart into a jar then? no? rats.
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US President George W. Bush (C) flanked by German Chancellor Angela Merkel (L), who holds the rotating presidencies of the EU and the Group of Eight (G8), and EU Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso, speaks during a joint press conference in the Rose Garden at the White House Washington, DC. Bush and visiting European leaders agreed Monday to define global warming as a serious problem requiring "urgent" action, but deadlocked on what concrete remedies to apply.(AFP/Saul Loeb)
The city of the Thunderdome in the Mad Max movie years ago was powered by pigs producing methane.
The gas can only be collected if the animals are in confinement. Environmentalists are fighting large confinement operations because of odors etc.
The majority of livestock is raised outside and that will never change. But for those confinement operations, they could produce enough power to run their fans and lights, and potentially sell some excess power. The most efficient use of the power would be locally. Widespread distribution would be limited.
Finally, a truly renewable source of fuel. Instead of curbing cow farts,we can capture that valuable gas for use in running our turbo-electric plants. The gas farmers can attach bladders (or something automatic like a milking machine) to the animals rears collecting it for transportation to major distribution centers. This also has the benefit of being CO2 neutral,since the emissions from burning the gas would equal the amount that would naturally be lost to space anyway. Do I hear carbon credits?
"It's okay. We bought carbon offsets from Al Gore."
Yes, get ready for the FART TAX. Every chicken, every cow, you name it will be taxed. There will be special taxes on food prices at Mexican restaurants....the list goes on with the ScamORats salivating.
why can't President Bush be like the Czechoslovakian leader and say that AGW is recycled communism. For President Bush to even agree to say "Global Warming" is a serious problem is very disheartening. If the eventual Republican nominee says that AGW is a serious problem, then our Liberties will be further threatened. Someone at the national level has to confront this insanity. I have never witnessed such mass brainwashing in my life.
“What worries me is the increased methane coming out of the stomachs of ruminants, mainly for increased beef consumption within an increasingly wealthy world. The diet of the West has a big impact on the atmosphere.”
There’s the money quote. Expect an assault on evil beef consumers destroying the planet. They’re probably already demonizing beef consumption in Kindergarten.
Termites produce more methane than all the other species on the earth combined.
Termites produce more methane than all the other species on earth combined...
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