Concentrations in the atmosphere have crept up since 2007, but during the same period,
methane emissions from human activities and natural sources have remained stable or even fallen slightly, both studies suggest.
Not exact matches
The findings are the first to note increased greenhouse gas
emissions due to antibiotic use in cattle; a recent study suggests that
methane emissions from cud - chewing livestock worldwide, including cows, account for about 4 % of the greenhouse gas
emissions related to
human activity.
This stability in
methane levels had led scientists to believe that
emissions of the gas
from natural sources like livestock and wetlands, as well as
from human activities like coal and gas production, were balanced by the rate of destruction of
methane in the atmosphere.
But based on that data, they estimate that
emissions from abandoned wells represents as much as 10 percent of
methane from human activities in Pennsylvania — about the same amount as caused by current oil and gas production.
Kessler adds, «Our results agree with this conclusion, showing that ancient
methane emissions to the atmosphere in an area that is experiencing some of the greatest warming today, is actually quite small, especially when compared to more direct
emissions from human activities.»
Although carbon dioxide accounts for the vast majority of greenhouse gas
emissions from human activities,
methane emissions are also an important factor driving climate change.
Human activities account for 60 percent of
methane emissions, but other contributors include plumes
from frozen ocean floors, microbes, abandoned wells and even beavers of all things.
Methane and nitrous oxide
emissions from agriculture and other
human activities add to the atmospheric burden of heat - trapping gases.
Some come
from natural sources such as marshes and other wetlands but a bulk of
methane emission comes
from human activities that include cattle operations.
The identification of other, sometimes more powerful, greenhouse gases such as
methane, the contributions to atmospheric carbon dioxide
from other
human activities such as deforestation and cement manufacture, better understanding of the temperature - changing properties of atmospheric pollution such as sulphur
emissions, aerosols and their importance in the post-1940s northern hemisphere cooling: the knowledge - base was increasing year by year.
Globally, over 60 percent of total CH4
emissions come
from human activities.2
Methane is emitted
from industry, agriculture, and waste management
activities, described below.
As I understand it, though, there has been an uptick in recent years, and before that stabilization may have been partly due to reduced
emissions of
methane (including natural gas leakage)
from human activity.