Scientists can't totally explain it, but levels of greenhouse-causing methane has jumped in a short period of time.Even if science wasn't your best subject, we all know that carbon dioxide, or CO2, is the stuff causing climate-change. But other gases also contribute to the problem. Methane, a greenhouse gas that is 25 times stronger than CO2, adds to global warming. Even without humans, methane gets released naturally by stuff like cows and wetlands, but humans increase methane-levels by producing coal and gas.
As the world went industrial, we doubled the amount of methane in the atmosphere. But then, for the last 10 years or so, methane levels pretty much stabilized. Last year, however, methane levels suddenly increased, according to scientists writing in Geophysical Research Letters.
While scientists don't really understand the increase, an unusually warm year in Siberia could have caused wetlands to release more methane than usual. That would, however, only explain an increase in the northern hemisphere -- the higher levels of methane has, surprisingly, been found in atmospheres all over the planet.
No comments:
Post a Comment