Tuesday, May 8, 2012

Flatulence, Climate and Dinosaurs

Methane released by cattle, and other ruminants accounts for 50 to 100 million tons of greenhouse gas emissions per year, and methane is 23 times more potent than carbon dioxide at warming our planet. This knowledge prompted some British scientists to hypothesize what large herbivorous dinosaurs might have released. Their calculations came up with about 520 million tons of methane per year, a quantity large enough that it could have accounted for the earth's relatively warm temperatures back in the age of dinosaurs 140 million years ago.

This news has been widely publicized, so maybe it is not new to you. What surprised me is that after reading about it from 4 or 5 different sources, I found by far the best and most accurate summary in the Wall Street Journal article, Dinosaur Gas Emissions May Have Warmed Air.

No comments:

GREENLAND - Will probably be the focus of near term sea level rise

Greenland is almost all covered by a very thick glacial ice cap. If all of Greenland's ice either melted or slid into the oceans, sea le...