morganism - 26-6-2014 at 13:46
didn't know this, and fungi too...
http://m.phys.org/news/2014-06-methane-source-greenhouse-gas...
Texium - 26-6-2014 at 19:02
That can't be good! Unless it could somehow be harnessed, although that would be quite doubtful, and probably not very helpful.
Tsjerk - 27-6-2014 at 02:47
Why can't this be good? Organisms have been doing this since the beginning of live. They just discus the mechanism by which it may happen.
Zyklon-A - 27-6-2014 at 10:48
Well methane is a greenhouse gas. Thus potential global warming increase. That's my guess of why zts16 said it can't be good.
Brain&Force - 27-6-2014 at 14:05
It depends on the abundance of the plants in question: cattle, for instance, are a major contributor to global warming because they're EVERYWHERE. A
lot of the problem isn't the methane itself, it's the eventual oxidation to carbon dioxide.
Texium - 27-6-2014 at 20:14
Methane is a far more potent greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide.
http://epa.gov/climatechange/ghgemissions/gases/ch4.html
And yes, cattle are definitely a lot more worrisome than the plants are. I was just kinda joking about that. And their manure is too, particularly
when not managed properly.
[Edited on 6-28-2014 by zts16]
HeYBrO - 30-6-2014 at 02:39
[rquote=336099&tid=31023&author=Brain&Force A lot of the problem isn't the methane itself, it's the eventual oxidation to carbon
dioxide.[/rquote]
methane is ~20 times more potent as greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide which mega sucks. And if that is not scary enough
[url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arctic_methane_release]check this out[/url]. it'll just be adding fuel to the fire that is climate change...
EDIT: had to turn off bbcode to avoid this:
[Edited on 30-6-2014 by HeYBrO]
Tsjerk - 30-6-2014 at 07:34
Just to put into perspective; without greenhouse gasses earth's average temperature would be well below zero. Water is actually by far the most
important greenhouse gas.
Anything that absorbs infra red is a greenhouse gas.
http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/greenhouse_data.html
HeYBrO - 30-6-2014 at 15:49
Indeed a greenhouse effect is essential to life on earth; however, we are facing the enhanced greenhouse effect due to anthropogenic
greenhouse gases. Anyway, before this becomes a huge off topic debate, the original post is quite interesting.