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	<channel>
		<title>Conservation news</title>
		<atom:link href="https://news.mongabay.com/feed/?topic=methane&#038;type=post" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml" />
		<link>https://news.mongabay.com/list/methane/</link>
		<description>Environmental science and conservation news</description>
		<lastBuildDate>Sat, 10 Oct 2026 21:36:00 +0000</lastBuildDate>
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	<url>https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2020/05/16160320/cropped-mongabay_icon-32x32.png</url>
	<title>News on Methane</title>
	<link>https://news.mongabay.com/list/methane/</link>
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				<item>
					<title>Hidden heroes: Australian tree bark microbes consume greenhouse &#038; toxic gases</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/01/hidden-heroes-australian-tree-bark-microbes-consume-greenhouse-toxic-gases/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/01/hidden-heroes-australian-tree-bark-microbes-consume-greenhouse-toxic-gases/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>16 Jan 2026 16:31:46 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Ruth Kamnitzer]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Glenn Scherer]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/01/15105459/2.-Luke-Jeffrey-tree-climbing-wetland-Melaleuca-to-measure-gas-fluxes_credit-Luke-Jeffrey-Southern-Cross-Uni-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=312991</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Planetary Boundaries]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Australia and Global]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Carbon Dioxide, Carbon Sequestration, Climate, Climate Change, Conservation, Ecosystems, Environment, Forest Carbon, Forests, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Health, Methane, Natural Gas, Pollution, Reforestation, Research, and Trees]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Microbes living in tree bark consume vast amounts of climate-related and toxic gases, according to new research published Jan. 8 in Science. In the past, tree bark was considered little more than an inert protective covering for trees and unlikely to support significant microbial life. But over the last decade, research has found that microbes [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Microbes living in tree bark consume vast amounts of climate-related and toxic gases, according to new research published Jan. 8 in Science. In the past, tree bark was considered little more than an inert protective covering for trees and unlikely to support significant microbial life. But over the last decade, research has found that microbes not only thrive in tree bark, but they consume methane, a phenomenon significant on a global scale. This knowledge caused scientists at Australia’s Monash and Southern Cross universities to wonder if microbial communities living in tree bark might also be utilizing and absorbing other ubiquitous atmospheric gases, a line of reasoning that turned out to be “spot on,” says Pok Man Leung, a research fellow at Monash University and the study’s co-lead author. The research team sampled the bark of eight common Australian trees across different biomes in subtropical eastern Australia. They then used metagenetics along with laboratory and field-based measurements of gas fluxes to determine what kinds of microbes lived in the bark, and what they were doing. Melaleuca wetland forest on the Tweed Coast of Australia, a hotspot for tree bark microbial life. Image courtesy of Luke Jeffrey/Southern Cross University. They found that the trees’ bark was brimming with microbes that digest methane, hydrogen, carbon monoxide and volatile organic compounds (VOCs). Methane is at least 20 times more potent as carbon dioxide as a greenhouse gas, while hydrogen and carbon monoxide are considered indirect greenhouse gases. Carbon monoxide and VOCs are both harmful&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/01/hidden-heroes-australian-tree-bark-microbes-consume-greenhouse-toxic-gases/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/01/hidden-heroes-australian-tree-bark-microbes-consume-greenhouse-toxic-gases/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-312991</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Methane chasers: Hunting a climate-changing gas seeping from Earth&#8217;s seafloor</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/01/methane-chasers-hunting-a-climate-changing-gas-seeping-from-earths-seafloor/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/01/methane-chasers-hunting-a-climate-changing-gas-seeping-from-earths-seafloor/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>08 Jan 2026 15:46:05 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Elizabeth Devitt]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Glenn Scherer]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/01/08115645/1.-BANNER-seep-bubbles-NOAA-1-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=312714</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Planetary Boundaries]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Arctic Ocean, Atlantic Ocean, Global, Indian Ocean, Pacific Ocean, and Southern Ocean]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Acoustic, Climate, Climate Change, Climate Science, Conservation, Ecosystems, Environment, Global Warming, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Marine, Methane, Oceans, Research, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[They’ve been called “bubble chasers,” and “seep seekers,” though they sometimes call themselves “flare hunters.” They’re a small group of scientific specialists searching the world’s oceans for tiny streams of methane gas-filled globules rising from seafloor sediments. On expeditions ranging from the Arctic to Antarctica, carried out in shallow waters to thousands of meters below [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[They’ve been called “bubble chasers,” and “seep seekers,” though they sometimes call themselves “flare hunters.” They’re a small group of scientific specialists searching the world’s oceans for tiny streams of methane gas-filled globules rising from seafloor sediments. On expeditions ranging from the Arctic to Antarctica, carried out in shallow waters to thousands of meters below the sea’s surface, their studies reveal how these tiny globules can potentially add to global warming while also creating unique ecosystems. But even when deploying advanced modern technology, finding these cold-ocean methane seeps isn’t easy. And it may be even harder to determine exactly how seafloor methane releases could factor into the future of humanity and the planet. Map showing the known global occurrences of methane-derived carbonates used to compile a study of seafloor methane seepage across the last 150 million years. Image courtesy of Oppo et al. (2020). Bubbles flowing from a methane seep at El Quisco, off the coast of Chile. Researchers found the seeps using sonar-based bubble mapping, bathymetric mapping, tracking in situ methane concentration measurements, and visual surveys with the ROV SuBastian. Image by ROV SuBastian/Schmidt Ocean Institute (CC BY-NC-SA). Hunting telltale bubbles “These seeps are fascinating and extreme environments,” said Claudio Argentino, a sediment biogeochemist at UiT, The Arctic University of Norway, whose fieldwork started at ancient methane seep sites in Italy’s Apennine Mountains in 2015, during his doctoral studies, and now takes him to the Arctic Ocean. “We want to know how much gas is escaping the seafloor sediment&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/01/methane-chasers-hunting-a-climate-changing-gas-seeping-from-earths-seafloor/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/01/methane-chasers-hunting-a-climate-changing-gas-seeping-from-earths-seafloor/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-312714</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Ditches on peatland oil palm plantations are an overlooked source of methane: Study</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/ditches-on-peatland-oil-palm-plantations-are-an-overlooked-source-of-methane-study/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/ditches-on-peatland-oil-palm-plantations-are-an-overlooked-source-of-methane-study/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>30 Dec 2025 14:18:37 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[John Cannon]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Isabel Esterman]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/12/30075343/Tropical-peatland-clearance-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=312273</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Malaysia, Southeast Asia, and Tropics]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, carbon, Carbon Dioxide, Carbon Emissions, Climate Change, Conservation, Environment, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Methane, Peatlands, Politics, Research, Soil Carbon, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[The water-filled ditches that laced through the oil palm plantation in Sarawak, a Malaysian state on the island of Borneo, nagged at Kuno Kasak when he saw them in 2022. He knew that these canals, used to draw water out of spongy peatlands to make them suitable for agriculture, had been shown to be sources [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[The water-filled ditches that laced through the oil palm plantation in Sarawak, a Malaysian state on the island of Borneo, nagged at Kuno Kasak when he saw them in 2022. He knew that these canals, used to draw water out of spongy peatlands to make them suitable for agriculture, had been shown to be sources of methane. But just how much remains an open question, with too few data points to make estimates with certainty. Though methane dissipates more quickly in the atmosphere than CO2, it’s more than 20 times more effective at trapping heat. It’s also responsible for nearly a third of the global temperature rise since the industrial revolution, making accurate methane accounting imperative for addressing climate change. Kasak, a professor of environmental technology at Estonia’s University of Tartu, is the lead author of a recent study in which he and his colleagues report that methane from these drainage canals accounted for as much as 10% of the total greenhouse gases from a given hectare of the oil palm plantations they studied. At the same time, the ditches covered no more than 4% of the plantations’ total area. “This is significant because it means that previous estimates of emissions from drained peatlands likely underestimate the contribution from ditches, which are often ignored in global carbon accounting,” Kasak told Mongabay in an email. They also found that the ditches were sources of CO2. One of the oil palm plantations where Kasak and his colleagues sampled emissions from drainage ditches.&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/ditches-on-peatland-oil-palm-plantations-are-an-overlooked-source-of-methane-study/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/ditches-on-peatland-oil-palm-plantations-are-an-overlooked-source-of-methane-study/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-312273</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Boom in burning waste for fuel could put human health and environment at risk</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/boom-in-burning-waste-for-fuel-puts-human-health-and-environment-at-risk/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/boom-in-burning-waste-for-fuel-puts-human-health-and-environment-at-risk/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>10 Dec 2025 15:23:16 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Sean Mowbray]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Glenn Scherer]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/12/10123021/1--768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=311039</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Planetary Boundaries]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Australia, Europe, Global, India, Indonesia, Jakarta, Myanmar, North America, South Asia, Southeast Asia, and United States]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Bioenergy, carbon, Carbon Dioxide, Carbon Emissions, Climate, Climate Change, Conservation, Energy, Environment, Fires, Fossil Fuels, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Health, Methane, Planetary Health, Plastic, Pollution, Public Health, and Waste]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[As the world desperately searches for a way out of its global climate change and plastic pollution crises, nations are increasingly turning to burning municipal waste to make fuel as a solution to both problems. One approach, dubbed refuse-derived fuel (RDF), processes, packages and burns conglomerated combustible organic waste with large amounts of potentially hazardous [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[As the world desperately searches for a way out of its global climate change and plastic pollution crises, nations are increasingly turning to burning municipal waste to make fuel as a solution to both problems. One approach, dubbed refuse-derived fuel (RDF), processes, packages and burns conglomerated combustible organic waste with large amounts of potentially hazardous plastics in order to make fuel to produce heat or electricity. RDF is an escalating global trend causing concern among environmental experts due to its potential climate, pollution and human health impacts. RDF is typically made up of around 50% plastic waste, which is combined with other combustible materials like wood, cardboard and textiles. The mixed waste is processed via drying and shredding, with the resulting materials then burned in so-called waste-to-energy incinerators, cement kilns, or other industrial facilities such as paper mills. Proponents argue that burning waste is an effective way to simultaneously reduce landfilling and plastic pollution, while cutting greenhouse gas emissions, as it’s a substitute for fossil fuels. Advocates have even marketed RDF as a circular economy solution. Critics aren’t convinced. They say that incinerating RDFs, with their high plastic content, is akin to swapping out one dirty fuel source for another, resulting in the release of significant greenhouse gases, along with harmful particulate and chemical pollutants, including dioxins, a potential byproduct of burning plastics. “Our concerns about [RDF] relate to the fact that plastic consists of polymers that are mixed with many, many different chemicals,” says Lee Bell, technical and policy&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/boom-in-burning-waste-for-fuel-puts-human-health-and-environment-at-risk/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/boom-in-burning-waste-for-fuel-puts-human-health-and-environment-at-risk/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-311039</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Indonesia’s gas bet poses risks for economy, health and climate</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/05/indonesias-gas-bet-poses-risks-for-economy-health-and-climate/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/05/indonesias-gas-bet-poses-risks-for-economy-health-and-climate/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>08 May 2025 09:55:52 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Hans Nicholas Jong]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Hans Nicholas Jong]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/05/08094352/image_1719806931458-768x512.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=298786</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Indonesia, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Air Pollution, Alternative Energy, Carbon Dioxide, Carbon Emissions, Clean Energy, Climate, Climate Change, climate finance, Emission Reduction, Energy, Environment, Fossil Fuels, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Methane, Natural Gas, Pollution, and Renewable Energy]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[JAKARTA — Experts have lambasted Indonesia’s heavy push toward natural gas, saying it risks locking the country into fossil fuel dependency under the guise of clean energy, dealing immense damage to the economy, public health and the environment. In a new report, Jakarta-based think tank the Center of Economic and Law Studies (CELIOS) and Greenpeace [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[JAKARTA — Experts have lambasted Indonesia’s heavy push toward natural gas, saying it risks locking the country into fossil fuel dependency under the guise of clean energy, dealing immense damage to the economy, public health and the environment. In a new report, Jakarta-based think tank the Center of Economic and Law Studies (CELIOS) and Greenpeace Indonesia identified significant downsides to this reliance, which has already seen a quarter of the national grid, or 26 gigawatts, powered by gas. The government recently unveiled a plan to build another 22 GW of gas power capacity by 2040. But even if only the announced projects from that new fleet, amounting to 2.6 GW, come online, that will still translate into additional annual emissions of 5.97 million metric tons of carbon dioxide and 5,332 metric tons of methane, according to the report. The full 22 GW gas expansion would raise this to 49 million metric tons of CO₂ and nearly 44,000 metric tons of methane annually, it says, making the embrace of gas incompatible with Indonesia’s climate goals. “Compared to renewable energy, which can contribute to reducing carbon emissions by 30-40%, fossil gas power plants can instead hinder progress toward achieving net zero emissions,” the report says. It adds that classifying gas as a “transition fuel” is “highly misleading, as it distracts from the immediate focus on adopting renewable energy that aligns with the Paris climate commitments.” The government has touted gas as a clean energy source that can bridge the transition from coal,&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/05/indonesias-gas-bet-poses-risks-for-economy-health-and-climate/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/05/indonesias-gas-bet-poses-risks-for-economy-health-and-climate/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-298786</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Sheinbaum’s energy agenda under fire as Mexican activists slam LNG megaproject</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/04/sheinbaums-energy-agenda-under-fire-as-mexican-activists-slam-lng-megaproject/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/04/sheinbaums-energy-agenda-under-fire-as-mexican-activists-slam-lng-megaproject/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>15 Apr 2025 14:06:48 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Daniela DíazJoshua Collins]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Alexandra Popescu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/04/15123839/IMG_9019-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=297648</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Latin America, Mexico, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Activism, Biodiversity, Biodiversity Hotspots, Carbon Emissions, Clean Energy, Conservation, Dolphins, Energy, Fossil Fuels, Governance, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Marine, Methane, Natural Gas, Politics, and Whales]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[On Jan. 29, the sky above Mexico City’s Zócalo plaza was filled with the floating figures of giant balloon whales. Hundreds of people from the “Whales or Gas?” coalition protested in front of the National Palace over the Saguaro energy project, a massive pipeline planned by the government with U.S. energy company Mexico Pacific that [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[On Jan. 29, the sky above Mexico City’s Zócalo plaza was filled with the floating figures of giant balloon whales. Hundreds of people from the “Whales or Gas?” coalition protested in front of the National Palace over the Saguaro energy project, a massive pipeline planned by the government with U.S. energy company Mexico Pacific that will move liquefied natural gas from Texas to the Gulf of California. The organizers of the Ballena Fest (Festival of Whales) had gathered more than 200,000 signatures against Saguaro. They say the project, which includes plans for a major LNG processing and shipping complex in the small coastal fishing town of Puerto Libertad, will destroy habitats in protected inland areas, as well as threaten delicate marine habitats and marine mammals. They also say that Saguaro deepens Mexico’s reliance on U.S. fossil fuels and goes against President Claudia Sheinbaum’s promises to invest in the country’s energy transition. The 30 million metric tons of LNG that the Saguaro project would move annually would have a greenhouse gas footprint of about 82.8 million metric tons of CO₂ equivalent, or the same as the yearly emissions of more than 19 million cars. Saguaro is also part of a broader controversy over a proposed energy reform bill that would lead to heavy investments in fossil fuel energy production and transport infrastructure in public-private partnerships with U.S. energy companies. Critics of the Saguaro energy project say the Saguaro pipeline, its associated infrastructure and increased industrialization will harm the Gulf of California,&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/04/sheinbaums-energy-agenda-under-fire-as-mexican-activists-slam-lng-megaproject/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-297648</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Colombia’s top oil company concealed environmental damages: Investigation</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/03/colombias-top-oil-company-concealed-environmental-damages-investigation/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/03/colombias-top-oil-company-concealed-environmental-damages-investigation/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>20 Mar 2025 06:35:09 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Mie Hoejris Dahl]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Alexandra Popescu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/03/19201957/13-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=296110</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Colombia, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Community Development, Corporate Environmental Transgressors, Corporate Social Responsibility, Corporations, Crime, Environment, extractives, Forest Destruction, Governance, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Indigenous Peoples, Law Enforcement, Methane, Oil, Oil Drilling, Oil Spills, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[BOGOTÁ, Colombia — A green iguana rests above the letters spelling Ecopetrol at the headquarters of Colombia’s largest company, located in the heart of Bogotá, the capital city. In 2021, this petroleum giant became the first in the oil and gas industry in Latin America to pledge a commitment to achieve net-zero carbon emissions by [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[BOGOTÁ, Colombia — A green iguana rests above the letters spelling Ecopetrol at the headquarters of Colombia’s largest company, located in the heart of Bogotá, the capital city. In 2021, this petroleum giant became the first in the oil and gas industry in Latin America to pledge a commitment to achieve net-zero carbon emissions by 2050. Yet, a recent investigation shows that the company’s operations appear far less green than the color of its iguana logo suggests. Under President Gustavo Petro, Colombia has positioned itself as a green leader in the region, and in 2023 announced it would halt new oil and gas exploration contracts. The same year, Petro replaced the longtime CEO of the 88% state-owned oil company with his campaign manager, Ricardo Roa Barragán (who the Colombian National Electoral Council is investigating for excessive campaign spending), and tasked him with accelerating the green transition.  However, a newly released report reveals that Ecopetrol has systematically underreported its emissions, covered up environmental damages from both Colombian authorities and international shareholders and collaborated with national security forces and armed groups. The report suggests the company has wielded undue influence over regulators and targeted environmental leaders perceived as threats to its operations.  Ecopetrol operates petroleum refineries across Colombia, Brazil, Peru and the United States and is listed on the New York Stock Exchange. Its minority shareholders include BlackRock Inc., Vanguard Group Inc. and JPMorgan Chase &amp; Co. The investigation portrays how the company’s sheer size and economic significance seem to have rendered&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/03/colombias-top-oil-company-concealed-environmental-damages-investigation/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/03/colombias-top-oil-company-concealed-environmental-damages-investigation/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-296110</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Bangladeshi researchers pin hopes on irrigation method with real-time methane monitoring</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/02/bangladeshi-researchers-pin-hopes-on-irrigation-method-with-real-time-methane-monitoring/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/02/bangladeshi-researchers-pin-hopes-on-irrigation-method-with-real-time-methane-monitoring/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>20 Feb 2025 08:08:19 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Sadiqur Rahman]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Abu Siddique]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/02/19164136/banner-768x512.png" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=294699</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia and Bangladesh]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Emission Reduction, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Methane, Research, Technology, and Wildtech]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[When Bloomberg published a report on Apr. 8, 2021, identifying Bangladesh as the 12th largest methane emitter globally, attributing a significant share to rice cultivation, the country’s rice researchers were concerned. Equipped with only secondary and manually collected data, they challenged the “exaggerated” claim, arguing that methane emission from Bangladesh’s rice production was relatively small [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[When Bloomberg published a report on Apr. 8, 2021, identifying Bangladesh as the 12th largest methane emitter globally, attributing a significant share to rice cultivation, the country’s rice researchers were concerned. Equipped with only secondary and manually collected data, they challenged the “exaggerated” claim, arguing that methane emission from Bangladesh’s rice production was relatively small compared to its neighbors India and China — the major emitters. Bloomberg’s publishing of another report two weeks later, claiming that a leaking municipal solid waste landfill contributed to the mysterious methane plumes, got the researchers at Bangladesh Rice Research Institute (BRRI) looking forward to using advanced technology to get concrete and real-time emission measurement data to counter these assessments. In 2024, BRRI researchers introduced Bangladesh’s first GHG emission monitoring laboratory at its regional office in Barishal district’s Sagardi area. Image by Sadiqur Rahman. On Sept. 4, 2024, BRRI researchers introduced Bangladesh’s first greenhouse gas (GHG) emission monitoring laboratory at its regional office in Barisal district’s Sagardi area with the support of development partners. This new installation also aims to support research on the emission-cutting Alternate Wetting and Drying (AWD) method that the BRRI researchers have been piloting in Bangladesh’s rice fields for several years. AWD is an irrigation method that reduces water use in rice fields without disturbing the plant&#8217;s growth, germination and other processes to mature the rice. “Given the real-time GHG emission measurement facilities, we would not only analyze the impacts of AWD but also claim carbon credits someday,” BRRI’s director general&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/02/bangladeshi-researchers-pin-hopes-on-irrigation-method-with-real-time-methane-monitoring/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/02/bangladeshi-researchers-pin-hopes-on-irrigation-method-with-real-time-methane-monitoring/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-294699</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Atmospheric methane removal: A promising but challenging climate solution</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/11/atmospheric-methane-removal-a-promising-but-challenging-climate-solution/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/11/atmospheric-methane-removal-a-promising-but-challenging-climate-solution/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>06 Nov 2024 17:20:55 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Sean Mowbray]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Glenn Scherer]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2024/11/06150102/2-cows-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=289723</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Planetary Boundaries]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Global]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[carbon, Carbon Dioxide, Carbon Emissions, Carbon Sequestration, Climate, Climate Change, Climate Science, Conservation, Emission Reduction, Environment, Geoengineering, Global Warming, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Methane, Mitigation, and Research]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[A variety of geoengineering technologies are being closely studied to rapidly remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. But researchers are also now considering removing another powerful greenhouse gas: atmospheric methane, or CH4. But no viable technology exists yet to do so at scale. Methane is a highly potent greenhouse gas, roughly 80 times more powerful [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[A variety of geoengineering technologies are being closely studied to rapidly remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. But researchers are also now considering removing another powerful greenhouse gas: atmospheric methane, or CH4. But no viable technology exists yet to do so at scale. Methane is a highly potent greenhouse gas, roughly 80 times more powerful than CO2 in its ability to heat up the Earth. It is currently responsible for about a third of annual warming, and for the past five years, civilization has released alarmingly record amounts of methane into the atmosphere. Today, at least two-thirds of yearly methane emissions come from human activities, including livestock, agriculture, fossil fuels, landfills and other waste — while climate feedbacks add to that total via releases from global wetlands and Arctic permafrost. Researchers emphasize that the quickest fix is to slash human-caused emissions. But some scientists are considering another approach: Methane is short-lived in the atmosphere, with CH4 molecules breaking down in seven to 12 years, against the 100 or more years it takes CO2 to break down. So scientists are investigating geoengineering technologies that might expedite this methane breakdown and help achieve a cooler world. “Currently, anthropogenic methane emissions are adding about half a degree Celsius [0.9° Fahrenheit] to warming,” says climate scientist Gabrielle Dreyfus from the U.S.-based Institute For Governance &amp; Sustainable Development. “In theory, combining mitigation measures to reduce [methane] emissions with removal could potentially [eliminate] that warming.” To that end, the U.S. National Academies of Science in a&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2024/11/atmospheric-methane-removal-a-promising-but-challenging-climate-solution/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/11/atmospheric-methane-removal-a-promising-but-challenging-climate-solution/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-289723</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>An ‘aquatic moonshot’ in Vietnam aims to fight livestock methane with seaweed</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/10/an-aquatic-moonshot-in-vietnam-aims-to-fight-livestock-methane-with-seaweed/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/10/an-aquatic-moonshot-in-vietnam-aims-to-fight-livestock-methane-with-seaweed/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>11 Oct 2023 10:00:56 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Michael Tatarski]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rebecca Kessler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Food systems]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2023/10/05122202/seaweed-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=273941</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Southeast Asia, and Vietnam]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Adaptation To Climate Change, Agriculture, Aquaculture, Biodiversity, Climate Change, Community-based Conservation, Conservation, Emission Reduction, Environment, Food, Marine, Marine Conservation, Methane, Nature-based climate solutions, Ocean Warming, Oceans, Research, Solutions, Sustainability, and Temperatures]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[VAN PHONG BAY, Vietnam — A bold mariculture experiment in this shimmering bay ringed by hills in central Vietnam is aiming to neutralize a globally significant source of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. An international team of scientists at Greener Grazing, an R&#38;D company, is growing a feathery, fern-like red seaweed called Asparagopsis taxiformis in a [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[VAN PHONG BAY, Vietnam — A bold mariculture experiment in this shimmering bay ringed by hills in central Vietnam is aiming to neutralize a globally significant source of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. An international team of scientists at Greener Grazing, an R&amp;D company, is growing a feathery, fern-like red seaweed called Asparagopsis taxiformis in a laboratory, with the aim of transferring the seaweed into the bay to grow fully. In theory, Greener Grazing would then disseminate this know-how to farmers around the world, allowing local communities to grow, harvest and sell A. taxiformis for income as a climate solution. This seaweed wouldn’t be for human consumption or use in cosmetics: It would be fed to livestock as a way to largely eliminate their methane emissions. The challenge, however, is immense. There are nearly 3 billion cattle and sheep in the world and Greener Grazing estimates about 100 million tons of A. taxiformis would be needed as a feed additive annually to eliminate 98% of the roughly 231 billion pounds of methane these livestock emit each year. In 2019, 34.7 million tons of seaweed were farmed globally — none of it A. taxiformis, according to the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). In this context, some researchers argue that this seaweed cannot practically be farmed at scale or have as large an impact as its promoters suggest. A view of Van Phong Bay, with traditional aquaculture pens in the distance. Image by Michael Tatarski for Mongabay. The foundational research Greener Grazing’s&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2023/10/an-aquatic-moonshot-in-vietnam-aims-to-fight-livestock-methane-with-seaweed/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/10/an-aquatic-moonshot-in-vietnam-aims-to-fight-livestock-methane-with-seaweed/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-273941</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Indonesia aims to use gas in foreign-funded energy transition; critics cry foul</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/03/indonesia-aims-to-use-gas-in-foreign-funded-energy-transition-critics-cry-foul/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/03/indonesia-aims-to-use-gas-in-foreign-funded-energy-transition-critics-cry-foul/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>09 Mar 2023 08:34:42 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Hans Nicholas Jong]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Karen Coates]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2023/03/09032715/WhatsApp-Image-2022-05-12-at-3.59.13-PM-768x512.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=266316</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Indonesia, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Alternative Energy, Carbon Emissions, charcoal, Climate, Climate Change, climate finance, Coal, Emission Reduction, Energy, Environment, Finance, Fossil Fuels, Fossils, Funding, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Methane, Natural Gas, Politics, Pollution, and Renewable Energy]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[JAKARTA — Activists have lambasted the Indonesian government’s proposal to include gas in its clean energy transition program funded by industrialized countries. They said the inclusion of gas-fired power plants in Indonesia’s transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy would derail the country’s bid to lower its emissions to contribute to capping global warming at [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[JAKARTA — Activists have lambasted the Indonesian government’s proposal to include gas in its clean energy transition program funded by industrialized countries. They said the inclusion of gas-fired power plants in Indonesia’s transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy would derail the country’s bid to lower its emissions to contribute to capping global warming at 1.5° Celsius (2.7° Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial levels. Indonesia was the world’s fifth-largest greenhouse gas emitter in 2019, behind only China, the U.S., India and the EU as a whole. Its emissions largely come from deforestation and burning of coal, with the latter generating 61% of the country’s electricity. Emissions from Indonesia’s power sector are projected to keep increasing as the country grows its economy, the largest in Southeast Asia and 16th largest in the world by nominal GDP. As a part of its energy transition program to lower emissions from the power sector, the government plans to convert existing diesel fuel-fired power plants into gas-fired ones. Energy and Mineral Resources Minister Arifin Tasrif argued that it’s the fastest way to curb emissions, as gas-fired power plants emit fewer emissions compared with diesel. &#8220;This is the fastest way to reduce emissions and costs, from diesel fuel-fired to gas-fired,&#8221; he said on Feb. 17. There are currently 5,200 diesel power plants in 2,130 locations throughout Indonesia. The plan is to convert at least 52 diesel plants into gas plants. At the initial stage of the plan, 33 diesel plants will be converted first. The oil and gas director-general at the energy ministry,&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2023/03/indonesia-aims-to-use-gas-in-foreign-funded-energy-transition-critics-cry-foul/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/03/indonesia-aims-to-use-gas-in-foreign-funded-energy-transition-critics-cry-foul/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-266316</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Potty-trained cows? Teaching cattle where to urinate could help reduce greenhouse gases</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2021/11/potty-trained-cows-teaching-cattle-where-to-urinate-could-help-reduce-greenhouse-gases/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2021/11/potty-trained-cows-teaching-cattle-where-to-urinate-could-help-reduce-greenhouse-gases/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>30 Nov 2021 16:02:37 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Emily Moskal]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rhett Butler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2021/11/20224155/potty-cow-rixster-veere-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=249722</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Global]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Carbon Emissions, Cattle, Environment, Farming, Green, Livestock, Methane, Mitigation, and Ranching]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Cows aren’t too bullheaded or dumb to learn new bathroom habits. Researchers showed this by toilet-training a small group of calves in a toilet they designed and dubbed the MooLoo. If they can scale up this approach to farms, the scientists believe it could help cut nitrous oxide emissions from cattle ranches—a major contributor to [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Cows aren’t too bullheaded or dumb to learn new bathroom habits. Researchers showed this by toilet-training a small group of calves in a toilet they designed and dubbed the MooLoo. If they can scale up this approach to farms, the scientists believe it could help cut nitrous oxide emissions from cattle ranches—a major contributor to climate change, according to a recent report in Current Biology. “We’ve trained probably the most difficult animal,” said senior author Lindsay Matthews, an animal behaviorist associated with the University of Auckland in New Zealand. “But that’s the reason we started with cattle, because it was a big challenge.” When ammonia from cow urine and feces mixes with microbes in the soil, nitrous oxide, a potent greenhouse gas, escapes into the air. Nitrous oxide has a greater warming power than carbon dioxide. Combined with the methane released by cow farts, excretions from cattle are harmful to the atmosphere. According to a recent study, cows can be potty trained just as quickly, if not quicker, than most toddlers. Image courtesy of Leibniz Institute for Farm Animal Biology. To train young cows to use the bathroom in 45-minute sessions, the scientists, led by Neele Dirksen and colleagues at the Leibniz Institute for Farm Animal Biology in Germany, staged three training phases. To initiate urination, the team gave the young cows a diuretic drug. Immediately after proper potty protocol, a researcher pushed a button to administer a sweet, tasty reward of molasses or barley. “A wee squirt” of water&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2021/11/potty-trained-cows-teaching-cattle-where-to-urinate-could-help-reduce-greenhouse-gases/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-249722</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Hope old and new: COP26 focused on two largely unsung climate solutions</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2021/11/hope-old-and-new-cop26-focused-on-two-largely-unsung-climate-solutions/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2021/11/hope-old-and-new-cop26-focused-on-two-largely-unsung-climate-solutions/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>18 Nov 2021 21:22:09 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Justin Catanoso]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Glenn Scherer]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2021/11/18170310/Banner-Image-768x450.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=249622</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Covering the Commons and Indigenous Peoples and Conservation]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Brazil, Democratic Republic Of Congo, Global, and Indonesia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Adaptation To Climate Change, Carbon Sequestration, Climate Change, Conservation, Environment, Environmental Policy, Forest Carbon, Forests, Global Warming, Happy-upbeat Environmental, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Reserves, Indigenous Rights, Methane, Nature-based climate solutions, Politics, Research, Solutions, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Indigenous stewardship of 960 million hectares of ancestral lands; along with rapid research and application of new methane removal technologies, could help curb global warming — if both approaches are fully backed by nations.]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[As consensus hardens around whether COP26, the just-concluded U.N. climate summit in Glasgow, Scotland, was a middling success or abject failure, two promising approaches to solving the climate crisis are emerging from the aftermath — one concept that is quite old, and another that is very new. If backed by the international community with action and funds, not just promises, both could curb climate change in the decades ahead. The first approach, as old as humanity’s relationship with nature itself, would empower the Indigenous peoples who first inhabited the tropical forests which are so crucial to pulling carbon from the atmosphere, storing it long-term, and bending the warming curve. The other approach, as new and groundbreaking as any scientific research anywhere, offers a potential technological fix known as atmospheric methane removal, an engineered climate strategy that could slow warming, and even cool the planet, if promising laboratory results can be successfully field tested and then implemented on a global scale fast enough. The first idea received major attention at COP26, the second flew largely under the media radar. But on land and in the sky — both could be game changers in holding global temperature rise to 1.5° Celsius (2.7° Fahrenheit), or below, compared to pre-industrial levels — the Paris Agreement target further emphasized in the final Glasgow accords. Those two approaches in summary: First, the return of land tenure and land rights over as much existing tropical forest as possible to Indigenous peoples and local communities (IPLCs). And second,&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2021/11/hope-old-and-new-cop26-focused-on-two-largely-unsung-climate-solutions/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2021/11/hope-old-and-new-cop26-focused-on-two-largely-unsung-climate-solutions/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-249622</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>COP26: As carbon emissions rise unabated, scientists eye a methane removal fix</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2021/11/as-carbon-emissions-rise-unabated-scientists-eye-a-methane-removal-fix/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2021/11/as-carbon-emissions-rise-unabated-scientists-eye-a-methane-removal-fix/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>08 Nov 2021 18:05:10 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Justin Catanoso]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Glenn Scherer]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2021/11/08172426/BANNER-IMAGE-METHANE-FLARE-768x454.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=249182</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Global]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Adaptation To Climate Change, carbon, Carbon Dioxide, Carbon Emissions, Carbon Sequestration, Climate Change, Earth Science, Emission Reduction, Global Warming, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Methane, and Research]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[With COP26 showing no sign of a CO2 reduction breakthrough, researchers are touting various atmospheric methane removal strategies. But is there the time, money and commitment to implement? And what are the risks?]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[GLASGOW, Scotland — Carbon dioxide emissions from energy and transportation have long taken center stage at United Nations climate summit negotiations. But here at COP26, in cold, rainy Scotland, methane, a far more potent heat-trapping gas, is grabbing a share of the spotlight for the first time. With good reason. Methane only exists at roughly 2 parts per million in the atmosphere, compared to 412 parts per million for CO2. But the methane molecule (CH4) traps as much as 85 times more heat than the more abundant polluting CO2. But while carbon dioxide remains in the sky like a warming blanket for hundreds of years, methane largely dissipates in roughly a decade — making it a ripe target for nations to attack in their effort to slow the ominous quickening pace of global warming. As the all-important Glasgow summit enters its second and final week, potential real progress came on November 2, when an alliance of some 100 countries, led by the U.S. and European Union representing two-thirds of the global economy, pledged to reduce methane emissions by 30% by 2030. A large COP26 sign decorated with tropical plants, displayed at the COP26 Climate Action Center in Glasgow, U.K. Image by Justin Catanoso for Mongabay. But China, Russia and India, major methane emitters, refused to join, a stark reminder of the political obstacles always in play during climate negotiations. And importantly, last week’s COP26 methane pledge is voluntary, legally non-binding, and has no enforcement provisions, meaning that it could suffer&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2021/11/as-carbon-emissions-rise-unabated-scientists-eye-a-methane-removal-fix/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2021/11/as-carbon-emissions-rise-unabated-scientists-eye-a-methane-removal-fix/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-249182</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Plastics set to overtake coal plants on U.S. carbon emissions, new study shows</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2021/10/plastics-set-to-overtake-coal-plants-on-ghg-emissions-new-study-shows/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2021/10/plastics-set-to-overtake-coal-plants-on-ghg-emissions-new-study-shows/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>22 Oct 2021 18:54:57 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Elizabeth Claire Alberts]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Elizabethalberts]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2021/10/22183826/51256359470_3c7e024d96_k-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=248458</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Covering the Commons]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[United States]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Air Pollution, carbon, Carbon Dioxide, Carbon Emissions, Carbon Footprint, Climate, Climate Change, Coal, Conservation, Environment, Fracking, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Industry, Methane, Microplastics, Natural Gas, Plastic, and Pollution]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Plastics will outpace coal plants in the U.S. by 2030 in terms of their contributions to climate change, according to a new report released Oct. 21 by Beyond Plastics, a project at Bennington College in Vermont. Yet policymakers and businesses are not currently accounting for the plastics industry’s full impact on climate change, allowing the [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Plastics will outpace coal plants in the U.S. by 2030 in terms of their contributions to climate change, according to a new report released Oct. 21 by Beyond Plastics, a project at Bennington College in Vermont. Yet policymakers and businesses are not currently accounting for the plastics industry’s full impact on climate change, allowing the industry to essentially fly “under the radar, with little public scrutiny and even less government accountability,” the report says. Judith Enck, president of Beyond Plastics and a former regional administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), says the report was intentionally released in the lead-up to the COP26 summit in Glasgow, Scotland, when world leaders will gather to discuss strategies for tackling climate change. “There’s a little discussion on waste, but not much,” Enck told Mongabay in a video interview. “But plastics’ contribution to climate change is not on the agenda.” The report, “New Coal: Plastics and Climate Change,” draws on public and private data sources to analyze 10 stages of plastic production in the U.S., including gas acquisition, transportation, manufacturing and disposal. It found that the U.S. plastics industry alone is presently responsible for at least 232 million metric tons of greenhouse gases every year, the equivalent of about 116.5 gigawatts in coal plants. But this number is expected to rise as dozens of plastics facilities are currently under construction across the country, mainly in Texas and Louisiana, according to the report. “What’s quietly been happening under the radar is the petrochemical industry&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2021/10/plastics-set-to-overtake-coal-plants-on-ghg-emissions-new-study-shows/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2021/10/plastics-set-to-overtake-coal-plants-on-ghg-emissions-new-study-shows/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-248458</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Seafloor microbes hoover up methane, keeping global warming in check</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2021/07/seafloor-microbes-hoover-up-methane-keeping-global-warming-in-check/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2021/07/seafloor-microbes-hoover-up-methane-keeping-global-warming-in-check/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>08 Jul 2021 14:42:15 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Elizabeth Claire Alberts]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Elizabethalberts]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2021/07/08143241/121-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=244604</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[United States]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Climate, Deep Sea, Ecosystems, Global Environmental Crisis, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Marine, Marine Conservation, Methane, Ocean Warming, Oceans, and Science]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Jeffrey Marlow says we should be thinking more about microbes — those teensy, tiny organisms that inhabit just about every part of the biosphere, but are only visible under the lens of a microscope. “Microbes really matter in the environment,” Marlow, an assistant professor of biology at Boston University, told Mongabay in an interview. “They&#8217;re [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Jeffrey Marlow says we should be thinking more about microbes — those teensy, tiny organisms that inhabit just about every part of the biosphere, but are only visible under the lens of a microscope. “Microbes really matter in the environment,” Marlow, an assistant professor of biology at Boston University, told Mongabay in an interview. “They&#8217;re often out of sight, out of mind — but they are the first line of defense often in terms of climate change.” Marlow is the lead author of a new study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences that looks at microbes that live in carbonate rock mounds and their interactions with methane, the chemical compound that naturally seeps out of the seafloor. By collecting samples at seven different seafloor seeps around North America, Marlow and his colleagues figured out that rock-inhabiting microbes were actually consuming methane inside the rocks. “That was surprising to me because we&#8217;ve often viewed these rocks as old repositories of ancient life, or past geochemical signals of what had happened in many years past, but the fact that they host these active microbes is pretty remarkable to me,” Marlow said. What’s more, these microbes appeared to consume methane 50 times faster than microbes in sediment, the study found. “We often see that some sediment microbes from methane-rich mud volcanoes, for example, may be five to ten times faster at eating methane, but 50 times faster is a whole new thing,” co-author Peter Girguis, a biologist and professor&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2021/07/seafloor-microbes-hoover-up-methane-keeping-global-warming-in-check/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2021/07/seafloor-microbes-hoover-up-methane-keeping-global-warming-in-check/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-244604</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>We have turned the Amazon into a net greenhouse gas emitter: Study</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2021/03/we-have-turned-the-amazon-into-a-net-greenhouse-gas-emitter-study/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2021/03/we-have-turned-the-amazon-into-a-net-greenhouse-gas-emitter-study/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>19 Mar 2021 15:59:45 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Liz Kimbrough]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Liz Kimbrough]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2019/08/25200307/GP0STTSE7_greenpeace_amazon_fires_2019-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=240740</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Amazon, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Biodiversity, Black Carbon, Carbon Dioxide, Carbon Emissions, Climate Change, Conservation, Deforestation, Drought, Environment, Fires, Forest Destruction, Forests, Green, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Methane, Nitrous Oxide, Ozone Layer, Rainforest Destruction, Rainforests, Research, Threats To Rainforests, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Something is wrong in the lungs of the world. Decades of burning, logging, mining and development have tipped the scales, and now the Amazon Basin may be emitting more greenhouse gases than it absorbs. Most of the conversation about climate change is dominated by carbon dioxide. While CO2 plays a critical role in the complex [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Something is wrong in the lungs of the world. Decades of burning, logging, mining and development have tipped the scales, and now the Amazon Basin may be emitting more greenhouse gases than it absorbs. Most of the conversation about climate change is dominated by carbon dioxide. While CO2 plays a critical role in the complex climate equation, other forces such as methane, nitrous oxide, aerosols and black carbon are also factors. In a first-of-its-kind effort, a group of 31 scientists calculated the balance of all natural and human-caused greenhouse gases coming in and out of the massive Amazon Basin. The team concluded that warming of the atmosphere from agents other than CO2 likely exceeds the climate benefits the Amazon provides via CO2 uptake. Or more simply: due to humans, the Amazon Basin is now a net greenhouse gas (GHG) emitter. “I would highlight that that natural greenhouse emissions from ecosystems aren’t causing climate change,” the study’s lead author, Kristofer Covey, an assistant professor at Skidmore College told Mongabay. “It’s the many human disturbances underway in the basin that are contributing to climate change.” Fire next to the borders of the Kaxarari Indigenous Land, in Lábrea, Amazonas state. Fires n the Amazon are caused by humans, typically set to clear forests for agriculture. Taken 17 Aug, 2020. CREDIT: © Christian Braga / Greenpeace. Earth receives constant energy from the sun. Climate-forcing factors in the atmosphere, such as greenhouse gases, act like a blanket, trapping that heat energy on Earth. When there’s more&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2021/03/we-have-turned-the-amazon-into-a-net-greenhouse-gas-emitter-study/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2021/03/we-have-turned-the-amazon-into-a-net-greenhouse-gas-emitter-study/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-240740</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Siberian heat drives Arctic ice extent to record low for early July</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2020/07/siberian-heat-drives-arctic-ice-extent-to-record-low-for-early-july/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2020/07/siberian-heat-drives-arctic-ice-extent-to-record-low-for-early-july/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>10 Jul 2020 14:08:39 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Gloria Dickie]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Glenn Scherer]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2020/07/10122019/BANNER-IMAGE-si-768x448.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=232372</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Arctic, Arctic Ocean, Russia, and siberia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[boreal forests, Carbon Emissions, Climate, Climate Change, Climate Science, Controversial, data, Disasters, Environment, Extreme Weather, Fires, Forest Carbon, Forests, Global Environmental Crisis, Global Warming, Green, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Impact Of Climate Change, Infrastructure, Methane, Permafrost, Pollution, Remote Sensing, Research, Sea Ice, Temperatures, and Water Pollution]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Temps as high as 100 degrees Fahrenheit in Siberia have triggered record Arctic sea ice melt, raging wildfires, permafrost thaw, and an Arctic oil spill.]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Arctic sea ice extent July 9, 2020. Image courtesy of University of Bremen. The record-setting heat wave that swept through Arctic Siberia in June has yielded a wide-range of deleterious effects in the expansive polar and sub-polar region, triggering raging wildfires, thawing permafrost, and now, spurring the rapid melt-out of Arctic sea ice. Last month, Siberian temperatures spiked, reaching a record average more than 5 degrees Celsius (9 degrees Fahrenheit) hotter than normal, according to recently released data from the European Union. The remote town of Verkhoyansk in northeast Siberia recorded a reading of more than 38 degrees Celsius (100 degrees Fahrenheit) on June 17, the highest temperature ever recorded north of the Arctic Circle. Under this metaphorical blow torch, ice extent in the seas that border Siberia has plummeted in recent days, pushing the Arctic region as a whole into the record books. Between July 2 and July 7, sea ice extent across the Arctic Ocean went from being at its fifth lowest extent for this time of year since satellite record-keeping began in 1979, melting into first place, slightly below even the calamitous year of 2012 which eventually saw sea ice hit a record low at the end of the summer melt season in September. As of July 9, sea ice extent in the global Arctic sits at just 8.310 million square kilometers (3.2 million square miles). If that melting momentum carries forward (and nobody knows if it will), 2020 could nab the title of the lowest ice&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2020/07/siberian-heat-drives-arctic-ice-extent-to-record-low-for-early-july/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2020/07/siberian-heat-drives-arctic-ice-extent-to-record-low-for-early-july/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-232372</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Arctic permafrost moving toward crisis, abrupt thaw a growing risk: Studies</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2020/03/arctic-permafrost-moving-toward-crisis-abrupt-thaw-a-growing-risk-studies/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2020/03/arctic-permafrost-moving-toward-crisis-abrupt-thaw-a-growing-risk-studies/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>18 Mar 2020 16:58:53 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Gloria Dickie]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Glenn Scherer]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2020/03/18145548/BANNER-IMAGE-cabin-768x453.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=228012</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Alaska, Arctic, Canada, and siberia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[carbon, Carbon Dioxide, Carbon Emissions, Carbon Footprint, Carbon Sequestration, Climate, Climate Change, Climate Science, Conservation, Controversial, data, Emission Reduction, Energy, Environment, Environmental Policy, Global Environmental Crisis, Global Warming, Green, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Impact Of Climate Change, Methane, Permafrost, Politics, Pollution, Remote Sensing, and Research]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Scientists are already warning of gradual permafrost CO2 releases; but future abrupt thaws could send huge amounts of methane skyward, causing a surge in global temperatures.]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Small scale permafrost slump. Photo credit: NPS Climate Change Response on Visual Hunt / CC BY. The cracked, buckling road between Fairbanks and Fox, Alaska, wends its way past snowy forests where slender birches and black spruce trees protrude out of the ground at impossible angles, slanting and swaying as if the very earth were alive. Scientists call these “drunken forests.” The ground here consists of permafrost — soil, sediment, rock and ice that often remains at or below 0 degrees Celsius (32 degrees Fahrenheit) year-round. Permafrost covers approximately 22.8 million square kilometers (8.8 million square miles) in the Arctic, sub-Arctic and alpine regions — comprising nearly a quarter of the exposed land surface in the northern hemisphere. In Alaska, 85 percent of the state lies within the permafrost zone, though discontinuous permafrost — areas with patchy permafrost presence — underlies much of the Fairbanks area. In Arctic regions, permafrost temperatures often dip down to -8 degrees C (-17.6 degrees F). But in Fairbanks, which lies roughly 321 kilometers (200 miles) south of the Arctic Circle, temperatures hover much closer to the freezing point, causing the permafrost to sporadically thaw out. This freeze-thaw action has long posed challenges for natural and human systems, intoxicating forests, breaking pavement, sinking houses, and even sometimes draining lakes sitting atop it. But as climate change heats up the planet, with the Arctic warming at twice the rate of the rest of the globe, things are about to get a whole lot worse. Scientists began&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2020/03/arctic-permafrost-moving-toward-crisis-abrupt-thaw-a-growing-risk-studies/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-228012</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Soggier forest soils thwart the uptake of climate-warming methane</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/08/soggier-forest-soils-thwart-the-uptake-of-climate-warming-methane/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/08/soggier-forest-soils-thwart-the-uptake-of-climate-warming-methane/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>07 Aug 2018 11:06:43 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Mongabay.com]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[John Cannon]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2018/08/07042710/177224-768x450.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=209061</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Global]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Carbon Emissions, Carbon Sequestration, Climate Change, Climate Science, Conservation, Ecology, Environment, Forest Carbon, Forestry, Forests, Global Warming, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Impact Of Climate Change, Methane, Mitigation, Rainforests, Research, Soil Carbon, Trees, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Rainier weather could be hampering the ability to siphon methane from the air by forest soils, thought to be important repositories for the growing concentrations of the greenhouse gas in the atmosphere, new research shows. “Our data strongly suggests that we’re significantly overestimating how much methane is being captured by forest soil,” Peter Groffman, one [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Rainier weather could be hampering the ability to siphon methane from the air by forest soils, thought to be important repositories for the growing concentrations of the greenhouse gas in the atmosphere, new research shows. “Our data strongly suggests that we’re significantly overestimating how much methane is being captured by forest soil,” Peter Groffman, one of the study’s authors and a biogeochemist at the City University of New York, said in a statement. “[That] means a lot more of this greenhouse gas is ending up in our atmosphere a lot faster than we believe.” Groffman and fellow author Xiangyin Ni of Sichuan Agricultural University in Chengdu, China, reported their findings Aug. 6 in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Groffman and his field team have been measuring nutrient uptake and gas exchange in Baltimore area forests for nearly 20 years. Image by Dan Dillon. A lot of human activity releases methane into the atmosphere. The fossil fuel we burn to run our cars and heat our homes, the livestock and crops we raise and the decomposing trash we leave behind are all significant sources of methane. And, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, it has 28 to 35 times the warming potential of carbon dioxide. Until now, scientists have generally seen the bacteria-rich soils of forests as a reliable sink for the methane we’ve been pumping into the air, with some hinting that global warming might even be increasing these soils’ capacity to take in methane.&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2018/08/soggier-forest-soils-thwart-the-uptake-of-climate-warming-methane/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/08/soggier-forest-soils-thwart-the-uptake-of-climate-warming-methane/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-209061</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Mangroves and their deforestation may emit more methane than we thought</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/07/mangroves-and-their-deforestation-may-emit-more-methane-than-we-thought/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/07/mangroves-and-their-deforestation-may-emit-more-methane-than-we-thought/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>13 Jul 2018 15:47:33 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Morgan Erickson-Davis]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Morgan Erickson-Davis]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2018/07/13153744/rosentreter4HR-768x448.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=208355</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Australia and Global]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Aquaculture, carbon, Carbon Dioxide, Climate, Climate Change, Coastal Ecosystems, Dams, Deforestation, Ecosystem Services, Forests, Global Warming, Infrastructure, Mangroves, Methane, Mitigation, Oceans, Rainforests, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
											<grant>
							<![CDATA[G-1710-55576]]>
						</grant>
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Mangroves, the dense tangled forests that buffer land from sea in many coastal areas of the tropics, are renowned for their ability to store carbon and help fight climate change. But new research finds mangroves may emit more carbon as methane than previously estimated – emissions made even worse by deforestation. The ability of mangroves [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Mangroves, the dense tangled forests that buffer land from sea in many coastal areas of the tropics, are renowned for their ability to store carbon and help fight climate change. But new research finds mangroves may emit more carbon as methane than previously estimated – emissions made even worse by deforestation. The ability of mangroves to sequester carbon in the ground – termed “blue carbon” – is unparalleled, with previous research finding a tract of mangrove can bury 40 times more carbon than a similarly sized area of rainforest. But what exactly happens to this carbon once it’s in the ground has been something of a mystery. So scientists at universities in Australia decided to find out by examining the soil carbon stored beneath mangroves in Queensland. Dr. Judith Rosentreter, a coauthor of the study, in a mangrove creek in North Queensland, Australia. Her research interest are in carbon cycling and greenhouse gas emissions from mangrove ecosystems. Photo by Jacob Yeo Their results, published in Science Advances, reveal that mangrove soil carbon doesn’t remain stored in perpetuity. Some of it is transformed from carbon dioxide (CO2) to methane (CH4) by tiny microorganisims called archea, and is then released back into the atmosphere. Methane has a much bigger warming impact than carbon dioxide – 34 to 86 times more powerful – so even a bit of methane has the potential to offset mangrove CO2 storage. Ultimately, the team found that the methane released from mangrove soil carbon offsets blue carbon burial&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2018/07/mangroves-and-their-deforestation-may-emit-more-methane-than-we-thought/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/07/mangroves-and-their-deforestation-may-emit-more-methane-than-we-thought/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-208355</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Proposed Colombia dam threatens to wipe out endangered plants, disrupt river</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2017/07/proposed-colombia-dam-threatens-to-wipe-out-endangered-plants-disrupt-river/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2017/07/proposed-colombia-dam-threatens-to-wipe-out-endangered-plants-disrupt-river/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>26 Jul 2017 17:52:32 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Taran Volckhausen]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Morgan Erickson-Davis]]>
					</author>
															<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2017/07/26174327/damsite-768x512.png" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=197645</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Colombia, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Climate Change, Dams, Energy, Environment, Fish, Forests, Global Warming, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Hydroelectric Power, Indigenous Peoples, Methane, Plants, Rainforests, Renewable Energy, Research, Species Discovery, Tropical Forests, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[PUERTO GARZA, Colombia – A Colombian conglomerate is moving ahead to build a nearly 400-foot-tall hydroelectric dam along the Samaná Norte River in northwestern Colombia, which threatens to extinguish critically endangered plant species found only in the canyon, and block the path of migrating fish. Shrouded in violent conflict between guerrilla, paramilitaries and the state [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[PUERTO GARZA, Colombia – A Colombian conglomerate is moving ahead to build a nearly 400-foot-tall hydroelectric dam along the Samaná Norte River in northwestern Colombia, which threatens to extinguish critically endangered plant species found only in the canyon, and block the path of migrating fish. Shrouded in violent conflict between guerrilla, paramilitaries and the state that displaced local farmers from their land for decades, the Samaná Norte River had been protected from development up until ten years ago, when the violence began to subside. Local ecologists, taking advantage of recent peace in the area, are now exploring the canyon in in search of any rare, native species that may be hidden beside the emerald green waters and within the tropical forests hanging off the canyon&#8217;s steep walls. The Samaná Norte River. Photo by Taran Volckhausen for Mongabay. The $800 million dam would provide 352 megawatts of electricity each year, representing 3 percent of Colombia’s annual electricity use. While the environmental license for hydroelectric project Porvenir II has already been approved by the National Authority of Environmental Licenses (ANLA) and construction is expected to begin at the end of this year, environmental and social leaders continue to fight the dam project, which they say will cause irreparable environmental and social harm. The opponents say endangered plant species that are endemic to this peculiar canyon ecosystem along the Samaná Norte River, situated between Medellin and Bogota, may disappear forever if the dam is built as planned. Endangered palm Expert local botanist Rodrigo&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2017/07/proposed-colombia-dam-threatens-to-wipe-out-endangered-plants-disrupt-river/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2017/07/proposed-colombia-dam-threatens-to-wipe-out-endangered-plants-disrupt-river/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-197645</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Methane mystery: fossil fuels spewing less methane, but gas continues to accumulate</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2017/05/methane-mystery-fossil-fuels-spewing-less-methane-but-gas-continues-to-accumulate/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2017/05/methane-mystery-fossil-fuels-spewing-less-methane-but-gas-continues-to-accumulate/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>15 May 2017 06:05:13 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Jacqueline Hernandez]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Maria Angeles Salazar]]>
					</author>
															<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2017/05/15055835/fieldriau-768x512.png" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=195715</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Global]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Carbon Dioxide, Climate Change, Economics, Energy, Energy Efficiency, Environment, Fossil Fuels, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Methane, and Research]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[It has no smell, but it’s a product of decay. You can’t see it with the naked eye, but it’s in increasingly high-demand. It’s methane: a gas that arises from anaerobic wetlands, rotting landfills, and ruminant indigestion. Fossil fuel production also releases this gas from its high-pressure underground reserves, allowing it to surface either as [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[It has no smell, but it’s a product of decay. You can’t see it with the naked eye, but it’s in increasingly high-demand. It’s methane: a gas that arises from anaerobic wetlands, rotting landfills, and ruminant indigestion. Fossil fuel production also releases this gas from its high-pressure underground reserves, allowing it to surface either as a potent greenhouse gas or as an energy source, depending on the fossil fuel company. NOAA has tracked methane’s presence in our atmosphere since 1984, capturing a surprising slowdown in its output throughout the 1990s and mid-2000s. But the past ten years have seen a rapid rise of methane in the atmosphere, though scientists aren’t sure of why. Yet they do know the gas is a devastating force furthering climate change; methane traps 34 times more heat than the infamous carbon dioxide over a 100-year period. Figuring out methane output from its various sources is no straightforward task– after all, it’s colorless, odorless, doesn’t show up on satellite images, and it’s formed from dozens of dynamic human activities and natural processes. A recent paper published in Environmental Research Letters addresses this challenge, showing a new way to calculate methane emissions from oil and gas fields around the globe – an analysis that concludes that oil and gas reserves are not likely responsible for the current trend in rising methane, but that in past decades, oil and gas reserves contributed far more damage than previously thought. Lena Hoglund-Isaksson examined published data on country-specific differences in the&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2017/05/methane-mystery-fossil-fuels-spewing-less-methane-but-gas-continues-to-accumulate/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-195715</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Rekindling Australia&#8217;s Aboriginal past to fight climate change (Commentary)</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2016/04/rekindling-australias-aboriginal-past-to-fight-climate-change-commentary/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2016/04/rekindling-australias-aboriginal-past-to-fight-climate-change-commentary/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>08 Apr 2016 19:55:36 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Catherine Monagle]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Morgan Erickson-Davis]]>
					</author>
															<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2016/04/01215447/australia_fnq_0524-495x330.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=185644</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Australia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Climate Change, Commentary, Environment, Fires, Global Warming, Grasslands, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Methane, Mitigation, Research, and Savannas]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Fire is bad and needs to be stopped at all costs. That is the attitude European administrators brought to colonized lands stretching from Africa to Latin America and Australia during past centuries. This Eurocentric principle of land management, proscribing fire at all costs, was based on a belief that newly settled territories were wild places [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Fire is bad and needs to be stopped at all costs. That is the attitude European administrators brought to colonized lands stretching from Africa to Latin America and Australia during past centuries. This Eurocentric principle of land management, proscribing fire at all costs, was based on a belief that newly settled territories were wild places where the first people exercised no custodianship over nature. It is now acknowledged, however, that many indigenous people lit fires regularly as part of a sophisticated relationship with the land that helped nurture their future supply of food resources and encouraged biodiversity. Growing concern about climate change has recently added impetus to moves reintroducing traditional people’s knowledge of fire to improve current land management. Australia, home to the oldest living cultural history, is at the forefront of such moves. Innovative methods of land management that both protect the environment and reduce greenhouse gas emissions have been developed in Australia’s sparsely populated northern regions. Aboriginal communities are now earning financial credits for reduced emissions by following traditional practices, established through countless generations of early-season burning. A fire burns as the sun sets in Australia. Photo by Rhett A. Butler. Before the arrival of European settlers, Aboriginal people regularly travelled through the bush lighting low-intensity fires to prevent the accumulation of dense ground vegetation. If left untended, the build up of this organic material would set off destructive wildfires sweeping through vast areas later in the year, sparked by natural fire starters such as lightning. The introduction&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2016/04/rekindling-australias-aboriginal-past-to-fight-climate-change-commentary/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-185644</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>California declares state of emergency after methane gas leak forces thousands from their homes</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2016/01/california-declares-state-of-emergency-after-methane-gas-leak-forces-thousands-from-their-homes/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2016/01/california-declares-state-of-emergency-after-methane-gas-leak-forces-thousands-from-their-homes/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>08 Jan 2016 18:18:47 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Mike Gaworecki]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mike Gaworecki]]>
					</author>
															<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2016/01/02223457/23263541203_dea1bc4257_k-495x330.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[California and United States]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Air Pollution, Climate Change, Fossil Fuels, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, and Methane]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[An ongoing methane gas leak at a facility in Southern California — what’s been called “the nation’s biggest environmental disaster since the BP oil spill” — has officially been declared an emergency by Governor Jerry Brown. Natural gas, or methane, first started leaking from Southern California Gas Co.’s Aliso Canyon storage facility on October 23 [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[An ongoing methane gas leak at a facility in Southern California — what’s been called “the nation’s biggest environmental disaster since the BP oil spill” — has officially been declared an emergency by Governor Jerry Brown. Natural gas, or methane, first started leaking from Southern California Gas Co.’s Aliso Canyon storage facility on October 23 last year. Some 2,300 homes have been evacuated in nearby Porter Ranch, a neighborhood of Los Angeles, after residents began experiencing nosebleeds, rashes, headaches and other serious health impacts due to the gas leak and the sulfur-like smell that is blanketing their community. It’s been estimated that the leak has so far emitted more than 150 million pounds (over 68,000 metric tons) of methane, a greenhouse gas that scientists believe to be as much as 35-times more potent than carbon dioxide, though it doesn’t persist in the atmosphere as long as CO2. According to a statement released by the Environmental Defense Fund, the leak was pouring 72 million cubic feet of methane into the atmosphere every day at its peak. Over the next 20 years, that will be equivalent to having 7 million more cars on the road. Overhead photo of the leaking Aliso Canyon well pad that is polluting Porter Ranch community in Los Angeles County. Photo by Earthworks / via Flickr. “This leak has been a state of emergency for the Porter Ranch community and the climate since day one,” Mark Brownstein, vice president for climate and energy at the EDF, said in&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2016/01/california-declares-state-of-emergency-after-methane-gas-leak-forces-thousands-from-their-homes/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-173537</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Scientists say frozen methane deposits off the coast of the US Pacific Northwest might be melting</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2015/10/scientists-say-frozen-methane-deposits-off-the-coast-of-the-us-pacific-northwest-might-be-melting/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2015/10/scientists-say-frozen-methane-deposits-off-the-coast-of-the-us-pacific-northwest-might-be-melting/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>16 Oct 2015 02:07:06 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Mike Gaworecki]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mike Gaworecki]]>
					</author>
															<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2015/10/03144721/14526221693_3dc7d0f1c3_h-520x293.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Pacific Northwest]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Climate Change, Methane, and Ocean Acidification]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[New research suggests methane deposits that have been frozen in the seabed off the coasts of Oregon and Washington for thousands of years might have begun to melt and bubble up through the warming ocean waters. Methane gas is slowly released from the ocean’s floor at almost all depths along the Pacific Northwest’s coastal margin, [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[New research suggests methane deposits that have been frozen in the seabed off the coasts of Oregon and Washington for thousands of years might have begun to melt and bubble up through the warming ocean waters. Methane gas is slowly released from the ocean’s floor at almost all depths along the Pacific Northwest’s coastal margin, but researchers at the University of Washington say they’ve found that plumes of the potent greenhouse gas are significantly more common at a depth of 500 meters (0.3 miles) — precisely where it was expected that frozen methane, known as methane hydrate, would start to melt due to rising ocean temperatures. A team of researchers at the University of Washington studied 168 methane bubble plumes that had been observed over the past decade and determined that 14 of them were located at that crucial transition depth, far more plumes per unit area than any other part of the region&#8217;s seafloor. The results of the UW researchers&#8217; study have been accepted for publication in the American Geophysical Union journal Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems. Sonar image of bubbles rising from the seafloor off the Washington coast. The base of the column is 515 meters deep (about 1/3 of a mile) and the top of the plume is at 1/10 of a mile (180 meters) deep. Credit: Brendan Philip/University of Washington “What we’re seeing is possible confirmation of what we predicted from the water temperatures: Methane hydrate appears to be decomposing and releasing a lot of gas,” H. Paul&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2015/10/scientists-say-frozen-methane-deposits-off-the-coast-of-the-us-pacific-northwest-might-be-melting/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-152181</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Video: global carbon dispersal looks like an impressionistic painting in motion</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2015/01/video-global-carbon-dispersal-looks-like-an-impressionistic-painting-in-motion/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2015/01/video-global-carbon-dispersal-looks-like-an-impressionistic-painting-in-motion/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>12 Jan 2015 17:22:00 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Jeremy Hance]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Jeremy Hance]]>
					</author>
															<enclosure url="" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">http://news.mongabaydev.co.uk/2015/01/video-global-carbon-dispersal-looks-like-an-impressionistic-painting-in-motion/</guid>

					
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Carbon Dioxide, Carbon Emissions, Environment, Global Environmental Crisis, Global Warming, Green, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Methane, and Videos]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[A new video showing the global movements of carbon dioxide during one year may look beautiful, but such impressions are misleading. The video, produced by NASA, shows just how much humans are impacting the world&#8217;s atmosphere, leading to rising temperatures, ocean acidification, melting glaciers, vanishing sea ice, and untold impacts on both wildlife and human [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[A new video showing the global movements of carbon dioxide during one year may look beautiful, but such impressions are misleading. The video, produced by NASA, shows just how much humans are impacting the world&#8217;s atmosphere, leading to rising temperatures, ocean acidification, melting glaciers, vanishing sea ice, and untold impacts on both wildlife and human communities. NASA used a supercomputer to model carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere over a year&#8212;2006&#8212;which change significantly due to weather patterns, seasonal changes, and various emissions and sinks. The model also shows the annual movements of carbon monoxide&#8212;in black and white&#8212;due to fires, including burning for agriculture and forest fires. Related articles Indonesia to weaken peatlands protection to support plantations (01/08/2015) The Indonesian Ministry of the Environment and Forestry has announced it will further hobble its peatlands protection law to allow plantations to continue operating on a business as usual basis. Growth of forests may not be keeping pace with rising CO2 levels (12/15/2014) Plants rely on three critical elements for growth: carbon dioxide, water, and sunlight. Rising atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations are therefore expected to increase rates of forest growth, in turn helping counter some of humanity&#8217;s influence on global climate. But a new study provides evidence that challenges that assumption. Indonesia sets reference level for cutting deforestation (12/05/2014) The Indonesian government has established reference levels for measuring reductions in emissions from deforestation and forest and peatland degradation, reports Antara. Threatened indigenous forests store more than half the Amazon&#8217;s carbon (12/02/2014) A new&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2015/01/video-global-carbon-dispersal-looks-like-an-impressionistic-painting-in-motion/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-24233</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Global warming emissions from meat consumption rising rapidly</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2014/07/global-warming-emissions-from-meat-consumption-rising-rapidly/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2014/07/global-warming-emissions-from-meat-consumption-rising-rapidly/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>22 Jul 2014 00:35:00 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Mongabay.com]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rhett Butler]]>
					</author>
															<enclosure url="" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">http://news.mongabaydev.co.uk/2014/07/global-warming-emissions-from-meat-consumption-rising-rapidly/</guid>

					
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Carbon Emissions, Cattle, Environment, Food, Green, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Livestock, Meat, Methane, and Ranching]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Greenhouse gas emissions from livestock production have increased by more than 50 percent over the past 50 years and are set to zoom higher as the developing world consumes more meat, finds a new study published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). The research is based on analysis of the [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Greenhouse gas emissions from livestock production have increased by more than 50 percent over the past 50 years and are set to zoom higher as the developing world consumes more meat, finds a new study published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). The research is based on analysis of the impacts of livestock production per calorie consumed, including water and fertilizer use, land area requirements, and other factors. It went beyond carbon dioxide, evaluating greenhouse gas emissions from methane and nitrous oxide. Like other studies, the paper found that beef has overwhelmingly the biggest climate impact among dairy, poultry, pork, and eggs. Percentage of the overall national environmental burdens exerted by the individual animal categories. Beef requires ≈88% of all US land allocated to producing animal-based calories, partitioned (from the bottom up) among pasture (≈79%), processed roughage (≈7%), and concentrated feed (≈2%). Image and caption courtesy of the authors. &#8220;Impacts of dairy, poultry, pork, and eggs were mutually comparable within a factor of two. Beef, however, required 28 times more land, 11 times more irrigation water, five times more greenhouse gas emissions, and six times more reactive nitrogen fertilizer than the respective average burdens of the other four livestock categories,&#8221; stated a release from PNAS. The study also noted a significant divergence in trends on livestock-related emissions between industrialized countries, where emissions peaked in the 1970s, and the developing world, where emissions could double by 2050. “The developing world is getting better at reducing greenhouse&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2014/07/global-warming-emissions-from-meat-consumption-rising-rapidly/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-24909</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Lab-grown meat: a taste of the future?</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2014/06/lab-grown-meat-a-taste-of-the-future/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2014/06/lab-grown-meat-a-taste-of-the-future/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>03 Jun 2014 21:47:00 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Morgan Erickson-Davis]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Morgan Erickson-Davis]]>
					</author>
															<enclosure url="" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">http://news.mongabaydev.co.uk/2014/06/lab-grown-meat-a-taste-of-the-future/</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Netherlands]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Environment, Green, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Happy-upbeat Environmental, Meat, Methane, Strange, and Technology]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Many problems surround growing animals for meat. Most of the deforestation of the Amazon is done to create pasture for cattle; the meat industry is also responsible for significant greenhouse gas emissions, amounting to five percent of the world’s total atmospheric carbon load and nearly 40 percent of its methane. Ethically, conventional meat is fraught [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
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							<![CDATA[Many problems surround growing animals for meat. Most of the deforestation of the Amazon is done to create pasture for cattle; the meat industry is also responsible for significant greenhouse gas emissions, amounting to five percent of the world’s total atmospheric carbon load and nearly 40 percent of its methane. Ethically, conventional meat is fraught with dispute, as animals must first be killed for their tissue. Numerous animal rights organizations also protest the conditions in which many animals are raised, such as factory farms in which thousands of animals spend their lives packed together. A new analysis published in Trends in Biotechnology describes one solution to the environmental and ethical problems of conventional meat production: growing meat without growing the animal. The authors write that cultured meat could someday replace conventional meat – if its price is brought down and its quality is improved. Also referred to as in vitro meat, test-tube meat, or “shmeat,” cultured meat is made using muscle stem cells collected from living animals. The cells are immersed in a nutrient bath, where they multiply and eventually form strips of tissue that can be processed into a product that has a consistency similar to canned meat or finely ground hamburger. A recipe for cultured meat. The left column shows the stepwise increase in cell-culture volume, starting with a vial from the working cell bank (note that a new working cell bank is made from a vial from the master cell bank). Exponentially growing cells from each step&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2014/06/lab-grown-meat-a-taste-of-the-future/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-25142</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Climate change&#8217;s ominous secret</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2014/05/climate-changes-ominous-secret/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2014/05/climate-changes-ominous-secret/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>21 May 2014 15:23:00 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Larry Kraft]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Jeremy Hance]]>
					</author>
															<enclosure url="" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">http://news.mongabaydev.co.uk/2014/05/climate-changes-ominous-secret/</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Antarctica, Arctic, and Greenland]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Climate Change, Climate Science, Commentary, Disasters, Environment, Global Environmental Crisis, Global Warming, Green, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Methane, and Permafrost]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Climate change is happening and humans are causing it, primarily from the increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide caused by burning fossil fuels. This much we know. The &#8220;secret&#8221; comes from changes happening in the fast-warming Arctic: we may be surprisingly close to an Earth that supports far fewer humans than it does today. Permafrost and [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
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							<![CDATA[Climate change is happening and humans are causing it, primarily from the increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide caused by burning fossil fuels. This much we know. The &#8220;secret&#8221; comes from changes happening in the fast-warming Arctic: we may be surprisingly close to an Earth that supports far fewer humans than it does today. Permafrost and methane hydrates In the Arctic, two things may become crucial: permafrost and methane hydrates. Permafrost&#8212;ground frozen for thousands of years&#8212;is a huge store of carbon, originating from long-dead plants and animals. As permafrost thaws, this carbon is released into the atmosphere as carbon dioxide or methane, both greenhouse gases that cause climate change. According to a NASA research report, &#8220;Is a Sleeping Climate Giant Stirring in the Arctic?&#8221; there is four to five times the amount of carbon in the permafrost than the sum total of all carbon humanity has emitted into the atmosphere since 1850. Methane hydrate. Photo by: Wusel007/Creative Commons 3.0. Methane doesn&#8217;t last as long as carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. But on a 20-year time scale, it&#8217;s 105 times as potent in causing global warming. In the Arctic Ocean, there is an immense amount of methane stored in ice, in a form called methane hydrates. According to a March 2010 report in Science, these methane hydrates are equivalent to 3-30 times the total amount of carbon dioxide humanity has emitted since the Industrial Revolution. Permafrost and methane hydrates are pivotal because the Arctic (and Antarctic) is warming faster than anywhere else&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2014/05/climate-changes-ominous-secret/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-25211</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Palm oil&#8217;s climate impact worse than thought due to methane emissions</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2014/02/palm-oils-climate-impact-worse-than-thought-due-to-methane-emissions/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2014/02/palm-oils-climate-impact-worse-than-thought-due-to-methane-emissions/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>27 Feb 2014 14:43:00 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Mongabay.com]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rhett Butler]]>
					</author>
															<enclosure url="" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">http://news.mongabaydev.co.uk/2014/02/palm-oils-climate-impact-worse-than-thought-due-to-methane-emissions/</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Indonesia and Malaysia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Carbon Dioxide, Carbon Emissions, Deforestation, Environment, Forests, Green, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Methane, Palm Oil, Peatlands, Plantations, and Rainforests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Clearing and burning for oil palm plantation establishment in Malaysia Methane leaks from palm oil wastewater significantly increases the climate impact of palm oil production beyond emissions from land clearance, fire, and peatlands drainage, reports a new study published in Nature Climate Change. The research, led by Philip. G. Taylor of the University of Colorado, [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Clearing and burning for oil palm plantation establishment in Malaysia Methane leaks from palm oil wastewater significantly increases the climate impact of palm oil production beyond emissions from land clearance, fire, and peatlands drainage, reports a new study published in Nature Climate Change. The research, led by Philip. G. Taylor of the University of Colorado, finds that annual methane emissions from palm oil wastewater effluent amount to the equivalent of 115 million tons carbon dioxide in Malaysia and Indonesia alone, or roughly 15 percent of total emissions from peat oxidation and land use change in the two countries. &#8220;Methane leaks from palm oil wastewater are a large climate threat, which could rise to 1 percent of global GHG emissions by 2050,&#8221; Taylor told mongabay.com. &#8220;Palm oil wastewater methane represents 15 percent of the forest greenhouse gas emissions problem, though it is certainly not appreciated as such.&#8221; But the problem isn&#8217;t intractable, says Wells, who suggests that instead of letting these emissions escape into the atmosphere, where they add to greenhouse gas concentrations, methane from wastewater should be used for bioenergy production. &#8220;These emissions are a source of renewable energy that should be tapped as profitable solution to climate change,&#8221; he explained. Oil palm fruit According to the research, Malaysia could meet roughly a quarter of its energy demand by utilizing methane from palm oil wastewater. The advantage of using this methane is it is an off-the-grid source of fuel in areas where power infrastructure is often poor. &#8220;Infrastructure development will&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2014/02/palm-oils-climate-impact-worse-than-thought-due-to-methane-emissions/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-25630</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Fracking: the good, the bad and the ugly</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2013/11/fracking-the-good-the-bad-and-the-ugly/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2013/11/fracking-the-good-the-bad-and-the-ugly/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>18 Nov 2013 17:57:00 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Owen Reynolds]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Jeremy Hance]]>
					</author>
															<enclosure url="" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">http://news.mongabaydev.co.uk/2013/11/fracking-the-good-the-bad-and-the-ugly/</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[United States]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Carbon Emissions, Climate Change, Coal, Commentary, Energy, Environment, Fossil Fuels, Fracking, Global Warming, Governance, Green, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Methane, Mitigation, Natural Gas, Politics, Pollution, Regulations, Sustainability, and Water Pollution]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[The last few years have ushered in a new national and global awareness of fracking, the 150-year-old technology for extracting natural gas and oil from rock. Fracking, short for hydraulic fracturing, uses ultra-high-pressure slurries to create hairline fractures throughout solid rock. Oil, and more frequently gas, comes rushing out while sand from the mixture holds [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[The last few years have ushered in a new national and global awareness of fracking, the 150-year-old technology for extracting natural gas and oil from rock. Fracking, short for hydraulic fracturing, uses ultra-high-pressure slurries to create hairline fractures throughout solid rock. Oil, and more frequently gas, comes rushing out while sand from the mixture holds the fractures open in this nearly alchemical process. As many readers are aware, there are two very divisive schools of thought on fracking. One side touts it as the future of energy. The other derides fracking as inherently toxic and demands its immediate and permanent cessation. Like so many aspects of life, the truth lies somewhere in between. The Good Perhaps the most surprising fact of fracking is that burning the resultant natural gas does, in fact, emit less carbon dioxide than coal or even traditionally extracted natural gas. As carbon dioxide is the most plentiful and troublesome greenhouse gas affecting global warming, fracking could be leveraged to significantly mitigate a major portion of greenhouse gases. The market effects of fracking have even hit the powerful, carbon-heavy coal industry. The recent glut in gas supply and more stringent regulation of the coal industry from the Obama Administration have already begun to supplant American coal-fired energy plants. Dozens of coal plants around the country are divesting from coal processes in exchange for cleaner natural gas. Offers to extract new coal are apathetically received; one recent auction received no bids for the first time in history. Because&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2013/11/fracking-the-good-the-bad-and-the-ugly/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-26065</doi>				</item>
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