4 ms·

Weird that there's no mention of the melting permafrost as a methane source. I thought that was a well understood potential feedback loop for climate change.

mirimir 7y ago
There is this, however, as mdorazio notes: > Potential drivers in the category of increased emissions include emissions from intensive agricultural practices, emissions from oil and gas operations, and increased emissions from wetlands responding to global warming. [This last potential driver is particularly worrisome as it implies the engagement of a global warming feedback loop.] So maybe "wetlands" is a veiled reference to permafrost. Which in fact are basically frozen wetlands.
ganzuul 7y ago
Yeah, barking up the wrong tree is not going to help. To memory, the Siberian permafrost massively outweights all other sources of greenhouse gasses. If it is melting, we should panic.
vneumanarc 7y ago
Because it doesn't jive with the vegan agenda. Look at the most upvoted comments here. It's all stealth vegan propaganda masquerading as concern about the environment. Never mind that cars, ships, agriculture ( I bet most of these vegans haven't ever heard of petrochemicals or fertilizers ), smartphones, electricity, etc are all individually greater contributors to environmental damage. Also, the growing numbers of bison, deer and other ruminants around the world contributes to increase in methane levels. People forget that all ruminants ( bison, cows, etc ) all produce methane though they'll use the faux stat of them being net negative contributors. And sad as it is, veganism will actually increase fossil fuel usage as the vegetation that people eat need petrochemical fertilizers to grow and a vegan diet cannot be locally sourced like meat can, so they need to ship vegan food from all over the world. But vegans don't like facts too much. They'll throw in the nonsense about livestock agriculture being transfered for humans. Good luck surviving on corn, soy and wheat. Humans aren't ruminants. We are omnivores by nature.
- brandmeyer 7y ago
  > Also, the growing numbers of bison, deer and other ruminants around the world contributes to increase in methane levels. XKCD put up a well-sourced graphic depicting the relative amounts of mammal biomass on the Earth. Wild animals aren't anywhere remotely close to food animals. https://xkcd.com/1338/ https://xkcd.com/1338/
  - vneumanarc 7y ago
    I know. But a lot of that is due to humans wiping out most of the wild animals. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bison_skull_pile_edit.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bison_skull_pile_edit.jpg If you want to understand the scale of the extermination, look at the historic ranges of these animals. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bison_original_range_map.svg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bison_original_range_map.... There used to be bears, wolves, elk, bison, jaguars, etc all over the US. Not to mention billions of birds like passenger pigeon. They were all wiped out and in their place we have livestock. There is a reason why the state animals of many states are extinct. No california bears in california. No wolverines in michigan.
- mullingitover 7y ago
  > And sad as it is, veganism will actually increase fossil fuel usage as the vegetation that people eat need petrochemical fertilizers I'm trying to wrap my head around this argument (and I'm not a vegan). If we're not vegan, we're eating animal protein, and those animals making that protein are...vegan. We're ultimately all getting our protein from plants.

mirimir 7y ago

There is this, however, as mdorazio notes: > Potential drivers in the category of increased emissions include emissions from intensive agricultural practices, emissions from oil and gas operations, and increased emissions from wetlands responding to global warming. [This last potential driver is particularly worrisome as it implies the engagement of a global warming feedback loop.] So maybe "wetlands" is a veiled reference to permafrost. Which in fact are basically frozen wetlands.

ganzuul 7y ago

Yeah, barking up the wrong tree is not going to help. To memory, the Siberian permafrost massively outweights all other sources of greenhouse gasses. If it is melting, we should panic.

vneumanarc 7y ago

Because it doesn't jive with the vegan agenda. Look at the most upvoted comments here. It's all stealth vegan propaganda masquerading as concern about the environment. Never mind that cars, ships, agriculture ( I bet most of these vegans haven't ever heard of petrochemicals or fertilizers ), smartphones, electricity, etc are all individually greater contributors to environmental damage. Also, the growing numbers of bison, deer and other ruminants around the world contributes to increase in methane levels. People forget that all ruminants ( bison, cows, etc ) all produce methane though they'll use the faux stat of them being net negative contributors. And sad as it is, veganism will actually increase fossil fuel usage as the vegetation that people eat need petrochemical fertilizers to grow and a vegan diet cannot be locally sourced like meat can, so they need to ship vegan food from all over the world. But vegans don't like facts too much. They'll throw in the nonsense about livestock agriculture being transfered for humans. Good luck surviving on corn, soy and wheat. Humans aren't ruminants. We are omnivores by nature.

brandmeyer 7y ago
> Also, the growing numbers of bison, deer and other ruminants around the world contributes to increase in methane levels. XKCD put up a well-sourced graphic depicting the relative amounts of mammal biomass on the Earth. Wild animals aren't anywhere remotely close to food animals. https://xkcd.com/1338/ https://xkcd.com/1338/
- vneumanarc 7y ago
  I know. But a lot of that is due to humans wiping out most of the wild animals. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bison_skull_pile_edit.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bison_skull_pile_edit.jpg If you want to understand the scale of the extermination, look at the historic ranges of these animals. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bison_original_range_map.svg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bison_original_range_map.... There used to be bears, wolves, elk, bison, jaguars, etc all over the US. Not to mention billions of birds like passenger pigeon. They were all wiped out and in their place we have livestock. There is a reason why the state animals of many states are extinct. No california bears in california. No wolverines in michigan.
mullingitover 7y ago
> And sad as it is, veganism will actually increase fossil fuel usage as the vegetation that people eat need petrochemical fertilizers I'm trying to wrap my head around this argument (and I'm not a vegan). If we're not vegan, we're eating animal protein, and those animals making that protein are...vegan. We're ultimately all getting our protein from plants.