A range of agricultural organisations in the UK are pressing for revisions to greenhouse gas (GHG) emission accounting systems.
Signatories to letter include the Ulster Farmers’ Union, the Livestock and Meat Commission, the National Sheep Association and the National Farmers’ Union.
The bodies are asking the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to evaluate the more accurate global warming potential (GWP) metric of GWP*/GWP-we.
At present, the IPCC uses GWP100 to compare different greenhouse gases.
However, it is widely accepted that the GWP100 system does accurately represent the global warming contribution of short-lived greenhouse gases, such as methane.
Oxford research
Speaking in Birmingham last week, Professor Myles Allen from the University of Oxford said that GWP100 was “not fit for purpose”.
“Methane does not behave like carbon dioxide. It does not accumulate in the climate system the way carbon dioxide does, so we don’t actually need to get methane emissions to net zero for it to stop causing global warming,” he said.
Calculations
Allen explained the difference between the standard GWP100 and GWP*, which was developed by researchers at the University of Oxford.
GWP100 is based on multiplying methane emissions for a single year by 28 to get a carbon dioxide equivalence (CO2e) value.
GWP* involves multiplying current-year methane emissions by 112, then multiplying methane emissions from 20 years ago by 105, and then subtracting the two values.
Overcharged
“If you have had a stable herd for the past 20 years, that is worth only 7t of CO2e per tonne of methane generated from your herd, rather than 28, so you were being overcharged by a factor of four,” Allen said.
Read more
UK farming causes global cooling, claims scientist
Methane from fossil fuels ‘vastly underestimated’ and much higher than cattle
A range of agricultural organisations in the UK are pressing for revisions to greenhouse gas (GHG) emission accounting systems.
Signatories to letter include the Ulster Farmers’ Union, the Livestock and Meat Commission, the National Sheep Association and the National Farmers’ Union.
The bodies are asking the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to evaluate the more accurate global warming potential (GWP) metric of GWP*/GWP-we.
At present, the IPCC uses GWP100 to compare different greenhouse gases.
However, it is widely accepted that the GWP100 system does accurately represent the global warming contribution of short-lived greenhouse gases, such as methane.
Oxford research
Speaking in Birmingham last week, Professor Myles Allen from the University of Oxford said that GWP100 was “not fit for purpose”.
“Methane does not behave like carbon dioxide. It does not accumulate in the climate system the way carbon dioxide does, so we don’t actually need to get methane emissions to net zero for it to stop causing global warming,” he said.
Calculations
Allen explained the difference between the standard GWP100 and GWP*, which was developed by researchers at the University of Oxford.
GWP100 is based on multiplying methane emissions for a single year by 28 to get a carbon dioxide equivalence (CO2e) value.
GWP* involves multiplying current-year methane emissions by 112, then multiplying methane emissions from 20 years ago by 105, and then subtracting the two values.
Overcharged
“If you have had a stable herd for the past 20 years, that is worth only 7t of CO2e per tonne of methane generated from your herd, rather than 28, so you were being overcharged by a factor of four,” Allen said.
Read more
UK farming causes global cooling, claims scientist
Methane from fossil fuels ‘vastly underestimated’ and much higher than cattle
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