Tag Archives: greenhouse gas

Interior Releases First-of-its-Kind Regional Study as Part of National Assessment of Carbon Storage in U.S. Ecosystems

By Guest PostDecember 5, 2011Environmentagricultural field, amount of carbon, atmospheric warming, biological carbon sequestration, carbon emissions, carbon sequestration, carbon sink, carbon storage, chemical cycles, david j hayes, department of the interior, eastern iowa, eastern montana, emissions of nitrous oxide, forests, fossil fuel, great plains region, great plains region of montana, great plains study, greenhouse gas, greenhouse gas emissions, ken salazar, marcia mcnutt, methane, natural resources, rangelands, senator, southern texas, U.S. Geological Survey, underground rock formations, united states, us ecosystems, usgs, wetlands

*Report evaluates amount of carbon absorbed by wetlands, grasslands and forests in the Great Plains region*

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Department of the Interior today released the first in a series of regional studies measuring the amount of carbon stored in U.S. ecosystems. Published by Interior’s U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), the study examines the current and projected future carbon storage in the Great Plains region, as part of a nation-wide assessment.

“This is truly groundbreaking research that, for the first time, takes a landscape-level look at how our lands naturally store carbon and explores how we can encourage this capability in ways that enhance our stewardship of natural resources,” said Deputy Secretary of the Interior David J. Hayes. “Our landscapes are helping us to absorb carbon emissions that would otherwise contribute to atmospheric warming.” (more…)

Deep Oceans May Mask Global Warming for Years at a Time

By Guest PostSeptember 22, 2011Environmentatlantic, climate system, community climate system model, computer simulations of global climate, coupled model intercomparison project phase 5, earth, el niño, eric deweaver, gerald meehl, global air temperatures, greenhouse gas, ice and snow, john fasullo, kevin trenberth, la niña, missing heat, national center for atmospheric research, ncar, oceanic circulation, rate of global warming, software tool, temperature, tropical pacific, warming the upper ocean

*Computer simulations of global climate lead to new conclusions*

Earth’s deep oceans may absorb enough heat at times to flatten the rate of global warming for periods of as long as a decade–even in the midst of longer-term warming. This according to a new analysis led by scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR).

The study, based on computer simulations of global climate, points to ocean layers deeper than 1,000 feet as the main location of the “missing heat” during periods such as the past decade when global air temperatures showed little trend. (more…)

Water Evaporated from Trees Cools Global Climate

By Guest PostSeptember 17, 2011Environmentatmosphere, central park, earth, emissions of carbon dioxide, evaporated water, evaporation, george ban-weiss, global balance of energy, global climate, global warming, govindasamy bala, greenhouse gas, julia pongratz, ken caldeira, new york, vegetation, water, water vapor

Washington, DC — Scientists have long debated about the impact on global climate of water evaporated from vegetation. New research from Carnegie’s Global Ecology department concludes that evaporated water helps cool the earth as a whole, not just the local area of evaporation, demonstrating that evaporation of water from trees and lakes could have a cooling effect on the entire atmosphere. These findings, published September 14 in Environmental Research Letters, have major implications for land-use decision making.

Evaporative cooling is the process by which a local area is cooled by the energy used in the evaporation process, energy that would have otherwise heated the area’s surface. It is well known that the paving over of urban areas and the clearing of forests can contribute to local warming by decreasing local evaporative cooling, but it was not understood whether this decreased evaporation would also contribute to global warming (more…)

Ethane Levels Yield Information About Changes in Greenhouse Gas Emissions

By Guest PostAugust 14, 2011EnvironmentAntarctica, atmosphere, atmospheric methane, carbon dioxide, change in energy use, change in human activities, decline in methane emission, donald blake, eric saltzman, ethane, fossil fuel emissions, global temperatures, greenhouse gas, greenland, hydrocarbons, julie palais, kristal verhulst, methane, michael prather, murat aydin, polar ice sheets in greenland and antarctica, potent greenhouse gas, qi tang, twentieth century, university of california

*Research at Greenland and Antarctic shows decline in methane and ethane levels*

Recent data from NSF-funded research in both Greenland and Antarctica demonstrate that fossil-fuel related emissions of both methane and ethane, two of the most abundant hydrocarbons in the atmosphere, declined at the end of the twentieth century, according to a paper published Thursday in the journal Nature.

The causes of the decline in methane emission rates to the atmosphere have been puzzling scientists for some time. This new study shows that a change in human activities may have played a key role in the recent leveling off of methane, which, being a potent greenhouse gas contributes to global temperatures. (more…)

Going Green: Berkeley Lab on a Path to Substantially Cut Its Emissions

By Guest PostJune 6, 2011Environmentadvanced light source, berkeley lab, blair horst, carbon cycle 2.0, carbon dioxide, cobbler children have no shoes, conserve energy, cool roofs, energy efficiency technologies, ghg, ghg emissions, global warming, godfather of energy efficiency, greenhouse gas, lawrence berkeley national laboratory, living laboratory, melissa summers, old saying, patrick thorson, president barack obama, site sustainability plan, the molecular foundry

*Energy use intensity is down; sustainability plan would reduce it even further.*

There’s an old saying that the cobbler’s children have no shoes. But at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, whose scientists have pioneered many of the energy efficiency technologies being deployed around the world today, energy conservation is not neglected at home. In fact, a number of homegrown energy-savings technologies are in use at the Lab itself, allowing Berkeley Lab to substantially reduce its energy use intensity and make headway towards achieving significant cuts in its greenhouse gas emissions.

From cool roofs to automated building controls to advanced lighting systems, the Lab has implemented an assortment of measures which has resulted in a 44 percent decline in energy use intensity, or energy usage per square foot, since 1985. And greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from Berkeley Lab facilities have shrunk by about 5 percent over the last two years. (more…)

Measurements of Winter Arctic Sea Ice Show continuing Ice Loss, says CU-Boulder Study

By Guest PostMarch 27, 2011EnvironmentArctic sea ice, climate scientists, greenhouse gas, ice extents measured, long-term record

The 2011 Arctic sea ice extent maximum that marks the beginning of the melt season appears to be tied for the lowest ever measured by satellites, say scientists at the University of Colorado Boulder’s National Snow and Ice Data Center.

The CU-Boulder research team believes the lowest annual maximum ice extent of 5,650,000 square miles occurred on March 7. The maximum ice extent was 463,000 square miles below the 1979-2000 average, an area slightly larger than the states of Texas and California combined. The 2011 measurements were tied with those from 2006 as the lowest maximum sea ice extents measured since satellite record keeping began in 1979. (more…)

Think Globally, but Act Locally When Studying Plants, Animals, Global Warming, Researchers Advise

By Guest PostMarch 22, 2011Environment, Natureagriculture, air pollution, butterfly, camille parmesan, climate, climate change, climate change impacts, effects of climate change, extinctions, global scale, global warming, greenhouse gas, habitat fragmentation, human activities, invasive species, los angeles, mediterranean geraniums, michael singer, multiple factors, natural changes, nobel prize, plants and animals, policy makers, quino checkerspot butterfly, san diego, southern california, species, united states, urban sprawl

AUSTIN, Texas — Global warming is clearly affecting plants and animals, but we should not try to tease apart the specific contribution of greenhouse gas driven climate change to extinctions or declines of species at local scales, biologists from The University of Texas at Austin advise.

Camille Parmesan, Michael C. Singer and their coauthors published their commentary online this week in Nature Climate Change.

“Yes, global warming is happening. Yes, it is caused by human activities. And yes, we’ve clearly shown that species are impacted by global warming on a global scale,” says Parmesan, associate professor of integrative biology. (more…)

Berkeley Lab Scientists Achieve Breakthrough in Nanocomposite for High-Capacity Hydrogen Storage

By Guest PostMarch 20, 2011Scienceclean energy, fossil fuels, greenhouse gas, hydrogen storage technology, nanoparticles of magnesium, nanoscale materials, plexiglas, pliable nanocomposite, polymethyl methacrylate, volatile gas

Since the 1970s, hydrogen has been touted as a promising alternative to fossil fuels due to its clean combustion —unlike the combustion of fossil fuels, which spews greenhouse gases and harmful pollutants, hydrogen’s only combustion by-product is water. Compared to gasoline, hydrogen is lightweight, can provide a higher energy density and is readily available. But there’s a reason we’re not already living in a hydrogen economy: to replace gasoline as a fuel, hydrogen must be safely and densely stored, yet easily accessed. Limited by materials unable to leap these conflicting hurdles, hydrogen storage technology has lagged behind other clean energy candidates. (more…)