Methane from tropical wetlands rises, threatens climate systems By Reuters

Written by Gloria Dickie

BAKU (Reuters) – Tropical wetlands around the world are emitting more methane than ever before, a study shows – an alarming sign that global climate goals are slipping further out of reach.

A huge increase in methane emissions – which is unknown in national emissions programs and under-accounted for in scientific models – could increase pressure on governments to cut deeply their fossil fuel and agriculture industries, according to researchers.

Wetlands contain large amounts of carbon in the form of dead plants that are slowly broken down by bacteria in the soil. Rising temperatures are like hitting an accelerator on that process, speeding up the organic interactions that produce methane. Heavy rains, cause floods that cause more wetlands.

Scientists have long predicted that wetland methane emissions will increase as the climate warms, but from 2020 to 2022, air samples show the highest concentrations of methane in the atmosphere since reliable measurements began in the 1980s.

Four studies published in recent months say tropical wetlands are at the forefront of the spike, as tropical areas have contributed more than 7 million tons to methane emissions over the past few years.

“The amount of methane is not only rising, but it’s rising faster in the last five years than at any time in the metal record,” said Stanford University environmental scientist Rob Jackson, who chairs the group that publishes the Global Methane Budget, which was recently released. September.

Satellite instruments reveal hotspots as the source of massive expansion. The scientists also analyzed different chemical signatures in the methane to determine whether it came from fossil fuels or a natural source — in this case, wetlands.

Congo, Southeast Asia and the Amazon (NASDAQ: ) and southern Brazil contributed the most to the spike in tropical climates, the researchers found.

Data published in March 2023 in Nature Climate Change show that annual greenhouse gas emissions from wetlands over the past two decades were nearly 500,000 tons per year more than scientists had predicted under extreme climates.

Capturing waste from wetlands is a challenge with current technology.

“We should be more worried than we are,” said climate scientist Drew Shindell of Duke University.

La Nina weather patterns that bring heavy rains to tropical regions appear to be responsible for the outbreak, according to a study published in September in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

But La Nina alone, which ended in 2023, cannot explain the record high emissions, Shindell said.

For countries trying to deal with climate change, “this has big implications when planning to reduce methane and carbon dioxide emissions,” said Zhen Qu, an atmospheric chemist at North Carolina State University who led research on the effects of La Nina.

If methane emissions from wetlands continue to rise, scientists say governments will need to take drastic measures to hold warming to 1.5 C (2.7 F), as agreed at the United Nations climate agreement in Paris.

WORLD OF WATER

Methane is 80 times more powerful than carbon dioxide (CO2) at trapping heat over a 20-year period, and accounts for about one-third of the 1.3 degrees Celsius (2.3 F) of global warming recorded since 1850. Unlike CO2 however, methane washes out of the atmosphere after about ten years, so it has little long-term impact.

More than 150 countries have pledged to deliver a 30% reduction from 2020 levels by 2030, to address leaking oil and gas infrastructure.

But scientists don’t see a recession yet, as technology to detect methane leaks has improved. Methane emissions from fossil fuels remain at a record high of 120 million tons as of 2019, according to the International Energy Agency’s 2024 Global Methane Tracker report.

Satellites have also picked up more than 1,000 methane leaks from oil and gas operations in the past two years, according to a UN Environment Program report published on Friday, but notified countries have responded to only 12 leaks.

Some countries have announced cheap plans to cut methane.

China last year said it would fight to prevent fires, or the burning of pollution from oil and gas wells.

President Joe Biden’s administration finalized a methane tax for major oil and gas producers last week, but it is likely to be overturned by the incoming presidency of Donald Trump.

Democratic Republic of Congo environment minister Eve Bazaiba told Reuters on the sidelines of the UN climate conference COP29 that the country is working to monitor methane rising from the Congo Basin’s swamp forests and wetlands. Congo was the largest emitter of tropical methane in the 2024 methane budget report.

“We don’t know how much it is [methane is coming off our wetlands],” he said. “That’s why we bring in those who can invest in this way, and they also do monitoring to make an inventory, how much we have, how we can exploit them.”