[HN Gopher] Scale of methane leaks from fossil fuel production a...
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Scale of methane leaks from fossil fuel production and landfills
exposed
Author : Leary
Score : 87 points
Date : 2024-01-27 16:16 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (news.sky.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (news.sky.com)
| rzimmerman wrote:
| There are several satellites focusing on human-driven methane
| emitters and monitoring that will be active in the next few
| years, like Planet's Carbon Mapper
| (https://www.planet.com/pulse/carbon-mapper-launches-
| satellit...). It's great to have active monitoring if we want to
| impose limits and hold offenders accountable.
| cyanydeez wrote:
| landfills in America have been regulated for methane for multiple
| decades.
| f321x_ wrote:
| Bitcoin mining fixes this
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VNrrpbtHtpg
| consumer451 wrote:
| Pivot to ML workloads, much less money laundering in that use
| case.
|
| https://www.acquired.fm/episodes/saving-the-planet-with-bett...
| llsf wrote:
| Indeed it looks like a low hanging fruit.
| profsummergig wrote:
| Nimby + disassociation.
|
| "That landfill is causing a lot of pollution". No, you caused
| that pollution. The landfill just collected it all in one place.
|
| This is similar to "China's manufacturing causes a lot of
| pollution". No, you, the consumer, cause that pollution.
|
| Just my $0.02.
| thfuran wrote:
| Pollution caused by a factory is an (almost certainly)
| unaccounted-for externality, a market failure hidden from the
| consumer of a good but known to the producer. Pinning the blame
| on the consumer removes it from the agent who is both directly
| causing it and actually able to effect change.
| BiteCode_dev wrote:
| I hear you, but if one maker makes you pay the real price of
| including the externalities, most consumers will by the
| equally good but much cheaper alternative.
|
| In fact, at equal price, they will choose the most convenient
| form factor with beautiful and practical packaging.
|
| We are not innocent in all this.
| notjoemama wrote:
| Nor are we at fault. Corporate consolidation has been
| happening for decades. They have psychologists on staff or
| contracted out to design products that sell based on
| inherent human bias and autonomic responses. We're sold to
| at the subconscious level now.
|
| I agree given only two choices the average consumer will
| spend the least, but doesn't that suggest trying to make
| aware or change human behavior is the wrong approach to
| solving the problem?
|
| I wouldn't bother with land fills for a while. First on my
| list is standardizing electrical power at docks for
| container ships. They run the most polluting fuel on idle
| 24 hours per day while docked. The amount of carbon release
| is something like in the millions of automobiles per day.
| If they could plug into every port they can shut their
| engines off. They might not even need to carry the dirtiest
| fuel anymore.
| mschuster91 wrote:
| > I wouldn't bother with land fills for a while. First on
| my list is standardizing electrical power at docks for
| container ships.
|
| There is some sort of effort going on, but IIRC it
| stalled as a consequence of covid [1]. Biggest problems
| are frequency differences (the entire world but the
| Americas runs at 50 Hz, but maritime+America runs at 60
| Hz), and the fact that for the many megawatts a ship can
| use you need extremely high voltages to get that
| transferred at reasonable currents, which is a safety
| challenge on its own [2].
|
| [1] https://sustainableworldports.org/wpcap/wg-3/our-
| mission/
|
| [2] https://sustainableworldports.org/wp-
| content/uploads/Landsto...
| jl6 wrote:
| > Nor are we at fault.
|
| Yes, we are. The vast majority of our (first world)
| consumption is not something we are forced to do. We
| (again, first world, but particularly here, in tech
| world) have comparatively massive disposable incomes and
| wide discretion about what we spend it on.
|
| "I can't avoid plastics because it's what my sushi comes
| packaged in"
|
| Don't buy the sushi.
| HPsquared wrote:
| Penalising polluting producers passes the price to the
| product purchaser.
| drekipus wrote:
| That is a good thing
| thfuran wrote:
| The solution, of course, is to not permit any maker to
| foist their negative externalities upon the commons to
| unfairly undercut competitors. If you're going to blame a
| consumer for the producer's pollution, why not instead
| blame their landlord for charging them the rent that forced
| them to drive to work and so buy tires? Why not instead
| blame the landlord's bank for demanding repayment of the
| mortgage or the bank's shareholders for demanding profit
| instead of benevolent loan forgiveness?
| 11235813213455 wrote:
| money exchange cause pollution, the less you spend money, the
| less you pollute, simple
| Johnny555 wrote:
| It's not really that simple -- there are lots of ways to
| spend less money while generating more pollution. I could
| spend less money by piling up my trash in my back yard
| instead of paying a waste management company to haul it away.
| But that's not going to reduce the amount of pollution I've
| caused, and will likely increase it.
| voisin wrote:
| If you don't spend money, then you ultimately have less
| stuff to put in your back yard. Hauling it away doesn't
| change the net amount of pollution - it's still pollution
| in a landfill, just less unsightly. Perhaps if everyone had
| to put their waste in their own backyard people would opt
| for products that produce less waste!
|
| I live rurally and have to take my waste and recycling to
| the transfer station. It's free but a pain in the ass so I
| try to make decisions which produce less waste so I don't
| have to go as often. Previously I lived somewhere rurally
| where you had to pay per pound brought to the transfer
| station - that was an even bigger incentive to cut back on
| waste.
| Johnny555 wrote:
| If you don't spend money at all, then you've removed
| yourself from participating in modern society, so that's
| not a reasonable suggestion.
|
| I spent more money to replace my aging furnace with a
| heat pump to reduce my emissions, so the mere exchange of
| money doesn't cause pollution. I could have spent a lot
| less money to repair or replace it with an equivalent 80%
| efficient furnace.
|
| My point is that it's not as simple as "money exchange
| causes more pollution" since I could stop sending money
| to my waste management company while not doing anything
| at all to reduce my personal pollution. Yes there are
| ways you can reduce your pollution impact (i.e. by buying
| less unnecessary goods, traveling less, etc), but there
| are also ways you can spend less money (i.e. by buying
| cheaper produce imported from another country 1000 miles
| away than paying a bit more for more local produce) while
| increasing your environmental impact.
| jancsika wrote:
| > No, you, the consumer, cause that pollution.
|
| Substitute "contribute to" for "cause"
| voisin wrote:
| I think OP is correct by saying "cause". The demand is
| actually causal, not merely contributory.
| Johnny555 wrote:
| When I pay my waste management company to haul away my trash, I
| do so with the expectation that they'll dispose of it in an
| environmentally conscious way (as environmentally conscious as
| dumping it into a big hole in the ground can be). If they can't
| afford to do methane capture based on what they are charging,
| then they should charge more.
|
| By not including externalized costs like environmental harm,
| cheap trash, just like cheap gas, leads consumers to use more
| of the product than if the environmental costs were factored
| in.
| voisin wrote:
| > I do so with the expectation that they'll dispose of it in
| an environmentally conscious way (as environmentally
| conscious as dumping it into a big hole in the ground can be)
|
| Where does this expectation stem from? We all know they dump
| it in the ground as you mention but has there ever been a
| push for regulation to demand methane capture? I've never
| heard of such a push so I can't imagine why anyone would
| expect them to have been doing it.
| Johnny555 wrote:
| Regulation - you can't dig a hole in the ground and call
| yourself a municipal landfill.
|
| https://www.epa.gov/landfills
|
| _Modern landfills are well-engineered and managed
| facilities for the disposal of solid waste. They must meet
| stringent design, operation, and closure requirements
| established under the Resource Conservation and Recovery
| Act._
|
| I'm not an environmental expert, if Methane emission causes
| significant environmental harm, then the EPA should be
| regulating it. It's hard to tell someone that they're
| harming the environment through methane emissions from
| trash while the actual environmental experts at the EPA
| don't bother to regulate it.
| jMyles wrote:
| ...this response rings so deeply and reverberating hollow
| to me.
|
| You can't just presume that "regulation" is magically
| removing the externalities of your consumption,
| particularly given that the data show so convincingly
| that regulatory capture is endemic.
|
| Of course the state occasionally displays the correct
| time as a broken clock would, but this is something that
| requires verification rather than naked presumption.
| Johnny555 wrote:
| >You can't just presume that "regulation" is magically
| removing the externalities of your consumption,
| particularly given that the data show so convincingly
| that regulatory capture is endemic.
|
| It doesn't matter what _I_ presume, it matters what the
| other 330 million people in this country presume. Telling
| people to be better conservationists is not going to
| succeed, externalities need to be priced into products so
| people can make informed decisions at the time of
| purchase. Make durable, re-usable, and repairable
| products the more affordable option.
| hunter-gatherer wrote:
| > When I pay my waste management company to haul away my
| trash, I do so with the expectation that they'll dispose of
| it in an environmentally conscious way (as environmentally
| conscious as dumping it into a big hole in the ground can
| be).
|
| Lol what??? Have you never seen how the cookie is made and
| discarded? It amazes me how so many people on this VC-
| sponsored forum hold such environment conscious expectations.
| Many of you are in a strange state of mind about the true
| cost of things. Nothing is made cheaper in consumption; costs
| are just offloaded to nature.
|
| FWIW: I grew up close to a copper mine, and currently live
| about 2 miles from a landfill (as the crow flies).
| Johnny555 wrote:
| >Have you never seen how the cookie is made and discarded?
|
| I can't speak for your state, but in my state the cookie
| isn't discarded in a landfill, it goes to composting
| facility.
| notjoemama wrote:
| Feel free to email Jeff Bezos to put a country of origin filter
| on Amazon.com so I can actually reduce the carbon footprint of
| the products I buy.
|
| Consumers have very few options within their control and the
| problem is not binary nor does its solution need to be zero
| sum.
| r00fus wrote:
| > No, you, the consumer, cause that pollution.
|
| I disagree that the end consumer has so much agency. As a
| consumer I simply have the choice to buy product A or B - the
| pollution caused by the factory that the store ordered hoping
| you would buy it - is obscured by many levels.
|
| The consumer is a small part of the decision chain
| Erratic6576 wrote:
| As a consumer, I can choose the plastic bottle in which my
| plasticised water is sold. I cannot choose deposit glass
| jl6 wrote:
| You can choose not to buy a bottle of water at all. You can
| buy a reusable bottle and get refills.
| akira2501 wrote:
| > This is similar to "China's manufacturing causes a lot of
| pollution". No, you, the consumer, cause that pollution.
|
| This pretends that China's environmental standards and
| oversight are identical to every other countries or that
| worldwide shipping isn't one of the largest contributors to
| pollution on the planet. Which we all know is far from the
| truth.
|
| So, no, China actually causes that pollution. The companies in
| the US who take advantage of China's lax environmental and
| labor laws to eke out a few points of profit causes that
| pollution.
|
| As a consumer, I require goods to survive and thrive, and I
| have very little say in how that market functions, and I have
| zero say when it comes to setting policy. I'm happy to do more,
| and do as much as I can when possible, but I'm wealthy enough
| to play this game... most of America is not.
|
| I wish HN would punch up nearly as much as it loves to punch
| down.
| rglullis wrote:
| > As a consumer, I require goods to survive and thrive, and I
| have very little say in how that market functions.
|
| You do have a say when/if you are willing to bear the cost of
| your decisions. If more people were willing to pay up the
| "manufactured in a place with strict environment and labor
| regulations" premium, then there wouldn't be so many
| companies flocking to China.
|
| But consumers don't want to do it. They rather save some
| bucks to buy the stuff they want and hide themselves under
| "everyone else does it".
| atleta wrote:
| GP talked about who _causes_ the pollution not where to punch
| (who to blame). Everybody has a little say in policies, at
| least in democracies. When you say that most of America is
| not wealthy enough to play this game then you basically admit
| this. And this is what is happening: people are not keen on
| making policies happen if those mean lowering their standard
| of living. But the thing is that, unfortunately, it is that
| very standard of living (i.e. consumption) that causes the
| problem.
|
| You can punch up as much as you want, things are not going to
| change without people lowering their standards. And once we
| accept it we can easily force politicians to do the right
| thing. The tragedy of the situation is that everyobody is
| complicit and most people will not accept that they
| themselves are. Sure, everybody _but them_ .
|
| And I'm not saying this to blame anyone. Blaming doesn't make
| sense. Identifying the causes and what needs to change does.
| pengaru wrote:
| > This is similar to "China's manufacturing causes a lot of
| pollution". No, you, the consumer, cause that pollution.
|
| Except the China Effect of producing TrashOnArrival products is
| doing more than its fair share of amplifying how much must be
| produced to keep operational product in consumer hands.
| jeffbee wrote:
| Why don't Americans incinerate more trash? It seems like the way
| to go.
| JoshTko wrote:
| We need carbon tax now to fine, and reallocate funds for better
| processes.
| Erratic6576 wrote:
| We need to ban fossil fuels for most uses now. Like coal
|
| We are doing too little too late
| irrelative wrote:
| Well a carbon tax would essentially end coal.
| johnea wrote:
| I'm not sure "exposed" is the right verb here.
|
| This issue has been known for quite some time.
|
| The problem is that no one is doing anything about it...
| nimbius wrote:
| The real comedy of all this navel gazing and head shaking is we
| _could_ capture all this excess methane to use as affordable
| winter heating or turbine fuel but it would literally crater a
| very lucrative natural gas oligopoly in a fortnight. Artificial
| scarcity is a planned feature in western capitalism.
| jwagenet wrote:
| Seems odd the title even mentions landfills and the comments here
| are focused on them, since despite the largest hourly producer of
| methane mentioned being a landfill, they are largely glossed
| over! Based on the map, landfill emissions are basically a non
| issue outside of South Asia, so efforts to reduce those emissions
| can be rather targeted.
|
| It's worth noting that despite trapping nearly 30 times more
| heat, methane is only responsible for around 25% of global
| warming and only exists in the atmosphere for a decade vs 100s of
| years for CO2. Certainly reducing methane emissions will help,
| but CO2 will hang around long after the methane is gone (why the
| usual "suspect", cattle, is a non issue).
|
| With regards to landfills, the culprit is anaerobic
| decomposition. Diverting paper to recycling and most other
| organics to compost would go a long way.
| jpk wrote:
| But that's the thing about methane, it doesn't become "gone",
| it oxidizes into CO2. So not only does it trap more heat for
| the decade it's around, it also converts into CO2 to trap heat
| at the lower rate for centuries.
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