The jump in the amount of methane recorded in 2020, despite the global lockdown related to the alleged pandemic, is a huge surprise. Everyone expected the opposite process, but scientists are amazed by the largest jump in methane emissions since the start of counting its concentrations forty years ago.
The astonishing rise in methane levels in the atmosphere in 2020 can be partly explained by the decline in nitrogen oxide emissions in the early stages of the covid-19 pandemic. Methane is a powerful greenhouse gas, responsible for one-fifth of the global warming caused by human activities. It can be emitted during the mining and transportation of coal, natural gas and petroleum, as well as from biological sources such as livestock.
Methane levels in the atmosphere have been rising since 2007, but 2020 saw the largest annual spike since records began in 1983. This increase is puzzling as fossil fuel consumption declined in 2020 due to the slowdown in human activity caused by the covid-19 pandemic. The International Energy Agency (IEA) reported that the fossil fuel sector emitted less methane into the atmosphere this year than in 2019.
To find out where the gas is coming from, Shushi Peng of Peking University in Beijing and colleagues analyzed the greenhouse gas inventories that countries submitted to the UN in 2020. These inventories included data on agricultural, waste and fossil fuel emissions in each country.
The researchers found that in 2020, global natural gas production fell by 3.8 percent and global crude oil production fell by 7.9 percent from the previous year. Using this information, they calculated that methane emissions from these industries would decrease by 3.1 million tons from the previous year.
Experts also found that methane emissions from the global waste sector in 2020 fell slightly compared to the previous year, while emissions from agriculture increased. This suggests that the pandemic did not have as much of an impact on human methane emissions as expected.
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