Methane Reduction

Methane is an underestimated, miscalculated, potent greenhouse gas.

Methane represents the low-hanging fruit of climate action with most emissions from agriculture, energy and waste sectors.

Since 2021, the Global methane pledge committed to reducing methane emissions by 30% by 2030.

National methane reduction strategies often neglect the agricultural industry’s emissions, yet no assessment exists to assess the effectiveness of industry attempts.

27 strategies from 46 articles in Australian research were ranked according to methane reduction, costs of implementation, technological readiness, policy acceptability and scalability.

Results show that land restoration was the most effective strategy in climate emergency scenario. This starkly contrasts with industry and government narrow focus on product based emissions, focusing on reducing methane intensity by increasing yields.

Full access to article available here:

https://www.mdpi.com/2225-1154/12/4/50

The World Health Organization (WHO) have confirmed that residential natural gas appliances are the main source of indoor air pollution, with gas stoves responsible for increases of carbon monoxide, nitric oxide, nitrogen oxide and methane in household air (WHO 2021). Local Istanbul studies of air quality further support these findings, demonstrating that traffic is not the main source responsible for health conditions arising from air pollution (Baye T  et al. 2019). Ventilation, if used at all, is ineffective at mitigating these gases and only electric stoves produce no household gas emissions (Bhangar et al. 2011; Cimini and Moresi 2022; Mullen et al. 2016). Air pollution is harmful for human health, targeting vulnerable populations easily and gas stoves has been proven to be directly responsible for onset and intensification of asthma in children (United States Environmental Protection Agency 2016).

WHO has equivalated the long-term impacts of air pollution as having the same impacts as inhaling second-hand smoke and adopting unhealthy dietary habits (WHO 2018), contributing to overall death rates resulting from cardiovascular and respiratory diseases and lung cancer (WHO 2021). Every year in Istanbul, on average more than 40,000 people die from cardiovascular disease; more than 7,500 die from lung cancer and another 7,500 from chronic respiratory disease.

Case study of economic benefits of converting to induction stoves coming soon..