Newly discovered greenhouse gas '7,000 times more powerful than CO2'

A new greenhouse gas that is 7,000 times more powerful than carbon dioxide at warming the Earth has been discovered by researchers in Toronto.

The newly discovered gas, perfluorotributylamine (PFTBA), has been in use by the electrical industry since the mid-20th century.

The chemical, that does not occur naturally, breaks all records for potential impacts on the climate, said the researchers at the University of Toronto's department of chemistry.

"We claim that PFTBA has the highest radiative efficiency of any molecule detected in the atmosphere to date," said Angela Hong, one of the co-authors.

The study, published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters, found PFTBA was 7,100 times more powerful at warming the Earth over a 100-year time span than CO2.

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/dec/10/new-greenhouse-gas-powerful-chemical-perfluorotributylamine


Just shows we are really in the dark with what we are chucking into the atmosphere, what next will be discovered?

That is just so depressing Didge! I think we are in the dark about a lot of things, and if we carry on, we will be 'in the dark' permanently!

Indeed, at least with have many scientists on board looking to help reverse or at least stem some of the damage that has been done

If they can!

 

THESE kinds of "man made" synthesised gases are in short supply though, relatively speaking - thankfully...

EVEN IF they were a million times stronger, these minor gases still wouldn't be a scratch on the worst offenders..

METHANE ~ from cow farts, rotting vegetation, landfills, leakage from oil drilling and CSG "fracking" projects, wood fires, coal mining and electricity production ~ still remains the worst of the worst..

THOUGH running second to CO2 in human contributions, it is also several times stronger in it's "greenhouse" effects.   

cor, convenient just as the CO2 bubble is being blown out of the water

does this mean governments will now try 7000 times the amount of tax they fleece from "We The People"

I think it means we still have not the full extent of what damage we are doing to our planet when we are only finding out information like this. That is what I see and where it should not be glossed over but see the full extent and damage this has done, would you not agree for the future?
Or does ignoring vital information not only for science but also the chance to right many things done wrong?
Surely you agree this is important these findings?

PhilDidge wrote:I think it means we still have not the full extent of what damage we are doing to our planet when we are only finding out information like this. That is what I see and where it should not be glossed over but see the full extent and damage this has done, would you not agree for the future?
Or does ignoring vital information not only for science but also the chance to right many things done wrong?
Surely you agree this is important these findings?

yes we know it is a sin not to fall into line on that one.

Welcome beekeeper....

Just imagine how much methane must have been around from rotting vegetation & ruminant farts before humans turned up and did the planet a favour by burning and cutting down the forests and hunting all the ruminants, some almost to extinction.

Does the 7,000 times worse gas mean the green brigade will have us back to candles or will we have to only work and get around in daylight hours and sleep away the dark hours?

Vintage wrote:Just imagine how much methane must have been around from rotting vegetation & ruminant farts

wow some one is ignorant about agriculture, do you think a wild plain or savannah is jam packed with animals like a cattle lot? what about multi story chicken factories? u think the cast of lion king went a built themselves some high rise?

only a complete jack ass could suggest that the bio density of the planet has not increased due to Human Industrialisation. there are not only more of us but more of specific plants and animals that we farm to feed us.

So we are releasing more methane with out even counting the emissions from factories and cars etc.

Not to mention, a lot of the world's methane is sequestered in the tundras and sea floors. As we warm the world, we soften the soils that contain sequestered methane, allowing more and more of it to leech out and creating a positive feedback loop.

Vintage wrote:Just imagine how much methane must have been around from rotting vegetation & ruminant farts before humans turned up and did the planet a favour by burning and cutting down the forests and hunting all the ruminants, some almost to extinction.

Does the 7,000 times worse gas mean the green brigade will have us back to candles or will we have to only work and get around in daylight hours and sleep away the dark hours?

it appears to be the intention in britain.

veya_victaous wrote:

Vintage wrote:Just imagine how much methane must have been around from rotting vegetation & ruminant farts

wow some one is ignorant about agriculture, do you think a wild plain or savannah is jam packed with animals like a cattle lot? what about multi story chicken factories? u think the cast of lion king went a built themselves some high rise?

only a complete jack ass could suggest that the bio density of the planet has not increased due to Human Industrialisation. there are not only more of us but more of specific plants and animals that we farm to feed us.

So we are releasing more methane with out even counting the emissions from factories and cars etc.

well the african plains and the american ones certainly were. Herds of bison that took days to past were not uncommon in america until they were wiped out in a few years. In africa there are still massive herds of various animals that migrate, they all fart. Termites also apparently are prone to letting one go.
climate changes, the thing that hasn't been proved is that it is changing now because of man.
The fact that some green eco nuts suggest people who disagree should be treated like criminals makes it more likely that they are insecure about their evidence.

CO2 does not drive climate, climate drives CO2. when it is warmer more CO2 is released, when it is cooler less is released.

Cantankerous wrote:climate changes, the thing that hasn't been proved is that it is changing now because of man.
The fact that some green eco nuts suggest people who disagree should be treated like criminals makes it more likely that they are insecure about their evidence.

CO2 does not drive climate, climate drives CO2. when it is warmer more CO2 is released, when it is cooler less is released.

Your assertions fly in the face of modern science. Climate does indeed change -- science has proved it -- but what that statement obscures is the fact that science has recorded this current climate as changing faster than ever measured before.

Yes, alligator-like animals once lived in the Arctic. But try to put an alligator in the Arctic now and they won't survive. Likewise, polar bears could evolve and adapt to the warming climate if it warmed over hundreds of thousands or millions of years, as in the past when they evolved to survive the cooling Arctic, but they need that long. They can't do it over a few hundred or thousand years.

CO2 does indeed drive warming. It is a simple-enough process to be replicated in a child's science project:

Cantankerous wrote:Does the 7,000 times worse gas mean the green brigade will have us back to candles or will we have to only work and get around in daylight hours and sleep away the dark hours?
it appears to be the intention in britain.

This is a common straw-man attack. Paint the environmental movement as a bunch of "back-to-the-caves" lunatics. If you actually took a clear-eyed look at the environmental movement you will find very few people advocating something like this, and they're very much on the fringe and not taken seriously. The vast majority of environmentalists advocate greater use of existing renewable energy technologies which will impact people's lifestyles only minimally. (Otherwise, how would we ever get people to agree to the changes in the first place?)

I might as well say that non-environmentalists want to destroy the planet and leave it uninhabitable for future generations; it's a comment with just as little merit.

Existing renewable energy technologies which impact people's lifestyles only minimally?
This section of my country endured coal mining and all that goes with it for over a hundred years, then the mines shut and the work went, people could have moved out for work and many did but not all could do that - who would buy your house in a depressed area? Then the area was re claimed and everyone thought how fortunate they were to live here even in low paid work or no work at all, then the wind turbines came few wanted them but they came anyway our community is practically ringed with them and they are huge and another site near here is being considered, every way you look you see wind turbines the strobe effect when the sun is out is awful. Now I want to save the planet but one of the things we need to do is bring the population under control because one of the many factors in climate change is intensive farming, China has lost millions of acres of farm lands through man made erosion and it goes on and unless someone invents a safe anti matter generator what ever we do we won't keep up with supply and demand. The planet has had dramatic climate change many times and usually without human imput and doesn't the sun have a contribution to make? Although I don't disagree we do contribute, how much is the question With love from the Jackass.

Ben_Reilly wrote:

Cantankerous wrote:climate changes, the thing that hasn't been proved is that it is changing now because of man.
The fact that some green eco nuts suggest people who disagree should be treated like criminals makes it more likely that they are insecure about their evidence.

CO2 does not drive climate, climate drives CO2. when it is warmer more CO2 is released, when it is cooler less is released.

Your assertions fly in the face of modern science. Climate does indeed change -- science has proved it -- but what that statement obscures is the fact that science has recorded this current climate as changing faster than ever measured before.

Yes, alligator-like animals once lived in the Arctic. But try to put an alligator in the Arctic now and they won't survive. Likewise, polar bears could evolve and adapt to the warming climate if it warmed over hundreds of thousands or millions of years, as in the past when they evolved to survive the cooling Arctic, but they need that long. They can't do it over a few hundred or thousand years.

CO2 does indeed drive warming. It is a simple-enough process to be replicated in a child's science project:

I'll just say one thing.
hockey stick.

The American Plain never look like that with Bison and none of the African plains are like that either.

Ben_Reilly wrote:

Cantankerous wrote:Does the 7,000 times worse gas mean the green brigade will have us back to candles or will we have to only work and get around in daylight hours and sleep away the dark hours?
it appears to be the intention in britain.

This is a common straw-man attack. Paint the environmental movement as a bunch of "back-to-the-caves" lunatics. If you actually took a clear-eyed look at the environmental movement you will find very few people advocating something like this, and they're very much on the fringe and not taken seriously. The vast majority of environmentalists advocate greater use of existing renewable energy technologies which will impact people's lifestyles only minimally. (Otherwise, how would we ever get people to agree to the changes in the first place?)

I might as well say that non-environmentalists want to destroy the planet and leave it uninhabitable for future generations; it's a comment with just as little merit.

isn't that the same argument used against those that do not immediately fall into the "tax them to death and call it green lobby".

renewable energies are sensible because the existing oil and gas are running.
the problem begins when you base your entire energy production on wind which require conventional back up for the times when they do not work.

Now wind may well be useful in parts of america where you can put up massive wind farms. I am not sure the word NIMBY applies so much over there.

wind is a great addition to a conventional generation system, however it cannot replace it.
there is of course solar as well, but to work well you need a lot of sun, whilst it does work under cloudy skies, it does not produce at full power then and it produces nothing at night.
the best solution available now is nuclear. But that requires a stable geography and not an area that may be prone to tsunami's.
the best solution for unlimited power would be solar collectors in space which beam the power down by microwave to receivers and distribute it from there.
I read of an ambitious scheme recently where they want to build a band of solar cells around the moon and microwave and laser the power back. the fact that it is around 6000 miles long and 250 miles wide might mean it wont be ready tomorrow.

Of course it would be enormously expensive and need entirely new technologies and more fundamentally a permanent manned presence on the moon to work

now the best solution to our problems would be a pandemic that killed most of us off.
But that might be a little extreme for most people

Vintage wrote:Existing renewable energy technologies which impact people's lifestyles only minimally?
This section of my country endured coal mining and all that goes with it for over a hundred years, then the mines shut and the work went, people could have moved out for work and many did but not all could do that - who would buy your house in a depressed area? Then the area was re claimed and everyone thought how fortunate they were to live here even in low paid work or no work at all, then the wind turbines came few wanted them but they came anyway our community is practically ringed with them and they are huge and another site near here is being considered, every way you look you see wind turbines the strobe effect when the sun is out is awful. Now I want to save the planet but one of the things we need to do is bring the population under control because one of the many factors in climate change is intensive farming, China has lost millions of acres of farm lands through man made erosion and it goes on and unless someone invents a safe anti matter generator what ever we do we won't keep up with supply and demand. The planet has had dramatic climate change many times and usually without human imput and doesn't the sun have a contribution to make? Although I don't disagree we do contribute, how much is the question With love from the Jackass.

many people seem to exclude that enormous ball of fusion energy in the sky as a source of change.

Cantankerous wrote:

Ben_Reilly wrote:

Cantankerous wrote:climate changes, the thing that hasn't been proved is that it is changing now because of man.
The fact that some green eco nuts suggest people who disagree should be treated like criminals makes it more likely that they are insecure about their evidence.

CO2 does not drive climate, climate drives CO2. when it is warmer more CO2 is released, when it is cooler less is released.

Your assertions fly in the face of modern science. Climate does indeed change -- science has proved it -- but what that statement obscures is the fact that science has recorded this current climate as changing faster than ever measured before.

Yes, alligator-like animals once lived in the Arctic. But try to put an alligator in the Arctic now and they won't survive. Likewise, polar bears could evolve and adapt to the warming climate if it warmed over hundreds of thousands or millions of years, as in the past when they evolved to survive the cooling Arctic, but they need that long. They can't do it over a few hundred or thousand years.

CO2 does indeed drive warming. It is a simple-enough process to be replicated in a child's science project:

I'll just say one thing.
hockey stick.

where have I said climate does not change. It is has changed since the first day the planet got an atmosphere.
It has changed wildly numerous times throughout the 4.6billion year history.
almost entirely without any intervention from man.
Sometimes changing wildly within a very short timespan.Decades not eons

veya_victaous wrote:


The American Plain never look like that with Bison and none of the African plains are like that either.

herds of bison in america were millions strong. Taking days to pass a single spot.

africa






far smaller perhaps that in days gone by, but a lot of farts in one day

yep 'Days to pass' but they did move around now we got that herd standing in one place and another herd of the same size standing where it was going to go. and another where it came from.

if not, it is because we put a city there.

Cantankerous wrote:I'll just say one thing.
hockey stick.
where have I said climate does not change. It is has changed since the first day the planet got an atmosphere.
It has changed wildly numerous times throughout the 4.6billion year history.
almost entirely without any intervention from man.
Sometimes changing wildly within a very short timespan.Decades not eons

Yeah, the hockey stick, not as broken as climate change denialists would deceive people into believing.

I didn't say that you denied past climate change. Read what I said again. To repeat myself (needlessly): To assert past climate change as though that refutes current climate change theory is an attempt to obscure the fact that the climate is now changing faster than ever before recorded.

Do you have any evidence of non-localized runaway climate change in the past that occurred over a few decades? The most rapid climate change that ever occurred before now was still over spans of tens of thousands of years, and was localized to Africa. It nearly wiped out humanity, but instead caused us to become the single most adaptable species this planet has ever known.

Australia’s research has focussed on ice cores
from Law Dome in East Antarctica (right). In
1993 a 1200 m-long ice core was extracted,
containing a 90 000-year climate record. This core
showed a rise in carbon dioxide coinciding with
the start of the Industrial Revolution.

http://www.antarctica.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0014/21065/ml_396036782407407_climate20change20research20fact20sheet.pdf

http://www.antarctica.gov.au/about-antarctica/environment/climate-change/australias-contribution-to-antarctic-climate-science-2008-report

Given all the new ice core data, what changes can we anticipate for our climate? If CO2 has increased over the past 150 years as much as it normally increases over thousands of years leading up to an interglacial phase (about 80 ppmv), then we could expect as much as a corresponding 10-12C increase in temperature. But if half the historical temperature increases have been due to orbital forcing and other factors, then we should expect an increase of "only" about 5-6C, or 9-11F.

http://www.daviesand.com/Choices/Precautionary_Planning/New_Data/

this data from before the climate debate got mainstream

The information in this web page was researched on Earth Day, 2000.
This page was last updated on May 30, 2000.

see the consistent high blue line at the end of the graph, and the red that shoots up at the end.

Hadn't seen that before. Couldn't get a better match if you tried.