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Comment by Zenst | Hacker News Reader

That is one heck of a blob over London and that area does lack farms. Indeed looking at somewhere like Spain and you would think all that fruit and vegtable production didn't exist.

So is farming more a scapegoat for these emmisions?

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According to above graph, 6,1% of the output in the Netherlands is coming from traffic compared to 46% from farming. And mind most of the output comes from farm animals like cows, pigs and chickens which the Netherlands has a lot on a small surface area. It is not as much caused by growing crops and fruits.

NO2 is mostly generated from burning fuel, that's why in most of the countries in the map you only see yellow blobs over major cities due to higher car traffic, and almost no NO2 in rural areas. The major blob over central europe and south uk makes no sense and I don't think that excessive farming can justify it. If you look at a worldwide map of NO2 emissions [1] you can see that besides that large area in Europe only China has concentrations of NO2 that high.

[1] https://so2.gsfc.nasa.gov/no2/pix/regionals/scripts/sliderav...

No, farming (fertilizer, manure) produces nitrogen oxide. Cars also produce nitrogen oxide, which is why metropolitan areas also show up.

It's mostly about the ammonia produced by animals (manure).

Animal waste in general.

Anyone with a dog and a yard learns how devastating their waste can be to plants. Now multiple that by 10,000.

Yes and wasn't dismissing farming as being a source and mindful cars were probably huge factor in this. But thought was worth opening that up for debate as many will see such data and run with their conclusions.

Thank you.

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