18,300kg methane per hour * 24 hours * 365 days = 160,308,000kg (~0.160 million metric tonnes). At 25x CO2 equivalent, that is 4,007,700,000kg (4 million metric tonnes).
This link about US electricity generation: https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=74&t=11 shows 767 "million metric tons" from coal, or 1.55 "billion metric tons" from all sources.
4 / 767 ~= 0.5%, so in the ballpark of the parent comment. Also possibly the second link is ton (~1016kg) vs tonne (1000kg), further tweaking the numbers.
And just about the Permian basin, Wikipedia says it "accounts for 20% of US crude oil production and 7% of US dry natural gas production" - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permian_Basin_(North_America)#... So if all sites like this were measured, it might be more like 2.5% coal-use-equivalent?
Where do you get the 25x from? Wikipedia says it's 80x-100x:
> over a 20-year period, [methane] traps 84 times more heat per mass unit than carbon dioxide (CO2) and 105 times the effect when accounting for aerosol interactions
(from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmospheric_methane)
After that 20 years, methane decomposes into CO2 so its long-term contribution is 3x CO2 equivalent (due to the higher mass after acquiring the oxygen atoms), so its lifetime CO2 equivalence can be higher or lower than 25x depending on which timescale you're looking at. Is the 25x an oft-used figure in the industry/literature?
You are right that there are different valid factors to consider, as can be seen here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_warming_potential
But also, 25x vs 100x is a 4x difference, which doesn't affect the comparison to coal that much (it's still single digit % "at best").
Only thing that trumps fossil fuels is nuclear - instead of the EU chasing Apple over USB-C ports, why don't they come up with some subsidies for better reactor designs?
If you think inflation is high now, try making this a reality.
The EU isn't a serious political body - instead of getting everyone at the table to solve hard problems, they chase nonsense.
As opposed to gridlock in US congress or UK changing 3 prime ministers in 1 year?
There has been a marked decline in the quality of western political leadership, its not just EU
A temperature increase of ~2C may at worst be comparable with a large pandemic or even WW2, just with the damage spread out over 2-3 generations. 12C, on the other hand, will leave large parts of the globe uninhabitable without technological assistance, and could wipe out a non-trival fraction of humanity if our tech doesn't keep up (still less hostile than Mars or Venus, though).
But for the scenarios that go 150+ years into the future, methane is a pretty small contributor compared to CO2.
I think perhaps (please correct me if you think I'm wrong) you're overestimating short term changes. Environmentalists tend to blame every disaster, flood or hurricane on climate change. This is like a mirror image to how the climate change deniers use every cold winter (or summer) as proof that climate change is a hoax.
If you look at the data, the current effects of climate change is somewhere in the middle. At present, one could argue that the net effects of climate change are actually slightly positive. Deaths due to heat is going up slightly, but deaths due to cold is going down faster than the deaths due to heat is going up.
By 2050, the adverse effects of the warming is probably greater than the positive ones, depending on scenario. Still, provided there is some technological and economic growth over the next 100 years, people living in 2122 will most likely be wealther (and more food secure), healthier and safer than people that live today, even if the improvement will be less than over 1922-2022.
> so the short-term impact should be a part of the conversation.
But by then, the impact of methane released today is already much LESS than the 25x quoted. More like 10x, and falling rapidly from there.
Also, there is the fact that changing policies takes time. One might even argue that there is an advantage to having a component to the warming where we will actually get a somewhat "quick" effect from cutting. Methane will contribute quite a bit to warming in the very short term, but as soon as we are able to stop releases, the effects will be gone within a generation, give or take (while CO2 hangs around for centuries).
And what % of US energy needs does that site supply to the grid?
It's down to the person making a claim to provide evidence. If someone points out that there is no evidence provided, that someone doesn't need to provide evidence themselves.
I mean yeah it's snarky, but it's a comment section on the internet.
It should be pretty clear that no sources are needed beyond using your eyes and looking at Robotbeat's comment - unless it's been edited, then it's rather obvious that no sources were provided, which was the claim being made.
Saying "what are your sources" without further elaboration is typically a little rude and combative, but this kind of "no you" comment is flat-out ridiculous.
https://www.google.com/search?q=(44%2F12)%2F(35MJ%2Fkg+*+0.3...
Global warming potential of CO2 over 100 year timeframe also googleable. These figures are all basic and pretty objective. (You May quibble about me choosing 100year timeframe vs 20 year, but that’s fine… it is still about the same order of magnitude.) More complicated to measure methane’s atmospheric lifetime and infrared absorption proportions, but nothing really controversial.
The EIA website also shows this stuff.