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Cause of the 2020 surge in atmospheric methane clarified

Atmospheric methane concentrations rose unexpectedly during the lockdowns of 2020. It now seems that this was due to warm, wet weather in the Northern Hemisphere and, ironically, a slowdown in air-pollutant emissions.
  1. George H. Allen

    1. George H. Allen is in the Department of Geosciences, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg, Virginia 24061, USA.

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The mysterious acceleration in the growth of atmospheric levels of methane (CH4) in 2020 received widespread media attention and has been a topic of ongoing speculation (see go.nature.com/3xvv5at). This acceleration was puzzling, considering that methane emissions decreased as a result of the economic slowdown during the COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns. In a paper in Nature, Peng et al.1 make considerable headway in explaining the cause of the phenomenon.

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Nature 612, 413-414 (2022)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-022-04352-6

References

  1. Peng, S. et al. Nature 612, 477–482 (2022).

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  2. Pörtner, H.-O. et al. (eds) Climate Change 2022: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability. Working Group II Contribution to the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (Cambridge Univ. Press, 2022).

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  3. Saunois, M. et al. Earth Syst. Sci. Data 12, 1561–1623 (2020).

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  4. Prather, M. J., Holmes, C. D. & Hsu, J. Geophys. Res. Lett. 39, L09803 (2012).

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Competing Interests

The author declares no competing interests.

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