Man-made greenhouse gases

Man-made greenhouse gases, i.e. those caused by human activities, are primarily carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4) and nitrous oxide (N2O). The concentration of these gases in the earth’s atmosphere and their greenhouse gas potential determine the contribution to global warming. Methane has a 28-fold and nitrous oxide a 265-fold greenhouse gas potential compared to carbon dioxide. This means that CH4 (N2O) emitted today will warm the climate 28x (265x) more than CO2 over the next 100 years.

Even though the greenhouse gas potential of CO2 is the smallest, its contribution to human-caused climate change is the most influential at 76% because extremely large amounts of CO2 are emitted into the atmosphere. (The contributions of CH4, at 16%, and N2O, at 6%, to greenhouse gas emissions are relatively small.) [1]

The concentration of these greenhouse gases in the Earth’s atmosphere has increased tremendously since 1750: The concentration of carbon dioxide increased by nearly 50%, that of methane by 173%, and the increase of nitrous oxide in the atmosphere is nearly 25%.

1750 2021 Growth in %
CO2 (in ppm) 280 416 49 %
CH4 (in ppb) 722 1.971 173 %
N2O (in ppb) 270 335 24 %

The trend regarding the concentration of carbon dioxide as the number one greenhouse gas in the atmosphere is clear: The measuring stations Schauinsland, Mauna Loa on Hawaii, Zugspitze as well as the world trend show identical courses. The trend is continuously increasing, as the graph shows.

Carbon dioxide concentration in the atmosphere (monthly mean) 1958 – 2021 [2].

A comparative look at the respective contributions of humans and nature to climate change is also instructive.

Edenhofer and others have examined the influence of natural factors – such as the sun or volcanism – as well as the human-induced contribution to climate change. The results suggest that an increase in global air temperature since the beginning of industrialization cannot be explained without human influence. [4]

Influence of natural and human-made factors on average global surface temperature from 1870 to 2020 [4].

The graph shows that volcanic eruptions repeatedly cooled the Earth’s surface during the observation period between 1870 and 2010. In addition, it can be seen that solar activity has had little effect on climate during the same period. Other factors, such as interactions between oceanic and atmospheric circulation, are short-term in nature and are referred to as internal variability. [1] [5] This also varies very constantly around the reference point (=0).

The IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) believes that it is primarily human influences that are responsible for the 0.7 oC increase in average temperature between 1951 and 2010. [1] In the graph, this is reflected by the rising black line, whose slope jumped from the mid-1980s.

 

 

Sources:

[1] Nelles, D. & Serrer, C. (2018): Kleine Gase – Große Wirkung: der Klimawandel; KlimaWandel, Friedrichshafen.

[2] Hawkins, E. & Sutton, R. (2009): The Potential to Narrow Uncertainty in Regional Climate Predictions. Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, vol. 90, no. 8, 2009, 1095–1107.

[3] Stocker, T.F., D. Qin, G.-K. Plattner, M. Tignor, S.K. Allen, J. Boschung, A. Nauels, Y. Xi (2013): IPCC. Climate Change 2013: The Physical Science Basis. Contribution of Working Group I to the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Cambridge University Press, 2013.

[4] Edenhofer, O., Pichs-Madruga, R., Sokona, Y. (2014): IPCC. Climate Change 2014: Mitigation of Climate Change. Contribution of Working Group III to the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Cambridge University Press, 2014.

[5] Umweltbundesamt (2022): Atmosphärische Treibhausgas-Konzentrationen. ,online https://www.umweltbundesamt.de/daten/klima/atmosphaerische-treibhausgas-konzentrationen#kohlendioxid- [zuletzt abgerufen: 19.07.2022]

 

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