Cows and rice paddies boost methane emissions: study

By Geert De Clercq PARIS (Reuters) - Global methane emissions from agriculture and other sources have surged in recent years, threatening efforts to slow climate change, an international study has found. Researchers led by French Laboratoire des Sciences du Climat et de l'Environnement (LSCE) reported that methane concentrations in the air began to surge around 2007 and grew precipitously in 2014 and 2015. In that two-year period methane concentrations shot up by 10 or more parts per billion (ppb) annually, compared with an average annual increase of only 0.5 ppb during the early 2000s, according to the study released by the Global Carbon Project, which groups climate researchers.