Whether it’s eating less meat or cycling instead of driving, humans can do many things to help prevent climate change.
Unfortunately, breathing less isn’t one of them.
That might be a problem, as a new study claims the gases in air exhaled from human lungs is fueling global warming.
Methane and nitrous oxide in the air we exhale makes up to 0.1 per cent of the UK’s greenhouse gas emissions, scientists say.
And that’s not even accounting for the gas we release from burps and farts, or emissions that come from our skin without us noticing.
The new study was led by Dr Nicholas Cowan, an atmospheric physicist at the UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology in Edinburgh.
‘Exhaled human breath can contain small, elevated concentrations of methane (CH4) and nitrous oxide (N2O), both of which contribute to global warming,’ Dr Cowan and colleagues say.
‘We would urge caution in the assumption that emissions from humans are negligible.’
As most of us remember from science classes at school, humans breathe in oxygen and breathe out carbon dioxide.
121 views