Levels of nitrous oxide (N20), better known as the laughing gas has raised serious concern. The UN Environment Program (UNEP) on Thursday released a report warning the levels of N20, a gas that depletes the ozone layer and is also a potent greenhouse gas, could almost double by 2050.
“We need all hands on deck to combat the serious and significant increases in N2O levels in the atmosphere,” UNEP Executive Director Achim Steiner said in a report released during the ongoing at the UN climate talks in Warsaw.
In the report Drawing Down N20 analysis by scientists from 35 organisations found that nitrous oxide is presently the most important ozone-depleting gas. According to the experts , the NO2 concentrations will rise by 83 per cent by 2050 compared to 2005, if the present trend continues.
Nitrous oxide is released after the nitrogen exchange between land and air and lives in the atmosphere on an average for 120 years. “Human activities have led to the increase in the levels of nitrous oxide and it takes atmosphere a very long time to cleanse itself from such chemicals,” said AR Ravishankara, director of the chemical sciences division at the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
According to the report the levels of nitrous oxide have spiked in the last decades due enormous use of nitrogen fertilisers in agriculture, emissions from the chemical production and pollution from road transport and waste management. The gas damages protective ozone molecules in the stratosphere, that shields the Earth from dangerous ultraviolet light. However, N02 was not included in the 1987 Montreal Protocol that was designed phase out a range of ozone-depleting chemicals. “When the Motreal Protocol came out there were more pressing priorities due to the rapid ozone depletion by chlorofluorocarbons but now the effects of N20 cannot be overlooked any further,” said Ravishankara
The UNEP says that since agriculture which accounts for two-thirds of man-made NO2 emissions, there is plenty of scope to reduce emissions through efficient use of fertilisers. Change in dietary behaviour like switching to a less meat-based diet would also help, reduce N02 emission as the production of animal protein leads to far higher NO2 emissions than plant protein, the report said.
Cutting NO2 emissions, which is the third most potent greenhouse gas could save millions of tones of CO2 in greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 which will help narrow the emission gap to UN’s target of limit global warming to 2 degree celsius, chief scientist at UN Joseph Alcamo explained.
The report comes just a day before the annual UN climate talk concludes in the Polish capital of Warsaw.
Bhrikuti Rai in Warsaw