Methane Is Invisible, Ubiquitous, and More Powerful Than We Imagined
A California Gas Leak Is Revealing the Outsize Punch of an Underestimated Molecule
Made of one carbon and four hydrogen atoms, lighter than air, methane is a democratic molecule. You make it, I make it, cows and coal mines emit it, as do termites and multinational oil companies. Power plants, land fills, sewage treatment plants, rice paddies, natural gas pipelines, and oil rigs leak it. When NASA looks for life on other planets, they don’t look for little green men, they scan for traces of methane. Methane is the ultimate sign of life, though a massively mysterious, and invisible, one.
The mysteries surrounding …
