If CO2 doesn’t kill us, the climate changistas warned, methane is going to do the job. The gas, which flatulent cows commonly emit, is so dangerous that it’s imperative that we switch to an insect diet, that we switch cows to an insect diet, or, failing that, put diapers or masks on cows, or even “toilet train” them. I’m sure you won’t be shocked to learn that the hysteria about methane is wrong because the atmosphere has a self-correcting mechanism.

You’re all familiar with the screaming headlines:

• Scientists are worried about the rise in methane emissions as the world heats up and ‘cows in particular’ are to blame
• Breeding ‘green’ cows? CRISPR poised to reduce climate-polluting methane gas emissions
• How New Zealand plans to tackle climate change: Taxing cow burps
• British cows could be given ‘methane blockers’ to cut climate emissions
• Students Had To Eat Bugs, Told It Was ‘Only Right Answer’ To Cows Destroying The Climate
• 5 reasons why eating insects could reduce climate change
• Opinion: Feeding Insects to Cows Could Make Meat and Dairy More Sustainable
• This burp-catching mask for cows could slow down climate change
• Diapers on Cows?
• Cows ‘potty-trained’ in experiment to reduce greenhouse gas emissions

Of course, it’s not just methane. According to “the science,” methane comes from fossil fuels, landfills, burning wood, rice farming, etc.

Image: Cow in a diaper and face mask by DALL-E (AI).

Got it: Methane bad. People die. Diaper cows. Eat bugs. Stop producing rice (thereby starving large parts of the world).

However, as is always the case when it comes to leftist hysteria about the climate, the “science” is partially or completely wrong. It’s easy to understand why, too. The earth’s climate is an infinitely complicated system, and leftists are relying on computer models for their conclusions. Because we lack the God-like ability to understand the existence of everything that affects the climate, every model is an example of “Garbage In; Garbage Out.” The models are always wrong, whether in big ways or small.

Now, it’s becoming apparent that the models are also wrong about methane. Science News, a publication that accepts Climate Change as true, has conceded that the atmosphere already has a system it place to help offset methane’s effects on the environment:

Methane is a greenhouse gas with dual personalities. It heats Earth’s atmosphere 28 times as potently as carbon dioxide, gram for gram. But its absorption of the sun’s radiation high in the atmosphere also alters cloud patterns — casting a bit of shadow on its warming effect.

So rather than adding even more thermal energy to the atmosphere, as previously thought, methane’s solar absorption sets off a cascade of events that reduces its overall warming effect by about 30 percent, researchers report March 16 in Nature Geoscience.

[snip]

But scientists are learning that greenhouse gases, including methane, also absorb some of the sun’s shortwave radiation. Recent estimates suggested that methane might contribute up to 15 percent more thermal energy to the atmosphere than previously thought, due to this additional shortwave absorption.

However, the new study reveals that methane’s shortwave absorption has the opposite effect. This finding is based on a detailed analysis of the gas’s absorption at various wavelengths.

The almost preternatural ability that so-called “climate scientists” have to be wrong about all their assumptions should control the world’s rush to stop producing food to “save the climate.” That won’t happen, of course, because it’s not about the climate; it’s never been about the climate. It’s about government control and wealth redistribution, with stupid people, especially celebrities, as dupes who push this nonsense.

Getting rid of obvious pollution is a good thing, as is preventing piggish, careless abuse of the planet’s resources. After all, each of us is a steward for our generation and for subsequent ones. It’s high time, though, to abandon climate paranoia.