Fox News: Burping Worms May Contribute to Global Warming

I recently came across an article from Fox News ("Fair and Balanced") about aquatic creatures, such as worms, contributing to global warming.

Aquatic animals that feed on lake and stream bottom sediments burp out small amounts of nitrous oxide, a potent greenhouse gas, a new study finds.

While the biological emissions from these critters pales in comparison to the nitrous oxide emitted by fossil fuel burning, their contribution could increase as more and more nitrogen-rich fertilizer runs off into lakes, streams and seas, the authors of the study said.

I'm not a fan of Fox News, and this fallible headline "Burping Worms May Contribute to Climate Change" is just plain silly, especially when one reads the article that cites Peter Stief, of the Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology in Germany, stating:

We're not expecting a new catastrophe...We have not discovered that the animals represent an environmental problem.

Yes, the word "may" was used in the headline, but the contribution of aquatic creatures to the effects of global warming are minuscule in comparison to livestock flatulence, let alone how human activities are increasing aquatic animals' contribution to greenhouse gases through fertilizer run off.  

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Posted by Jennifer Lance at March 9, 2009 1:14 AM