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EnvironmentPoliticsScience

The Global Methane Pledge

A hundred countries promise to cut the gas responsible for a third of current warming.

When
Known to
± 12 hours
Era
Contemporary, Holocene

Launched at COP26 on 2 November 2021, the pledge committed signatories to cut methane emissions 30% by 2030. Methane traps far more heat than carbon dioxide over twenty years but leaves the atmosphere in about a decade, so cutting it is the fastest available brake on near-term warming. China, India and Russia declined to join, and atmospheric concentrations have kept rising.

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