India's emissions may be higher due to dams: study - Reuters

Source: Reuters

India's emissions may be higher due to dams: study
Wed Jun 27, 2007 4:24AM EDT

By Nita Bhalla

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - India's greenhouse gas emissions could
be 40 percent higher than official estimates if methane released
from dams is taken into account, according to a new study.

Methane -- about 23 times more powerful than carbon dioxide in
terms of the amount of heat it traps -- is released from reservoirs,
spillways and turbines of hydropower dams as a result of rotting
carbon-containing vegetation.

But India, already one of the world's top polluters, has never
measured methane emissions from its 4,500 large dams and has
therefore never taken it into account in official data.

According to a study by scientists from Brazil's National Institute
for Space Research, methane equivalent of 825 million tons of
carbon dioxide is released annually by India's dams.

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Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/environmentNews/idUSDEL31974420070627