Since both of these chemicals are more potent greenhouse gases than carbon dioxide, this effect, too, should help combat global warming.
ECONOMIST: Biochar could enrich soils and cut greenhouse gases as well
The award winning Bengtsson, highly decorated by scientific bodies across the globe, also pointed out that the heating effect of carbon dioxide (CO2) is logarithmic, which means the higher the concentration is, the smaller the effect of a further increase.
FORBES: As The Economy Recesses, Obama's Global Warming Delusions Are Truly Cruel
It said the gases had "very high global warming potentials compared to carbon dioxide", as an amount about 1g in weight could have the same effect as 1 ton of carbon dioxide being released into the atmosphere.
The WMO data, meanwhile, confirms that atmospheric concentrations of the three gases principally responsible for the man-made component of the greenhouse effect - carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide - all rose during 2009.
Most of it is, of course, radiated back into space. (It is the partial blocking of this radiation by gases such as carbon dioxide that causes the much-talked-of greenhouse effect.) Some of it, however, goes in the opposite direction, into the ground.
Natural processes involving changes in the Sun could have at least as powerful an effect on global temperature as increased emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2).
Would the carbon dioxide emissions from such not for profit supply have the same effect on the climate as those pumped out by fuels supplied by greedy profit seekers?
FORBES: The Billionaires Who Benefit From Today's Climate Crisis
Thanks to the Kyoto treaty on climate change, which came into effect in February, most rich countries regulate emissions of carbon dioxide in some manner.
"If it is true that the mechanism is all about rays enhancing diffuse radiation, it would mean that 'global dimming' and 'global brightening' would have a big effect on tree growth and therefore on the absorption of carbon dioxide, " warns Ms Dengel.
Both are far better at trapping heat than carbon dioxide, meaning that cows, chickens and their ilk have a larger greenhouse effect than all the cars, trucks and planes in the world.
These are pollutants, particularly ozone and soot, that do not hang around in the atmosphere as carbon dioxide does, but have to be renewed continually if they are to have a lasting effect.
As well as warming the oceans, rising carbon dioxide emissions are slowly reducing the alkalinity of seawater, which is also projected to have a detrimental effect on coral growth.
Greenhouse effect: heating of the earth's atmosphere due to an increase in gases like carbon dioxide.
应用推荐