Two new greenhouse gases have been on the rise recently. These are methane and nitrogen trifluoride, but methane seems by far the biggest worry. It is considered the second most dangerous greenhouse gas based on the amount of warming it causes and by the amount in the atmosphere.

The effect of methane on global warming is one-third that of man-made carbon dioxide. As for the nitrogen trifluoride, it is a gas that is thousands of times more effective at warming the atmosphere than an equal amount of carbon dioxide. Luckily for us, nitrogen trifluoride is far less prevalent than the CO2.

Methane comes from landfills, natural gas, coal mining, animal waste and decaying plants. One of the major problems that might be caused by the methane is located in the Arctic land.

Billions of tons of methane were created by Arctic plants, but they lie frozen in permafrost wetland and trapped in the ocean floor. That could soon change, given the fact that the Arctic warms, and the methane released in the atmosphere would certainly worsen global warming.

Using new analytical techniques, a research team in California made the first atmospheric measurements of NF3 (nitrogen trifluoride). These showed that the amount of NF3 in the atmosphere was about 4,200 metric tons in 2006, not 1,200, as they measured back then. Currently, 5,400 metric tons of nitrogen fluorides are estimated to be in the atmosphere, and the amount of gas is increasing by about 11 percent per year. NF3 is 17,000 times more powerful at trapping heat than carbon dioxide and it’s one of the gases used during the manufacture of liquid crystal flat-panel displays, thin-film photovoltaic cells and microcircuits.

Basically, NF3 was used because engineers thought that only about 2 percent of the gas escapes in the atmosphere, therefore replacing the perfluorocarbons used before in these industries. Now, scientists strongly recommend adding nitrogen trifluoride to the list of greenhouse gases regulated by Kyoto, given the fact that its use is growing and its emission are not well known.