NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 15: Scientists working at the premier Indian laboratory, the National Institute of Oceanography (NIO) in Goa, have found a hitherto unknown reservoir of a potent climate change gas, the nitrous oxide (commonly called the laughing gas), within the coastal waters off India in the Arabian Sea. The discovery could seriously dilute India's negotiating position in the discussions at sixth Conference of Parties being currently held at The Hague.According to the study by the NIO team, reported in the current issue of the prestigious British journal Nature, that fertilizer runoff into the Arabian Sea off the west coast of India (see graph) may be stimulating the production of nitrous oxide (laughing gas) and hydrogen sulphide. The hydrogen sulphide presence could badly affect the local fisheries industry.The phenomenon could have major implications for global climate if it becomes more widespread. Nitrous oxide is a potent greenhouse gas and some estimates suggest it is 200-300 times more potent than carbon dioxide, notorious for causing global warming.Experiments conducted over five cruises of Indian research vessels, Sagar Sampada and Sagar Kanya, show that post-monsoon 180,000 sq kms of the Arabian Sea becomes low in oxygen, leading to the death of bottom-living marine life.The team led by S.W.A. Naqvi reports that over the past three years there has been even less oxygen in this region, probably as a result of increased input of nutrients from human activities. This has been accompanied by the highest accumulations of nitrous oxide and hydrogen sulfide so far observed in open coastal waters.India has always argued that it need not cutback on its carbon emissions since the per capita emission of carbon dioxide from here is negligible in comparison to advanced countries like the US. But, this new find from Goa suggests that this mere 0.05 per cent of the world's ocean - totally off India - may be contributing a disproportionately huge amount of up to about 21 per cent of the global output of potent gas. This new report, once confirmed, could very well tilt the balance against India.A few years back, the National Physical Laboratory, New Delhi, had with great difficulty countered allegations from certain international agencies that the lowly Indian cow and paddy fields were to blame for the increased levels of methane, another potent climate change gas, in the atmosphere. At that point an accusing finger was pointed at India saying your per capita emission of carbon dioxide may be low but `Bharat' emits a far more potent climate change gas albeit methane. Indian atmospheric scientists had to undertake detailed studies to call this bluff from international scientists.The new finding is so significant that Nature has done an accompanying editorial on the same issue where in a leading climate change expert Hermann W. Bange of the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry, Germany takes a pot shot at the name of this potent molecule the `laughing gas' and says `in environmental terms, this may be no laughing matter'.It may be noted that it is rarely that India-based research papers ever get published in top international journals like Nature and Science. In fact this is the very first paper of the new millennium to find place in Nature from all of the 40 odd laboratories of the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR). CSIR Director General R.A. Mashelkar told The Indian Express that the team would be given a special grant of Rs 5 lakhs to undertake more research on the same topic since they had been able to get their work published in such a `top notch' publication. He however declined to comment on the global implications of the finding.On his part, the team leader for the research report, says their finding is `scientifically correct' and emphasises that only further detailed studies will reveal whether this increased production of `laughing gas' in the Arabian Sea is due to `natural reasons' or due to `man-made changes' taking place on the west coast of India.
