Mammoths to save the world?

[downbeatplumb]

As you probably know there is still lots of permafrost in the Arctic and underneath it there are large amounts of methane which is starting to get released more and more due to global warming. Methane is very potent greenhouse gas and there is more carbon in permafrost than is in the Earth’s atmosphere today, so once that gets released it's pretty much game over for most of humans. There will be droughts which means food shortage and so on.

Apparently in Russia, scientist Sergey Zimov, believes that re-populating the Arctic with herds of large herbivores is the world’s last hope to prevent disastrous permafrost melting and runaway climate change. He's already populated it with horses, bisons, muskox, moose and some other animals thus creating "Pleistocene Park". He also needs mammoths, because they knock down trees and help the grass grow, which is apparently better to preserve permafrost from not melting.

In any case does this sound desperate?

I would imagine Mammoths would fart a bit, so I'm not sure what the benefit would be.