Signs of Runaway Greenhouse Effects Happening Now?

international | environment | other press

Monday January 08, 2007 19:18

by Terence

Methane escaping from Ocean Floors

According to thelong running Wayne Madsen website, who is a former intelligence officer in the US, there are reports from captains of tankers which would have methane sensors onboard due to their cargo, that there has been an increase in alarms going off on these sensors and that it is in fact not caused by their cargo, but Methane gas escaping or bubbling up from the Ocean floor especially along the Hudson Submarine Canyon over the eastern USA.

Methane as many know, while having a shorter half-life in the atmosphere than CO-2, is a much more potent greenhouse gas. Over the past few decades, ocean scientists had discovered that many areas of the deep ocean floor contained significant deposits of what are known as Methane Hydrates. At the cold temperatures of the deep ocean which are typically 4 deg celsius (also corresponds to temperate at which water achieves maximum density), the methane hydrates exist in a complex methane-water crystal structure. It seems it is these that may be releasing the gas, if these reports can be confirmed.

Apparently the deposits of these hydrates globally are very large and have even been entertained as a future alternative to oil & gas which of course is a mad idea, considering how much warming there is already. However concern has often been raised but never taken too seriously that significant amounts of this gas could be released if there was a temperature increase leading to a surge in atmospheric methane and thus creating a potent postive feedback loop.

In many ways, this report is similar to the way the Chernobyl accident was initially discovered in Western Europe when returning nuclear workers were returning to work at Swedish Nuclear power stations and the radiation sensors picked up the increased radioactivity except it was coming from outside. In this scenario it seems the sensors on board the tankers installed for safety are picking up emissions from the environment.

Here's some extract from the report found at the URL below.

January 8, 2007 -- The environmental "surge" you're not hearing anything about.

According to U.S. maritime industry sources, tanker captains are reporting an increase in onboard alarms from hazard sensors designed to detect hydrocarbon gas leaks and, specifically, methane leaks. However, the leaks are not emanating from cargo holds or pump rooms but from continental shelves venting increasing amounts of trapped methane into the atmosphere. With rising ocean temperatures, methane is increasingly escaping from deep ocean floors. Methane is also 21 more times capable of trapping heat in the atmosphere than carbon dioxide.

In fact, one of the major sources for increased methane venting is the Hudson Submarine Canyon, which extends into the Atlantic 400 miles from the New York-New Jersey harbor. Another location experiencing increased venting is the Santa Barbara Channel on the California coast.

Ideally this report needs to be confirmed but if true, represent something that needs close investigation.

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Comments (4 of 4)

recent gas smell in new york ..!

by jm

Mon Jan 08, 2007 19:37

reuters.com, Mon Jan 8, 2007 10:12am ET, "NY gas smell shuts trains, forces evacuations"
.. could be a mains leak, or ...

More reports hinting at Climate positive feedback. Methane releases

Tue Feb 06, 2007 11:05

Here's 3 reports that hint at the possibility that positive feedbacks to the Climate may be kicking in, but one should be aware that these are all initial reports and will require a lot more measurements to quantity the figures correctly.

The first report: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/09/0609071028...8.htm
"Greenhouse Gas Bubbling From Melting Permafrost Feeds Climate Warming" discusses findings published in the science journal Nature last Sept...

.. has found that as the permafrost melts in North Siberia due to climate change, carbon sequestered and buried there since the Pleistocene era is bubbling up to the surface of Siberian thaw lakes and into the atmosphere as methane, a greenhouse gas 20 times more potent than carbon dioxide.

In turn, that bubbling methane held captive as carbon under the permafrost for more than 40,000 years is accelerating global warming by heating the Earth even more --- exacerbating the entire cycle. The ominous implications of the process grow as the permafrost decomposes further and the resulting lakes continue to expand, according to FSU oceanography Professor Jeff Chanton and study co-authors at the University of Alaska-Fairbanks.

The second report covers events in Siberia: Methane Flux From Arctic Tundras: It's The Hydrology, Stupid! at http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/04/0604042003...8.htm
... and basically outlines how the permafrost in the tundra which is beginning to melt is both absorb and release CO-2, and in areas that are flooded, it releases methane. There seems to be some indications that the flooded areas of which there is quite a bit, because there are big rivers there and it is very flat, are net greenhouse gas emitters whereas the dryers areas tend to be net absorbers....

And finally in this audio report: Bubbling Methane in the Beaufort http://radio.cbc.ca/programs/quirks/media/2006-2007/mp3...e.mp3

...discusses the discovery of methane bubbling up from probably methane hydrates in the Beaufort Sea in the Arctic. This is only a recent discovery and seems to have occured because of an influx of slightly warmer water along the sea-bed, warming the hydrates.....

It is from this page: http://radio.cbc.ca/programs/quirks/archives/06-07/jan2....html and originally reported from here: http://www.energybulletin.net/25628.html

The common factor in all of these findings are that they are potentially quite strong positive feedback mechanisms and whilst they have been thought about amongst scientists over the years, it was expected that these sort of effects would kick in much later. As with the fairly rapid increase in the rate of melting of the Greenland ice-pack, these events have caught the scientific community by surprise for the speed at which they have begun. It would seem that the intensity of the rapid rise of greenhouse gases and other changes in such geologically short times (~200 yrs or so) means that this spike is much more rapid than previous times for which past records -as in ice cores are available. So it is possible the mechanisms at play both positive and negative are interacting a little bit different than before.

fascinating..

by Jasper

Tue Feb 06, 2007 11:32

Livestock are responsible for 18% of global methane emissions!

boring

by anon

Tue Feb 06, 2007 18:09

jasper please tell us something we don't know

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Signs of Runaway Greenhouse Effects Happening Now?

Comments (4 of 4)