Russian Scientist Discovers Giant Arctic Methane Plumes

thomst writes "Russian scientist Igor Semiletov of the International Arctic Research Centre at the University of Alaska Fairbanks revealed in an interview with The Independent that his team discovered 'powerful and impressive seeping structures (of Methane gas) more than 1,000 metres in diameter' during their survey of the Arctic Ocean earlier this year. 'I was most impressed by the sheer scale and the high density of the plumes. Over a relatively small area we found more than 100, but over a wider area there should be thousands of them,' Semiletov told The Independent's Steve Connor. This finding is important because methane is estimated to be 20 times as potent as carbon dioxide as a greenhouse gas, and it could indicate that global warming is about to accelerate dramatically."

Comments

Sorry!

[nullnick]

It was the dog!

Re:Sorry!

[flyneye]

In space, no one can hear you fart, but, in the arctic no one can blame it on you.

Methane emissions not tied to modern warming

[DamonHD]

In this case it seems that most of the methane is locked up far deeper than will be affected by rising temperatures for the foreseeable future.

http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2011/2011EO490014.shtml

So, not good, but maybe not as bad as appears at first blush, thankfully...

Rgds

Damon

Re:Methane emissions not tied to modern warming

[Anonymous Coward]

Hopefully they're right. This older review from Real Climate comes to the same conclusion.

But we'll know for sure one way or another in a couple of years, by watching the atmospheric methane concentrations
.

Re:Methane emissions not tied to modern warming

[Lumpy]

So why not tap it and burn it off? it's a shallow sea cant they drill and start sucking?

Re:Methane emissions not tied to modern warming

[tp1024]

If methane was a serious problem, the must have been a huge one at the end of the last ice age, when there was a lot more permafrost thawing up and releasing methane than there is even in existence today. Alas, it wasn't.

If methane was the harbinger of a climate apocalypse, the apocalypse should have happened long ago.

Re:Methane emissions not tied to modern warming

[alcarinque]

Wasn't something like this that caused one of the biggest extinctions ever? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permian%E2%80%93Triassic_extinction_event#Methane_hydrate_gasification

Re:Methane emissions not tied to modern warming

[Waffle Iron]

If methane was the harbinger of a climate apocalypse, the apocalypse should have happened long ago.

The end of the ice age involved melting through a mile-thick sheet of ice. Much of this pooled up behind a gargantuan ice dam, and when it broke loose, it scoured much of the western United States off the map in a cataclysmic torrent that flowed all the way to the Pacific Ocean. That's not a "climate apocalypse"?

Re:Methane emissions not tied to modern warming

[aurizon]

Temperate methane clathrates are deeper and stabilized by pressure in warmer water. The Arctic clathrates, as mentioned in this article, exist over huge land areas and were stabilized by temperature under permafrost and there is also a lot in the shallow of the arctic, also cold stabilized. Both the water based and tundra based clathrates are being released now. This is very ominous. Nothing we can do will prevent this - not even a total cessation of coal/oil/gas combustion - and we know how likely that is!
Part of the methane from millions of years of vegetative rotting on tundra and shallow seas was trapped in these clathrates. Large areas of tundra are also emitting methane the same way.

dig deeper here http://tinyurl.com/d64n5zb

Bill

Re:Methane emissions not tied to modern warming

[Culture20]

Spain was filled with moors in 750AD, but there's no indication they were gassier than other people.

Re:Methane emissions not tied to modern warming

[nadaou]

methane is a more potent ghg, but only really sticks around in the upper atm for 25 to 125 years before it breaks down to co2+h2o. co2 sticks around until the next epoch of mass vegetation.
cumulatively (if you integrate it wrt dt), co2 is still much worse, and methane is just delayed co2.

and yes, it is typically too diffuse to economically mine. but people are certainly willing to try.

the melting pt is around 4C, if the oceans at 1000m get up to that we hit the ghg positive feedback loop doomsday scenario.

fun times.

in this case I wonder if volcanic activity might be warming the earth below a patch.

Re:Methane emissions not tied to modern warming

[Waffle Iron]

That sounds fascinating. Please name the event it so we can google it.

Ok, it took me about 3 seconds on Google to find this page on the USGS website:

At the end of the last Ice Age, a finger of the Cordilleran ice sheet crept southward into the Idaho panhandle, forming a large ice dam that blocked the mouth of the Clark Fork River, creating a massive lake 2000 feet deep and containing more than 500 cubic miles of water. Glacial Lake Missoula stretched eastward for some 200 miles and contained more water than Lake Erie and Lake Ontario combined. When the highest of these ice dams failed, lake water burst through, shooting out at a rate 10 times the combined flow of all the rivers of the world.

This towering mass of water and ice literally shook the ground as it thundered toward the Pacific Ocean, stripping away hundreds of feet of soil and cutting deep canyons -- "coulees" -- into the underlying bedrock. With flood speeds approaching 65 miles per hour, the lake would have drained in as little as 48 hours.

Re:Methane emissions not tied to modern warming

[cusco]

These are clathrate deposits, frozen blocks of methane. It would take the equivalent of underwater strip mines to get at the stuff, and it's so unstable that it's almost impossible to handle safely. They've looked at mining clathrate deposits along the continental shelves, and even those paragons of environmental caution BP and Exxon decided it was unfeasible.

Re:Methane emissions not tied to modern warming

[Shotgun]

I watched a show where there was a lake in the mountains of Africa somewhere that was killing people. Vegetation fell in, sank to the bottom and decomposed. The lake was so deep that the resulting C02 stayed dissolved due to the pressure. But occasionally, the amount of C02 would get so high that it would start to bubble out of solution. When this happened, the bubbles would decrease the density of water above, allowing more C02 to bubble out. The result was a positive feedback mechanism that resulted in a cloud of C02 that would roll down the hill and kill entire villages.

The scientist's solution was to sink a pipe into the lake from a raft, then pump water out of the pipe. Once enough of the water was out of the pipe, there wasn't enough pressure to keep the C02 dissolved *in the pipe*. The water would spew out of the pipe like a warm Coca-Cola, and new C02 laden water would take its place at the bottom. With no energy input, they were able to slowly bleed off the C02 in a way that would not harm every animal around the lake.

The same technique could be used to "mine" this methane.

The next question

[sidthegeek]

Now, the next question would be whether it'd be profitable for anyone to access this methane. I wouldn't think so, seeing as oil rigs burn it off when drilling, but would this be different?

Re:The next question

[Joce640k]

Can these plumes be lit? Burning it would be cool (and reduce the overall greenhouse effect)

Re:The next question

[Joce640k]

The momentary heat would be nothing compared to having all that methane around for the next hundred years.

Re:The next question

[Anonymous Coward]

Drilling for methane hydrate deposits is one of the 'unconventional' energy resources that's had a lot of attention paid to it in the last while. I believe the Japanese, amongst several others, are paying a lot of attention to it as there are some big deposits off their coast.

However, the relative 'tightness' (poor quality) of the sediment its found in makes it difficult to extract. It's a completely different situation compared to a conventional gas reservoir.

Ironically enough, the poor quality and relative depth of the sediment could be the thing that stops this being as bad as some people think it could be.

Re:The next question

[Smidge204]

That link doesn't exist.

Methane has an atmospheric lifetime of about 12 years. However it is MUCH more effective at trapping heat than carbon dioxide, so over a 20 year period a ton of methane will cause the same amount of global warming as 72 tons of carbon dioxide. Consider that a ton of methane, burned, would produce about 3.7 tons of carbon dioxide, burning it is a valid approach to mitigating the impact on our climate.

Setting the plumes on fire is a big silly, though. We should trap the gas and use it to displace petroleum fuels.
=Smidge=

Re:The next question

[Smallpond]

Great plan! We have large quantities of a gas that causes global warming. So then you burn it an end up huge amounts of extra warm and a gas that causes a bit less warming.

methane absorbs 20 times as much IR as the water and CO2 that would result from burning it, so its probably a net win to burn it.

Why do scientists make these statements?

[Zondar]

""The concentration of atmospheric methane increased unto three times in the past two centuries from 0.7 parts per million to 1.7ppm, and in the Arctic to 1.9ppm. That's a huge increase, between two and three times,"

I'm OK with her statement, until this:

"...and this has never happened in the history of the planet," she added.

So there's data for the last 4+ BILLION years with 10-50 year precision so that over a 100-200 year timespan, she can measure the slope of the line (rate in rise over the run of time) precisely enough to say that the slope of the line over the last 200 years is steeper than it has been in any other 200 year period in the last 4 billion years? Sorry, but I find that hard to believe.

Re:Why do scientists make these statements?

[TheRaven64]

I'd believe most of what a scientist says to a journalist. I have more of a problem believing things that a journalist hears from a scientist...

Re:Why do scientists make these statements?

[zill]

with our current high period being an extended one

"Extended"? How about "off the charts"? The current ch4 concentration is 1745 ppbv, which is almost twice the peak on that chart.

and yes their are higher peeks

No, there hasn't been. This planet has not seen this much CO2 or methane in the past 400,000 years according to that graph.

Re:Why do scientists make these statements?

[Anonymous Coward]

What graph are you looking at? Cause the graph I'm looking at shows both CO2 levels and CH4 levels higher at about 125kya and 325kya.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Vostok_420ky_4curves_insolation.jpg

So this planet HAS seen this much or more CO2 and methane in the past 400,000 years according to that graph.

Re:Why do scientists make these statements?

[Lumpy]

Cthulhu... his farts of death! They existed 400,000 years ago.

Re:Why do scientists make these statements?

[stevelinton]

That chart is too coarse-grained, in the time dimension to show the recent very sharp peak. The CH4 peaks (including the "present" one) on that chart
are at about 0.7 ppm and the current level is about 1.7. Similarly, the CO2 peaks are at about 280 ppm and the current level is around 385.

Re:Why do scientists make these statements?

[zill]

That chart only covers the ice-core data, which doesn't include the past few hundred years. Google "CO2 ppmv" and "methane ppbv" and you'll see that the current levels are off the charts. I've even graphed it out for you here. Sorry about my shitty photoshop skills.

Re:Why do scientists make these statements?

[zill]

http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2008/20080423_methane.html

Re:Why do scientists make these statements?

[hairyfeet]

You ever see a bronto buddy? That's one big assed cow right there. you don't think having plant eaters the size of buildings didn't create some major stinkies? I bet that whole era smelt worse than the bean eating scene in Blazing Saddles!

As for TFA? Burn it, either capture and burn or just light it, since either method would be a net win on greenhouse effect and we are already developing plenty of ways to deal with carbon. you can store it, bury it, even feed it to algae and make fuel out of it, but methane is worse than carbon. The best method of course would be to burn it for electricity, if done right we could feed the carbon output to algae and then use it again to power vehicles but being in the arctic it may not be cost effective. better to get rid of it one way or another than let it go.

Re:Why do scientists make these statements?

[jlehtira]

You're right, that's obviously nonsense. We don't have such data. Further, it's been suggested that the Permian Extinction, killing (up to) 96% of all marine species and 70% of terrestrial vertebrates, was caused by a sudden release of methane. So there's indication that large increases did happen before, although there's no way of telling how fast.

Re:Why do scientists make these statements?

[thomst]

""The concentration of atmospheric methane increased unto three times in the past two centuries from 0.7 parts per million to 1.7ppm, and in the Arctic to 1.9ppm. That's a huge increase, between two and three times,"

I'm OK with her statement, until this:

"...and this has never happened in the history of the planet," she added.

So there's data for the last 4+ BILLION years with 10-50 year precision so that over a 100-200 year timespan, she can measure the slope of the line (rate in rise over the run of time) precisely enough to say that the slope of the line over the last 200 years is steeper than it has been in any other 200 year period in the last 4 billion years? Sorry, but I find that hard to believe.

I suspect she's talking about it having never previously happened in a span of just a couple of centuries.

A dramatic increase in atmospheric methane - triggered by a dramatic rise in atmospheric carbon dioxide? Now that's definitely happened before - at the end of the Permian Period. And it helped cause the Permian/Triassic extinction event, the largest species die-off since the Oxygen Catastrophe.

Oh great

[Guil Rarey]

Mega-giant civilization destroying hurricanes next. We're doomed.

when did it start?

[argStyopa]

Nothing I see in that article suggests that this is a new phenomenon...aside from the hyperbolic statements of the scientists.

The author is astonishingly remiss in not asking the obvious question: did this just start? It could be that such methane plumes have existed forever, we just never detected them. This is the EIGHTH such cruise/survey. They should be able to conclusively say "we checked this area in at least one or two previous instances and such seeps weren't observed", no?

It seems logical that there must have been plumes like this for a while, to prompt (and justify) such a large-scale survey.

Yet both the scientists and article author seem to gloss over the fact that "never seen before" != "never happened before".

Re:when did it start?

[wytcld]

Plumes have been seen before. This has been reported in other articles on this. However the plumes seen before were neither so large nor grouped so closely together.

Your painting the scientists as "hyperbolic" speakers establishes, what, that you know a big word and can use it correctly in a sentence? This should cause us to see you as smarter than research scientists with advanced degrees and many years of expeditions to gather evidence? Trust me, they have a far larger vocabulary than you do. Yet you are the one speaking hyperbolically. Now, what drives you to that?

It's not as if the waters where these were found were terra incognito - or mare incognito - the arctic has been peopled for thousands of years, particularly by the Russians, which is how they came to possess not just Siberia but Alaska. So when a Russian, in particular, says the like has not been seen before, that's someone reporting from a culture which has a good historical knowledge of what's been there to be seen. Sort of like getting a report on the normalcy or not of current tornadoes from someone with deep roots in Oklahoma.

Re:when did it start?

[c0lo]

Nothing I see in that article suggests that this is a new phenomenon...aside from the hyperbolic statements of the scientists.

Hmmmm... TFA...

The scale and volume of the methane release has astonished the head of the Russian research team who has been surveying the seabed of the East Siberian Arctic Shelf off northern Russia for nearly 20 years.

In an exclusive interview with The Independent, Igor Semiletov of the International Arctic Research Centre at the University of Alaska Fairbanks, who led the 8th joint US-Russia cruise of the East Siberian Arctic seas, said that he has never before witnessed the scale and force of the methane being released from beneath the Arctic seabed.

"Earlier we found torch-like structures like this but they were only tens of metres in diameter. This is the first time that we've found continuous, powerful and impressive seeping structures more than 1,000 metres in diameter. It's amazing," Dr Semiletov said.

So, 20 years of beating around the Arctics and seeing seepings of 10s m in diameter and, unlucky them, it is only recently that they found the larger ones... What are the chances? I mean, pretty hard luck to miss something that large and find only the smaller ones for 20 years... I wonder why the International Arctic Research Centre at the University of Alaska Fairbanks keeps such unlucky researchers on its payroll?

ka ching!

[sgt scrub]

This is a gold mine of resources. There are a lot of great things going on with methane studies, from fuel cells to low energy conversion methods.

Sen and postdoctoral associate Minren Lin announced a breakthrough. By dissolving a powder of rhodium chloride in water, along with carbon monoxide and oxygen, they had produced acetic acid from methane directly. The reaction took place at a relatively low temperature (100 degrees centigrade), required little energy, and left no environmentally harmful solvents to throw away. http://www.rps.psu.edu/sep98/methane.html

Colleagues of ours created a highly porous carbon-nitrogen polymer, which we realised had very similar structural motifs to the Periana catalyst,' Schüth says, 'so we wondered if we could incorporate platinum into the structure.
If the mixture is then pressurised in an autoclave with methane, the methane is consumed and methanol formed at conversion rates comparable to Periana-based systems but with the solid catalyst easily recoverable at the end of the reaction. http://www.rsc.org/chemistryworld/News/2009/August/10080902.asp

Re:Opportunities?

[ColdWetDog]

Perhaps (crazy talk around here, I know) the free market might be able to do something about this now apparently abundant resource?

Natural gas (methane and others) is currently being flared off hundreds of drilling rigs because it's not 'economical' (ie, the free market can't figure out how to do it). Now, that is in a place with drilling rigs and other infrastructure and "all" they need to do is collect the stuff, stick it in a pipe and send it to market.

At current natural gas prices, it's a no-go.

Now, lets take a diffuse, dilute methane torch, perhaps 20 meters in diameter. This particular deposit, like the others found, is in Northern Siberia, and in fact, off the coast of Northern Siberia. A place not noted for high concentrations of industrial infrastructure. So, you have to drag everything needed to collect and process the gas to the middle of nowhere. That's rather expensive.

Nope, your happy little 'free market' isn't going to solve this particular problem.