EnviroLink Forum

http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic ... or_methane

Certainly coming much sooner that expected............from the article:
"While it’s no ice-nine, a frozen form of methane trapped in ocean sediments could be cause for concern. Warm Gulf Stream waters off the east coast of North America are converting large amounts of the substance into methane gas, which could lead to underwater landslides and influence global climate.

A good portion of the biological carbon on Earth is stored in the seafloor as methane hydrate, a frozen mixture of methane and water formed at high pressure and low temperature. Changes in the temperature or direction of the Gulf Stream, which carries warm water north from the Gulf of Mexico, have heated sediments in a strip along the North Atlantic seafloor by 8 degrees Celsius, unlocking 2.5 billion metric tons of methane from deep-sea caches, scientists report in the Oct. 25 Nature."
It must also be noted that these methane hydrate deposits at lower levels and colder are still subject to rapid releases from landslides above. It takes only a few pounds of mechanical pressure to cause it to fizz out. All it takes in temperature is an increase of 1*C to fizz out.
Also, doing the math on the warming effect of these releases, at 25 times the warming effects of CO2 that is like 25 times 2.5 gigatons or 62.5 GT equivalent of CO2. Last year humans released 26.4 GT of CO2. In 15 years the methane breaks down into water vapor and CO2.

_________________
"With every decision, think seven generations ahead of the consequences of your actions" Ute rule of life.
“We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors; we borrow it from our children”― Chief Seattle
“Those Who Have the Privilege to Know Have the Duty to Act”…Albert Einstein

_________________
Potato chip enthusiast.

California is NOT where the Gulf Stream is, Milt.
I hope it IS just sensationalistic and most just dissolved into the water, but over 1*C causes methane hydrate to more than just slowly fizz and dissolve. It violently releases all the way to the surface. I wonder how the certain spots of the Gulf Stream could have warmed a full 8*C. Seems impossible for another half a millennium.

_________________
"With every decision, think seven generations ahead of the consequences of your actions" Ute rule of life.
“We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors; we borrow it from our children”― Chief Seattle
“Those Who Have the Privilege to Know Have the Duty to Act”…Albert Einstein

From the article:
"This is the first study to suggest that methane hydrate melting is related to ocean currents themselves, says study coauthor Benjamin Phrampus, an Earth scientist at Southern Methodist University in Dallas. Previous studies suggested that the global ocean temperature would have to increase to cause hydrate breakdown, which would take a very huge input of energy, he says. “We don’t need this large amount of energy to explain this. It’s simply a change in the ocean currents.”

The main thing is this makes AGW worse and with it the tipping points of tundra methane releases, open ocean warming, and oceanic self releases of methane. Do we even have until 2020 to reduce emissions 90% to prevent thermageddon between 2300 and 3500AD?

_________________
"With every decision, think seven generations ahead of the consequences of your actions" Ute rule of life.
“We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors; we borrow it from our children”― Chief Seattle
“Those Who Have the Privilege to Know Have the Duty to Act”…Albert Einstein