Recently, I learned about about a Thom Hartmann YouTube about extinction but it is long on hysterics and week on content. Not to dismiss the methane hydrate/permafrost hypothesis but Thom's piece was more "set your hair on fire, we're all going to die." Still, I wondered about satellite surveys and eventually found: Methane concentration levels in 3D by MethaneTracker.org There is a lot of unexplored stuff but some interesting comments about rapid methane oxidation suggesting the half-life is shorter than previously reported. That does not mean methane is 'not so bad' as it simply becomes CO{2} sooner rather than later. But it makes a lot more sense even if methane is a more effective greenhouse gas. Of all the various extinction scenarios, a rapid release of methane hydrates is the one I find most plausible. So I'll be looking for papers and especially field work in this area. Feel free to recommend sources. Thanks, Bob Wilson
The best way to remove the possible tipping point of these frozen methane reserves is to harvest them. Big oil is already looking into this World’s first methane hydrate mining to begin off central Japan coast - The Japan Daily Press Governments should encourage their harvest. One thing the US and Canadian governments could do would be to exact a coal tax, to make sure inexpensive coal was not a risk to price to mining these deposits. A tax of $50/ton would probably do the trick.
Methane harvest on the appropriate scale in rigorous environments is not necessarily a simple activity. If the Japan demonstration project is highly successful first, then we can talk. Soil methane and marine hydrates are not the same thing. The former, released from very carbon-rich soils, seems to depend mostly on the depth the water-saturated soil. In observational studies, that can be quite variable so a wide range of results occur. This provides great opportunities for affinity websites of either 'pole' to selectively cite, and...well it just goes downhill from there. Once methane gets into the air, its rate of conversion to CO2 is largely controlled by the concentration of hydroxyl radical. That little pixie is so 'dilute' and short-lived that it cannot (yet) be directly measured. A 24-yr methane lifetime is not something that could be assured if release rates increase a lot. Overall I find future methane concentrations highly difficult to predict. From that starting point it is very difficult to become enthusiastic about 'extract baby extract'.
In jest, my first thought was, 'Did the Russians lose another submarine?' . . . 'Or the Chinese?'. Bob Wilson
With all the discussions of Miller's Methuselah Moss, I wiggled into the Geophysical Research Letters website to get my own pdf. Not wishing to let that effort go to waste, I looked around a bit for other interesting items. One I found from 2008 concerns methane release from permafrost soils. For brevity I will describe it only as doi:10.1029/2008GL033639 They used mainstream models of air-T release rates. They used their own local expertise to consider methane release, including from heat generated by microbes in the soils. This is elsewhere referred to as 'the compost bomb'. It doesn't get any more lurid than that Anyway, they suggest that 21st century should not have large methane releases. However, if the modeled air-T trends were to continue, the 23rd century would have large methane releases. By large I mean LARGE. Not the sort of thing you'd like to see happen to your favorite planet. While I am happy they did the work and happy to mention it here, there are several reasons not to panic. First, you and several generations of heirs will be dead by then. Second, to get the arctic that warm would require large, sustained CO2 injections. I don't see it could happen from coal and oil. Maybe marine harvest of methane hydrate could swing it. Third, with CO2 that high, breathing humans would be more or less anaesthesized. Fourth, sea level would also be +several meters, and all our dandy coastal infrastructure would be underwater. In short, I don't think it makes much sense to run out models for 100s of years. But I am consoled that these permafrost experts expect the permafrost C to 'hold' during this century. It is an important century, during which very important 'planet-level' decisions will be made. I call this study good news, and report such here when they cross my desk.
I continue to hijack this thread. While the above suggests most cold soils can 'hold methane', the arctic coastal soils are in retreat. To what extent this may relate to arctic sea-ice loss, I can't tell you. But I want you to know of the Gunther group Thawing permafrost: The speed of coastal erosion in Eastern Siberia has nearly doubled I see it in this way. When arctic sea ice comes to the shore, then the soils are stable. Else, they are not. How big this is won't be seen until arctic summer returns.
Good find! I would add that loss of surface ice in the Arctic has also increased the magnitude and frequency of wave action. This would accelerate the shore loss. During the recent Stena Polaris transit of the NorthEastern passage, the days of ice were calm. Soon as the got into open water, the waves came and after they entered the Bering Sea, whoa boy! Bob Wilson
