Another greenhouse input
News stories about new, unexpected inputs of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere as a result of global warming that will lead to more global warming are sadly coming more frequently. In this case, science has had another ‘golly gee’ moment over a study that indicates that there are massive methane deposits trapped beneath the (rapidly melting) polar ice sheets that could be rapidly released into the atmosphere and trigger catastrophic climate change. It seems to have done that earlier in Earth’s history:
An abrupt release of methane, a powerful greenhouse gas, from ice sheets that extended to Earth’s low latitudes some 635 million years ago caused a dramatic shift in climate, scientists funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) report in this week’s issue of the journal Nature.
Tags: climate change, global warming, greenhouse gases, methane
May 30th, 2008 at 9:07 pm
There’s much talk about the Tipping Point (where there’s no stopping the melting of ice around the entire planet) and that it is very near.
And knowing that there is nothing the human race will do to reverse any effects, whether we caused or contributed to them in any fashion, is sealing the fate of near generations.
While I can’t say whether we are solely responsible for what’s happening to our planet, the research shows that we are a huge contributor to it and the greed that goes along with doing nothing will be the death of many, many human beings. All for a few shiny things.
But hey, greed is good, right Mr. Reagan and all the fucking greedy free market will fix everything assholes in the world.
BTW, has anyone watched the documentary on Global Dimming? It’s fascinating! It’s 45 or so minutes well spent.
http://www.documentary-film.net/search/sample.php
May 31st, 2008 at 2:50 pm
This isn’t a particularly new revelation. Nature has been reporting on the methane clathrates for some time. I’ve been following the ongoing story, because it sounded scary as hell when I first heard about it.
This particular article has two new elements: first, painstaking measurement of relevant oxygen isotopes has shown that the methane release probably was the principal contributor to the rapid warming that ended “Snowball Earth”. Second, it was possible to measure the size of that release. The authors say that the amount released was an order of magnitude larger than all the methane clathrates currently locked up in the oceans.
Is it a concern? In a sense, yes, but it’s a more distant one. The methane at present is kept locked in its crystals by a combination of cold ocean temperatures, and water pressure. The crystals under lowest pressure would not release their methane until a temperature rise of at least six degrees C. None of the IPCC models expect that level of rise in the current century. And I haven’t run across a discussion of what temps we’d have to get to release the lion’s share of deposits, which lie at greater depths and are protected by higher pressures.
A more imminent, distinct problem is the methane bound up in permafrost. Its release could lead to some dramatic feedback and constitute a tipping point in this century. I am not aware that the IPCC has tried to model the consequences of that release. Could one consequence of permafrost methane release be this-century rise of six degrees or more? I don’t know, but if so then it really would be Nelly bar the door.
June 1st, 2008 at 5:56 am
Greenboy, I’m sorry, but I do science for a living and I find your repeated sneering at science’s “golly gee moments” really quite obnoxious.
Scientists *are* emotionally invested in these issues. But we couch them in very dispassionate terms because we don’t trust passion. It’s too easy to let one’s biases and inclinations run away with one’s reasoning, and it makes it easier for enemies of action on global warming to discredit us.
You may not like how we approach things, but it is the only way to do science and remain credible. It falls on activists to put our findings into the proper social context, and we trust that they will do so with the tools and information we provide.
June 1st, 2008 at 7:28 am
We are not responsible its the ones who (quite naturally – with the info avail at time it was the right decision) pushed for rapid adoption of oil-burning internal combustion engines and those who profit from the use of petroleum that are responsible (with further info it appears the former decisions were in toto a tragic mistake ). we have no power as individuals to change society’s practices. sadly all of us have physically benefited from the use of this energy source we need to stop but natural system feedback is possible and unknown so problem may be greater in scope than our actions all alone would have caused… but we know that it happens from time to time…that such feedback does exist….indeed it’s why we have so much difficulty in changing habits of consumption.. we need to disrupt those feedback loops that encourage us to continue grossly inefficient uses of energy resources and even more importantly the emissions concomitant thereto…
June 3rd, 2008 at 9:00 am
Luciftias, I’m actually a science buff. I’m guessing you are rather new to Needlenose and haven’t seen my various posts related to science issues over the last several years. I do admit I got a little snarky there, but my core point (which I have made repeatedly in prior posts on global warming) is that current global warming models and projections repeatedly underestimate the actual warming that is occurring, and that appears to be largely because of lots of unknown potential inputs (methane clathrates, soil bacteria, pollutant-driven changes in oceanic biosphere & chemistry) that contribute in positive feedback loops.
That deserves a little snark, I think, given the fact that over the last decade the models are consistently low-balled. Time for some more pessimistic elements based on systemic studies?
What do you do for a living (just curious)?
June 3rd, 2008 at 9:07 am
pt bridgeport, our old archive site is temporarily broken, but I did a previous (more detailed) post a few years back about the methane clathrates clustered around the rims of continental shelves. The studies I cited described the current warming of the oceans and cautioned that this was happening ‘faster than predicted.’ Since that methane is trapped by a combination of both heat and pressure, it is quite possible that a warming ocean could destabilize these deposits resulting in a rapid release of methane into the atmosphere.
What I hadn’t known before ( I don’t usually read Nature, just Sci Am) was that there were similar deposits of methane clathrates trapped under the polar ice sheets. That actually strikes me as a worse situation than the other deposits deep along the rims of the continental shelves, given the fact that the ice sheets seem to be rapidly collapsing. Sci Am had an article recently about the ice sheets in the Antarctic, how many of them sat atop liquid lakes, and how melt-water from the surface appears to be ‘drilling’ to the bottom of the sheets and lubricating and accelerating the flow of ice to the ocean.
Pretty *chilling* stuff.