"Methane Burps": Massive attack of planetary indigestion looming?

[Filius Nullius]

As scary as worldwide signs of melting glaciers certainly are, they pale in comparison with the possibility that we will reach the point where large volumes of clathrates (methane hydrates) frozen in the arctic tundra and in undersea deposits suddenly begin to melt in massive quantities and produce so-called "methane burps." Al Gore warned of this in his 1993 book Earth in the Balance, and no one listened. However, when we have scientists telling us that the arctic polar ice has thinned 40% over the last two decades, that there may be no glaciers left anywhere on Earth by the end of this century and that the fabled "Northwest Passage" from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific (of which explorers like Henry Hudson once dreamed and for which they repeatedly searched in vain) may become a permanent reality within as little as a few more decades, it is time we all started listening.

A possible consequence of such a cataclysmic event is no less than a massive die-off of species, which is quite likely to include us. Even if things do not go quite that far, massive loss of human life would almost certainly occur.

Methane (CH4) is a greenhouse gas that has many times as powerful an effect in warming the earth's atmosphere as does carbon dioxide (CO2). Normally, methane is kept in check by negative feedback loops or methane "sinks" that exert a dampening effect. Probably the most potent of these are when methane becomes dissolved in ocean water and is oxydized to CO2 through several intermediate steps or freezes in combination with water in cold regions to produce methane hydrates.

The earth seems to be able to accomodate normal quantities of methane entering and leaving the atmosphere, but many scientists have expressed concern over the possibility that a positive feedback loop may take over if larger amounts of methane begin entering the atmosphere that can be cycled out by methane sinks. The analogy is sometimes used to a car heater's thermostat. Under normal conditions, when the car becomes too cold, the lower set point of the thermostat will turn on the heater and warm the interior until the temperature reaches the upper set point, at which time the thermostat turns the heat off. However, If you switch the terminals of the thermostat, the heater stays off until the interior air is heated to the upper set point, which causes the heater to come on and stay on. Then the heater runs out of of control and heats the car to an unbearable, and likely lethal, extent.

In a similar manner, global warming due to increased concentrations of CO2, methane and other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere has the potential to cause temperatures in arctic regions to reach the point where large volumes of methane begin to melt. Then, the methane, which has 30 times the heat-trapping ability of CO2 and is estimated to be 20 to 21 times as potent a greenhouse gas overall as CO2, will likely cause the arctic temperatures to rise faster and melt more CH4, which will cause the temperature to rise even faster. The temperature ultimately runs out of control.

This is, in fact, what scientists think occurred on Venus and Mars and is why their atmospheres are so inhospitable to life. It is also believed to have happened more than once on the Earth, most famously at the end of the Permian age, when a mass extinction believed to have been caused by an enormous increase in atmospheric CH4 and CO2 concentrations wiped out as much as 80 percent of all species on the planet (including up to 95 percent of all marine species) and almost snuffed out animal life completely. <http://archives.cnn.com/2000/NATURE/07/27/ocean.methane... >; <http://palaeo.gly.bris.ac.uk/Essays/wipeout/default.htm... >; <http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/3451787.stm >.

Scientists differ on just how likely this is to occur. However, even if the probability is relatively low, as some believe, the effects if it does happen are so drastic and irreversible (at least on any human time scale), that we really cannot afford to risk such an occurance. We are almost certainly not going to get a "do over" or even be able to stop it if such a "runaway greenhouse effect" does, in fact, occur.

This is perhaps the strongest reason of all why we need to convert to a renewable fuels economy right away. For example, we can use solar, wind and geothermal energy to generate the electricity needed to use "reverse fuel cells" to convert water into hydrogen gas (H2), with oxygen (O2) as a byproduct. We then use fuel cells in our vehicles to combine the hydrogen with atmospheric oxygen to produce energy to drive the automobiles, with water as the only byproduct. By doing this, we will begin to slow down the rate at which a major source of CO2 enters the atmosphere, which will, in turn, slow the rate at which CH4 is produced from methane hydrates.

Similarly, by using solar towers, PV panels, passive solar collectors, wind turbines and geothermal generating plants to produce much higher portions of our other electical generating needs, we will begin to stop our current dependence on coal as our largest source of electrical energy and put an even greater dent in the rate at which greenhouse gases are increasing in the atmosphere. If we work long enough and hard enough at it, we may even stop or reverse the trend toward higher and higher levels of atmospheric greenhouse gases.

The problem is that we do not have time to allow the electrical utilities in the U.S. to continue burn up all of the available coal before making the switch. There is a very strong possibility that, in so doing, they will cause global concentrations of greenhouse gases to go beynd the tipping point and cause an irreversible catastrophe.

According to John Atcheson, a geologist who has held a variety of government policy positions and who wrote on this subject in the December 15, 2004 edition of the Baltimore Sun:

"The Arctic Council's recent report on the effects of global warming in the far north paints a grim picture: global floods, extinction of polar bears and other marine mammals, collapsed fisheries. But it ignored a ticking time bomb buried in the Arctic tundra.

"There are enormous quantities of naturally occurring greenhouse gasses trapped in ice-like structures in the cold northern muds and at the bottom of the seas. These ices, called clathrates, contain 3,000 times as much methane as is in the atmosphere. Methane is more than 20 times as strong a greenhouse gas as carbon dioxide.

"Now here's the scary part. A temperature increase of merely a few degrees would cause these gases to volatilize and "burp" into the atmosphere, which would further raise temperatures, which would release yet more methane, heating the Earth and seas further, and so on. There's 400 gigatons of methane locked in the frozen arctic tundra - enough to start this chain reaction - and the kind of warming the Arctic Council predicts is sufficient to melt the clathrates and release these greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.

"Once triggered, this cycle could result in runaway global warming the likes of which even the most pessimistic doomsayers aren't talking about.

"An apocalyptic fantasy concocted by hysterical environmentalists? Unfortunately, no. Strong geologic evidence suggests something similar has happened at least twice before.

"The most recent of these catastrophes occurred about 55 million years ago in what geologists call the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM), when methane burps caused rapid warming and massive die-offs, disrupting the climate for more than 100,000 years.

"The granddaddy of these catastrophes occurred 251 million years ago, at the end of the Permian period, when a series of methane burps came close to wiping out all life on Earth.

....

"If we trigger this runaway release of methane, there's no turning back. No do-overs. Once it starts, it's likely to play out all the way.

"Humans appear to be capable of emitting carbon dioxide in quantities comparable to the volcanic activity that started these chain reactions. According to the U.S. Geological Survey, burning fossil fuels releases more than 150 times the amount of carbon dioxide emitted by volcanoes - the equivalent of nearly 17,000 additional volcanoes the size of Hawaii's Kilauea.

"And that is the time bomb the Arctic Council ignored.

"How likely is it that humans will cause methane burps by burning fossil fuels? No one knows. But it is somewhere between possible and likely at this point, and it becomes more likely with each passing year that we fail to act.

"So forget rising sea levels, melting ice caps, more intense storms, more floods, destruction of habitats and the extinction of polar bears. Forget warnings that global warming might turn some of the world's major agricultural areas into deserts and increase the range of tropical diseases, even though this is the stuff we're pretty sure will happen.

"Instead, let's just get with the Bush administration's policy of pre-emption. We can't afford to have the first sign of a failed energy policy be the mass extinction of life on Earth. We have to act now."

<http://www.newmediaexplorer.org/sepp/2005/02/01/global_... >.

[whistle]

1. Arctic bogs on fire, uhmmmmm

[Coastie for Truth]

2. Before losing too much sleep, one should read

Anthony Evans' "An Introduction to Economic Geology and Its Environmental Impact" or a simple introduction to geologist for intelligent non-geologists (as opposed to "dummies"). Evans has several pages of a good and readable discussion of methane hydrate.

[Ganja Ninja]

3. Face it we're doomed.

It's not likely we're going to cut back on co2 emissions anytime soon. So unless some other massive die off occurs like a war or a runaway disease outbreak we're done for.

[orwell]

4. Thanks

Thanks for the post.

What always strikes me as strange is the lack of conservative principles when it comes to resource conservation itself. Any investor understands the concept of gambler's ruin - "betting the farm" when there exists some real possibility of complete loss of capital. That is what is behind the notion of portfolio diversification.

Why then are many Cons "betting the farm" on denial of even the possibility of global warming and the attendant threat it represents to the biosphere? The conservative position should be that the proportionally small costs associated with things such as raising CAFE standards are at the very least the beginnings of a prudent insurance policy.

[NNadir]

5. I am amused.

I am always amused when solar hype types talk about global climate change. They post all kinds of links on the subject, lecture us self-seriously, and then go on to tell us about some 500 MW installation that will be available in twenty years, if it in fact it is available ever.

This is like a member of the Bush administration talking about "healthy forests," or "democracy" or some other doublespeak pablum that is more remarkable for what it pretends than for what it does.

Global climate change is a reality, but there are very, very, very few people with the courage to confront that reality in any practical way...

This emergency isn't some day when a nine trillion dollar solar collector is built on the moon. This is NOW.

[Filius Nullius]

6. I am confused

Hmmm. "Solar hype type." This is obviously intended as a devastating putdown, but I am not sure I understand why you felt the need. I do believe we may be in much deeper shit with regard to global warming than we, as a society, seem to realize. I also believe that we should have stopped using fossil fuels 30 years ago and that we may be running out of time and energy resources to convert to a renewable-energy economy. However, I'm certainly not selling anything. I don't own any patents on any R-E technology, sell anyone else's R-E equipment or own stock in any R-E companies.

If your ire is directed at my previous posts regarding the solar tower proposal, I'm not saying it is the only thing we should be doing, by any means. We should also be working on hydrogen, PV, passive solar collectors, wind farms, biomass, geothermal and a host of other things. Nevertheless, I would very much like to see a solar tower built in order to see if it works as well as some believe it will.

You obviously have a different agenda. What is it?

[NNadir]

7. My agenda:

It is quite simple: To stop the deterioration of the global climate crisis by practical developed immediately available means.

To do this, I believe that it is absolutely essential to begin building nuclear power plants at a breakneck pace worldwide, a pace comparable to the pace in Japan, China, and India, even larger.

Now, in general, I support solar energy research, and practical solar power that is readily available, such as wind power. However, I am very angry and dismissive of renewable energy advocates who pretend that the world has time for their Rube Goldberg Schemes to replace coal. It doesn't.

The reason I morally despise solar hype types is that they are too poorly educated to recognize that nuclear energy is the safest form of energy known. They also seem to be incapable of understanding a few basic realities of which the following is a much abbreviated partial list:

1) Few of them understand that hydrogen is NOT a form of energy for instance; it is a manufactured product which is often manufactured at tremendous environmental cost.

2) Few of them understand that the world's largest and most deadly form of energy use involves the use of biomass. The forests of Nepal have disappeared from such use. The high tech rube goldberg schemes involving intensive industrial farming, irrigation, etc, etc, are NOT sustainable. They are in fact, petroleum dependent.

3) If renewable energy was practical alternative, it would be being built at a scale that represents a comparable scale to other capacity being built.

I don't own any nuclear stocks, though I plan to buy some when I get rich, as I expect to do in the next several years because of some technology I'll be exploiting.

I do not hold any nuclear patents, although I will be writing one in a few years, if I am able to retire and focus on practical matters.

My real big problem with solar hype types is that they are trying to prevent my children's future. In fact, they are trying to kill my children, all because they despise education and thinking.

I have yet to meet one solar hype type who can show me a plan that can be completed within 20 years representing a non-GHG replacement of even 20% of the world's coal capacity. This may have something to do with the fact that people actually don't give a fuck about coal. They are instead obsessed with the supposed "dangers" of nuclear power, even though when you ask them, they cannot produce a single person killed by a nuclear power plant in the United States, a single person killed by exposure to so called "dangerous nuclear waste," etc, etc.

There are no solar power towers. There are no cities in the world powered by PV power. There are some wind farms, and they are a help, but attempting to stop nuclear energy is immoral, because it is now producing about 20% of the world's energy and it is the only form of energy available on that scale that does not contribute massively to global climate change.

[Filius Nullius]

8. Wow! A lot of venom

directed at people who are seeking in good faith for solutions to the world's energy and environmental problems. With nuclear energy, safety is not the only issue, although it is a biggie. Part of my problem with it is the question of generational equity. With one of the byproducts, plutonium, being one of the most toxic substances known to man and having a half life of 24,000 years, it will have to be safely sequestered and guarded from terrorists for hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of years. What civilization do you know that has lasted more than a few thousand years? Of course, the world record holder is ancient Egypt, and even it experienced numerous regime changes involving the creation of entirely new dynasties, so there actually was no continuity. Is it really fair to saddle future generations with the burden of guarding our spent nuclear fuel? Actually, I feel that it is just as immoral as burning up all of the world's supply of fossil fuels.

Another problem is that no one wants the spent fuel to be stored in their neighborhood. Are you willing for it to be buried down the road from you? Even if it can be stored safely for a while so that you and your kids and grandkids can sleep safely for your lifetimes, what happens if cracks develop a few thousand years from now or an earthquake causes a rupture and radioactive material contaminates ground water? How do you fix that? The answer is, you can't. No, the dangers of nuclear energy are just too great to do an about face and begin traveling down that road again.

On the subject of the lack of progress with renewable fuels, part of the reason for that is that the grants and tax incentives that have been given to renewables -- when, indeed, there have been any at all -- have been truly paltry. Instead of offering tax incentives and grants for nuclear energy, we need to ramp up and offer major inducements to start installing PV panels and passive solar systems in buildings, converting to hydrogen and biomass fuels and building wind farms, geothermal generating plants, and, yes, solar towers, "at breakneck pace worldwide." And, oh yes, we have to do something to get our borders under control so that we can stabilize our population.

Incidentally, on the subject of solar towers, EnviroMission, Ltd. of Australia recently announced on its Web site, "Inroads with power station scale, capacity and capital cost are set to boost the commercial case for Solar Tower development using enhancements found to significantly reduce the footprint and tower height whilst increasing output and carbon abatement by more than 40%." <http://www.enviromission.com.au/index1.htm> Nevertheless, as I have said, solar towers are not the total solution, just one of many arrows in our quiver.

By the way, how will you replace gasoline and diesel fuel? I am sure you are not advocating a mini nuclear reactor for every vehicle. Are you against generating hydrogen from water using reverse fuel cells and electricity from renewable energy sources?