How much time is there left to act?

How much time is there left to act, before methane hydrate releases will lead to human extinction? 

by Malcolm Light, edited by Sam Carana

 

Figure 1 below looks at the temperature impact of abrupt methane releases, as measured in 2010 in Svalbard (above image). Such emissions are typically triggered by disruption of the integrity of the hydrates holding the methane.

As the red line on the graph indicates, these emissions would raise local temperatures significantly, in a matter of months, since methane has a strong greenhouse effect.

At the time, the rapid increase in methane levels alarmed scientists around the world, but NASA now regards these releases merely as a local peak event that had little impact on overall global temperatures. Even so, the Svalbard event is indicative of the local temperature impact of such emissions.

The IPCC estimates the temperature change at 2090-2099 (relative to 1980-1999) at between 1.8°C (likely range: 1.1°C to 2.9°C) and 4.0°C (likely range: 2.4°C to 6.4°C), depending on the chosen scenario.

There are several ways to project how much temperatures will rise in future. The chart below shows the global temperature rise from 1980 to 2011, using the most recent NASA data. Clearly, a simple linear extension of this trend would not suffice, as it would ignore the many feedback effects accelerating the rise.

The worst-case IPCC scenario projects a mean temperature rise that would take average global temperature beyond 20 degrees Celsius this century, an obviously catastrophic scenario. Yet, the IPCC scenarios fail to include the many feedbacks that accelerate temperature rises, such as large abrupt releases from methane hydrates. In fact, the IPCC miserably failed to warn about the dramatic loss of Arctic sea ice, as pictured on the chart below, by Wipneus based on PIOMAS data.

Mid-point IPCC projections have been incorporated in Figure 2 below for reference. The diagram also incorporates the warming impact of large methane releases, triggered by a scenario based on the data from Svalbard and by the impact of increased seismic activity in the Arctic. 

Above updated global warming extinction diagram was produced using new information from the ice cap melting curve and the measured Svalbard methane concentrations (NOAA 2011a). 

While the gradients were calculated in a different way, taking account of existing Arctic temperatures, the result is almost identical to the earlier version. Furthermore, methane would only require to have a global warming potential of 43.5 over 50 years duration (Figure 2, duration from Carana 2011g) to achieve this high temperature increase in the Arctic.  The Arctic ice cap heating curves lag behind the expected Arctic atmospheric temperature curves by some 10 to 20 years over the defined extinction period which is probably a result of the extra energy needed for  the latent heat of melting of ice as the permafrost, Greenland and Antarctic ice caps melt away (Figure 2).

It is perfectly clear from the graphs that the methane build up in the Arctic is mainly a result of increasing earthquake activity along the Gakkel Ridge caused by global warming induced worldwide expansion of the Earth’s crust due to the carbon dioxide buildup in the atmosphere which is enhanced by the heating up of the Arctic ocean due to the high global warming potential of the methane (Light 2011). This close relationship between the Gakkel Ridge earthquake activity, the destabilisation of the Arctic methane hydrates and the NASA GISS surface temperature anomalies has already been clearly demonstrated (Carana, 2011b; Light 2011).

If I was a medical doctor I would say that the patient has a terminal illness and is expected to die of an extreme fever between 2038 and 2050. There are three actions that have to be taken immediately by world governments, if there is any faint hope of preventing the final excruciating stages of death the human race will be forced to live through as we are all boiled like lobsters.

1. Developed (and some developing) countries must cut back their carbon dioxide emissions by a very large percentage (50% to 90%) by 2020 to immediately precipitate a cooling of the Earth and its crust. If this is not done the earthquake frequency and methane emissions in the Arctic will continue to  grow exponentially leading to our inexorable demise in 2038 to 2050. 
    
2. Geoengineering must be used immediately as a cooling method in the Arctic to counteract the effects of the methane buildup in the short term. However, these methods will lead to further pollution of the atmosphere in the long term and will not solve the earthquake induced  Arctic methane buildup which is going to lead to our annihilation. 
    
3. The United States and Russia must immediately develop a net of powerful radio beam frequency transmission stations around the Arctic using the critical 13.56 MHZ  beat frequency to break down the methane in the stratosphere and troposphere to nanodiamonds and hydrogen (Light 2011a) . Besides the elimination of the high global warming potential methane, the nanodiamonds may form seeds for light reflecting noctilucent clouds in the stratosphere and a light coloured energy reflecting layer when brought down to the Earth by snow and rain (Light 2011a). HAARP transmission systems are able to electronically vibrate the strong ionospheric electric current that feeds down into the polar areas and are thus the least evasive method of  directly eliminating the buildup of methane in those critical regions (Light 2011a).

References

IPCC Fourth Assessment Report on Climate Change 2007 - temperature rise projections
ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/wg1/en/spmsspm-projections-of.html

NASA global temperature data
data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/tabledata_v3/GLB.Ts.txt

Arctic Sea Ice yearly minimum volume, with trendline added by Wipneus, based on data by
Polar Science Center | Applied Physics Laboratory | University of Washington (2011) http://psc.apl.washington.edu/wordpress/research/projects/arctic-sea-ice-volume-anomaly/

Carana, S. (2011b), Light M.P.R. and Carana, S. (2011c)
Methane linked to seismic activity in the Arctic
arctic-news.blogspot.com/p/seismic-activity.html

Light M.P.R. (2011), Edited by Sam Carana
Use of beamed interfering radio frequency transmissions to decompose Arctic atmospheric methane clouds
arctic-news.blogspot.com/p/decomposing-atmospheric-methane.html

Carana, S. (2011g)
Runaway Global Warming
geo-engineering.blogspot.com/2011/04/runaway-global-warming.html

Hansen, J.E. (2011)
GISS Surface Temperature Analysis. NASA. Goddard Institute for Space Physics
data.giss.nasa.gov/cgibin/gistemp/do_nmap.py?year_last=2011&month_last=08&sat=4&sst=1&type=anoms&mean_gen=02&year1=2009&year2=2009&base1=1951&base2=1980&radius=1200&pol=pol

IPPC (2007)
Fourth Assessment Report on Climate Change 2007. FAO 3.1, Figure 1, WG1, Chapter 3, p. 253.
blogs.ei.colombia.edu/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/graph-2-600X422.jpg

Light M.P.R. (2011)
Global Warming
globalwarmingmlight.blogspot.com

Masters. J. (2009)
Top Climate Story of 2008
www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMasters/comment.html?entrynum=1177

NOAA (2011a), generated ESRL/GMO – 2010, November 08, 11:12 am
Huge sudden atmospheric methane spike Arctic Svalbard (north of Norway)
The need for geo-engineering

NOAA (2011b), generated ESRL/GMO – 2011, December 14, 17:21 pm
Huge sudden methane spike recorded at Barrow (BRW), Alaska, United States.
The need for geo-engineering

Runaway Warming

Thermal expansion

As mentioned in Ten dangers of Global Warming, one of the biggest dangers is that, without dramatic action, the atmosphere will reach certain tipping points beyond which sudden dramatic and catastrophic changes will take place. 

As Earth warms up, tectonic plates will expand and some areas will come under increasing pressure, especially along fault lines where tectonic plates collide. As described in this comment and this post, this could lead to earthquakes. Thermal expansion of land and water could put more stress on areas prone to seismic activity, triggering earthquakes that can make the greenhouse effect much worse. The danger is that such seismic activity will cause slope failure in regions with methane hydrates that are already unstable and vulnerable due to global warming.   

Ice and glaciers melting away

Links between climate change and geological and geomorphological phenomena were the theme of this 2009 conference. Several speakers addressed the danger that, as ice and glaciers in the mountains melt away, a substantial weight is disappearing, changing pressures that act on the Earth's crust and contribute to seismic activity. This link was confirmed in several scientific studies, such as this one dating back to 2003. 

Hydrates disturbed by drilling and fracking

There is also an indirect risk. Melting of Arctic sea ice may open up sea routes to hydrates. Drilling and fracking in these hydrates could trigger earthquakes, especially if they're already under extra stress, resulting in the release of huge amounts of methane. This is particularly worrying in the Arctic, where waters can be very shallow, leaving less opportunity for methane to be broken down in the water.

Deep Ocean Warming

The ocean conveyor belt transports water--and heat--around the globe, as shown on the image left, from a NSF press release describing recent research by scientists at NCAR and the Bureau of Meteorology in Australia, which found that deep oceans can warm by 18% to 19% more during a period corresponding with a La Niña event. 

Global warming is likely to cause thermal expansion of the oceanic crust, putting stress on areas where tectonic plates meet. Such a warming peak deep in the ocean could put enough extra stress on these areas to trigger earthquakes that in turn disturb hydrates, resulting in huge amounts of methane to be released. The NOAA image below shows how the Mid-Atlantic Ridge continues into the Arctic Ocean. 

Gakkel Ridge

One place to watch is Gakkel Ridge, the boundary between the North American Plate and the Eurasian Plate. Earthquake activity along Gakkel Ridge has been rising since 1970. Earthquakes in the Gakkel Ridge area could send shockwaves into the shallows of the Arctic Ocean. 

Between 1999 and 2000 alone, there was an anomalously large number of earthquakes along the Arctic Gakkel Ridge (more than 250). In addition, two very unusual and extremely violent submarine pyroclastic eruptions occured in the central Gakkel Ridge region. 

Of the earthquakes measured on the Arctic Gakkel Ridge between March 19th 1980 and the 31st December 2010, most (94%) were strong enough to cause widespread collapse of the methane hydrates and release of methane plumes into the water column and atmosphere. [source: globalwarmingmlight.blogspot.com]

Runaway Warming

In conclusion, global warming can accelerate in a number of ways, including thermal expansion of tectonic plates, causing landslides and shocks from earthquakes, while extra stress can be added due to deep ocean warming peaks and a change in weight as ice retreats on land. This could be ameliorated by drilling and fracking activities.

The danger is that this will put increasing stress on hydrates that can contain huge amounts of methane. If such hydrates are disturbed, huge plumes of methane can be released, causing supersaturation of waters with methane. As a result, further methane releases will enter the atmosphere without being oxidized in the water. The risk is that such methane releases lead to runaway global warming. 

This risk is unacceptable, making it imperative to reduce emissions and bring atmospheric carbon dioxide down, which is best achieved by means of feebates and requires a number of geoengineering techniques, as discussed in Sustainable Economy. In Geoengineering the climate (Royal Society, 2009) various geoengineering methods are compared. These methods may differ in timescale, cost-effectiveness and wider impact (see e.g. this posts on Biomass), but the urgency to act on global warming is such that we may well need all of them to avoid runaway global warming.  

[adapted from NOAA image - click to enlarge]