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Mon, May 18, 2015
from PhysOrg:
Ocean currents disturb methane-eating bacteria
Offshore the Svalbard archipelago, methane gas is seeping out of the seabed at the depths of several hundred meters. These cold seeps are a home to communities of microorganisms that survive in a chemosynthetic environment - where the fuel for life is not the sun, but the carbon rich greenhouse gas....
There is a large, and relatively poorly understood, community of methane-consuming bacteria in this environment. They gorge on the gas, control its concentration in the ocean, and stop it from reaching the ocean surface and released into the atmosphere....
"We were able to show that strength and variability of ocean currents control the prevalence of methanotrophic bacteria", says Lea Steinle from University of Basel and the lead author of the study, "therefore, large bacteria populations cannot develop in a strong current, which consequently leads to less methane consumption."
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Bubble, bubble, roil and trouble, microbes fail and methanes double.
ApocaDoc
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Sun, Aug 3, 2014
from US Naval War College, via YouTube:
Jeremy Jackson: Ocean Apocalypse, a lecture at the US Naval War College
In an hour-plus lecture filled with trenchant analysis of current data, and astounding historical comparisons between 1900 and now, Jackson (aka "the James Hansen for the Ocean") overviews how badly, badly we've been treating the oceans -- and how unlikely it is that we can recover them, prior to the consequent collapse of civilization. ...
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What I hear you saying is "Help!"
ApocaDoc
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Sun, Nov 10, 2013
from Foreign Affairs, via WitsEndNJ:
The Devolution of the Seas: The Consequences of Oceanic Destruction
Of all the threats looming over the planet today, one of the most alarming is the seemingly inexorable descent of the world's oceans into ecological perdition. Over the last several decades, human activities have so altered the basic chemistry of the seas that they are now experiencing evolution in reverse: a return to the barren primeval waters of hundreds of millions of years ago....
Over the last 50 years -- a mere blink in geologic time -- humanity has come perilously close to reversing the almost miraculous biological abundance of the deep. Pollution, overfishing, the destruction of habitats, and climate change are emptying the oceans and enabling the lowest forms of life to regain their dominance. The oceanographer Jeremy Jackson calls it 'the rise of slime': the transformation of once complex oceanic ecosystems featuring intricate food webs with large animals into simplistic systems dominated by microbes, jellyfish, and disease. In effect, humans are eliminating the lions and tigers of the seas to make room for the cockroaches and rats. ...
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So, you environmentalists have become 'cockroaches and rats'-ists?
ApocaDoc
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Wed, Jul 24, 2013
from BBC:
Arctic methane 'time bomb' could have huge economic costs
Scientists say that the release of large amounts of methane from thawing permafrost in the Arctic could have huge economic impacts for the world.
The researchers estimate that the climate effects of the release of this gas could cost $60 trillion..., roughly the size of the global economy in 2012....
Previous work has shown that the diminishing ice cover in the East Siberian sea is allowing the waters to warm and the methane to leach out. Scientists have found plumes of the gas up to a kilometre in diameter rising from these waters.
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A trillion or two could put up a lot of solar panels.
ApocaDoc
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Mon, Feb 4, 2013
from Arctic News:
Dramatic increase in methane in the Arctic in January 2013
... Sea ice is declining at exponential pace. The big danger is that a huge rise of temperatures in the Arctic will destabilize huge amounts of methane currently held in the seabed. Comprehensive and effective action is needed now to avoid catastrophe....
As said, there appears to be a strong relationship between the location of the high levels of methane and the contours of land and sea ice, as illustrated by the above animation. There appears to be little relationship between methane levels and depth of the sea, as illustrated by the animation on the right. ...
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Hah! Those environmenterrorist nuts won't be able to blame this one on humans!
ApocaDoc
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Wed, Aug 15, 2012
from Mongabay:
NASA image shows Northwest Passage open
A satellite image released by NASA last week shows a key channel that forms part of the Northwest Passage is partially free of ice....
Predictions range widely, but many experts expect the Arctic to be free of summer sea ice entirely within a few decades. By almost all standards, sea ice is disappearing faster than expected, partly a consequence of a positive feedback loop triggered by retreating ice. Sea ice typically helps cool the Arctic by reflecting sunlight back into space. But when sea ice melts, the dark areas of open water absorb the sun's radiation, warming the region and worsening melting.
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We'll be over Peak Methane before ya know it!
ApocaDoc
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Mon, Aug 30, 2010
from Xinhua, via China.org.cn:
China sets up base to explore deep-sea energy
China will build a multi-million dollar research base on its east coast to accelerate the study and exploration of deep-sea energy resources, officials with the preparatory group of the base said Thursday.
The base covers 26 hectars of the ground and 62.72 hectares of the sea in the coastal city of Qingdao, Shandong Province, and will serve as a ground support station for China's manned submersible vehicle "Jiaolong".... Scientists believe sea beds at a depth of 4,000 to 6,000 meters hold abundant deposits of rare metals and methane hydrate, a solidified form of natural gas bound into ice that can serve as a new energy source. ...
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Use it or lose it, right?
ApocaDoc
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Mon, Jul 5, 2010
from Science, via McClatchy:
World ocean: 'overwhelming evidence' that it's 'a lot worse than the public thinks.'
A sobering new report warns that the oceans face a "fundamental and irreversible ecological transformation" not seen in millions of years as greenhouse gases and climate change already have affected temperature, acidity, sea and oxygen levels, the food chain and possibly major currents that could alter global weather.... "We are becoming increasingly certain that the world's marine ecosystems are reaching tipping points," Bruno said, adding, "We really have no power or model to foresee" the impact.
"It's a lot worse than the public thinks," said Nate Mantua, an associate research professor at the University of Washington's Climate Impacts Group.
Mantua, who's read the report, said it was clear what was causing the oceans' problems: greenhouse gases. "It is not a mystery," he said.
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Alright! If it's not a mystery, then we can do something about it!
Right?
Right?
ApocaDoc
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Thu, Jul 1, 2010
from SolveClimate:
Methane Dead Zones in Gulf Waters Confirmed, Gas Levels 100,000 Times Normal
Scientists are confronting growing evidence that BP's ruptured well in the Gulf of Mexico is creating oxygen-depleted "dead zones" where fish and other marine life cannot survive. In two separate research voyages, independent scientists have detected what were described as "astonishingly high" levels of methane, or natural gas, bubbling from the well site, setting off a chain of reactions that suck the oxygen out of the water. In some cases, methane concentrations are 100,000 times normal levels.
Other scientists as well as sport fishermen are reporting unusual movements of fish, shrimp, crab and other marine life, including increased shark sightings closer to the Alabama coast.... Joye said her preliminary findings suggested the high volume of methane coming out of the well could upset the ocean food chain. Such high concentrations, it is feared, would trigger the growth of microbes, which break up the methane, but also gobble up oxygen needed by marine life to survive, driving out other living things.
Joye said the methane was settling in a 200-metre layer of the water column, between depths of 1,000 to 1,300 metres in concentrations that were already threatening oxygen levels.
"That water can go completely anoxic [extremely low oxygen] and that is a pretty serious situation for any oxygen-requiring organism. We haven't seen zero-oxygen water but there is certainly enough gas in the water to draw oxygen down to zero," she said.
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I thought they only let fertilizer runoff make dead zones!
ApocaDoc
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Thu, Sep 17, 2009
from Environmental Science and Technology:
Greenhouse gas leaking from Arctic Ocean floor
Scientists have reported the presence of previously unknown sources of methane—a greenhouse gas some 25 times more powerful than CO2 at trapping heat—bubbling up from the Arctic Ocean seafloor north of Norway. Gradual warming of a regional current has caused temperature-sensitive methane hydrate below the seabed to break down and discharge the gas, the researchers say... Over the past couple of decades, as the tools for oceanographic exploration have grown more sophisticated, researchers have documented about Previously, International Polar Year (2007) surveys of the East Siberian Arctic shelf uncovered abundant methane seeps and measured record-breaking summertime concentrations of the gas in northern polar waters. ...
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Bring on the giant caulkgun!
ApocaDoc
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Mon, Aug 17, 2009
from New Scientist:
As Arctic Ocean warms, megatonnes of methane bubble up
It's been predicted for years, and now it's happening. Deep in the Arctic Ocean, water warmed by climate change is forcing the release of methane from beneath the sea floor.
Over 250 plumes of gas have been discovered bubbling up from the sea floor to the west of the Svalbard archipelago, which lies north of Norway. The bubbles are mostly methane, which is a greenhouse gas much more powerful than carbon dioxide.... "Hydrates are stable only within a particular range of temperatures," says Minshull. "So if the ocean warms, some of the hydrates will break down and release their methane."... Just because it fails to reach the surface doesn't mean the methane is harmless, though, as some of it gets converted to carbon dioxide. The CO2 then dissolves in seawater and makes the oceans more acidic. ...
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The worst-case scenario regarding really rapid greenhouse effects...? We may have to revise it.
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Wed, Feb 25, 2009
from Courier-Mail (Australia):
Human activity seen as a threat to marine echinoderms
CREATURES are falling victim to human activities, and scientists say it could interfere with the evolutionary process and lead to extinctions.
Known as echinoderms, the species are essential for keeping ecosystems healthy and if their populations either crash or multiply, degraded seascapes may result.... "Each of these 28 cases was experiencing difficulties because of human activity, including over-fishing, nutrient run-off from the land, species introductions and climate change," Dr Uthicke said.
"We suggest that human-induced disturbance, through its influence on changes to echinoderm population densities, may go beyond present ecosystems impacts and alter future evolutionary trends."
In the Caribbean, sea urchins have died off and on the Great Barrier Reef an over-fished sea cucumber area closed six years ago has not recovered.
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Starfish, sea urchins, sand dollars, even sea cucumbers -- all the cute sea critters. Time for a save-the-echinoderms campaign?
ApocaDoc
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Tue, Oct 14, 2008
from CBC News (Canada):
Methane hydrates: Energy's most dangerous game
All the energy America needs for the next 100 years lies under the sea off the coast of South Carolina. One problem: Digging it out could cause a global climate disaster.
Welcome to the final frontier in fossil fuels, the wild card in climate change theories and the dark horse in the scramble to secure access to clean energy. Meet methane hydrates, the world's most promising and perilous energy resource.... In other words, the extraction process, if done improperly, could cause sudden disruptions on the ocean floor, reducing ocean pressure rates and releasing methane gas from hydrates. A mass release of methane into the sea and atmosphere could have catastrophic consequences on the pace of climate change. More than 50 million years ago, undersea landslides resulted in the release of methane gas from methane hydrate, which contributed to global warming that lasted tens of thousands of years. ...
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Exxon: Heck, we'll be careful, don't worry.
ApocaDoc
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Want more context?
Try reading our book FREE online:
Humoring the Horror of the Converging Emergencies!
More fun than a barrel of jellyfish!
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Fri, Sep 26, 2008
from Telegraph.co.uk:
More methane plumes found in Arctic
Hundreds more methane plumes have been discovered in the Arctic raising fresh fears that the greenhouse gas is contributing to global warming.... The findings follow the revelation earlier this week that Russian scientists have discovered vast quantities of methane being released by the melting permafrost from the seabed off Siberia.
Scientists believe that sudden releases of methane have, in the past, been responsible for increasing global temperature, dramatic climate change and the extinction of species.
The latest discoveries came from researchers on the British ship the James Clark Ross. They said they had observed around 250 methane plumes in a 30 sq mile area. ...
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Holy hockey stick, Batman!
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Sun, Jul 6, 2008
from Nature Geoscience, via ScienceDaily:
New Pathway For Methane Production In The Oceans Discovered
A new pathway for methane production has been uncovered in the oceans, and this has a significant potential impact for the study of greenhouse gas production on our planet. The article, published in the journal Nature Geoscience, reveals that aerobic decomposition of an organic, phosphorus-containing compound, methylphosphonate, may be responsible for the supersaturation of methane in ocean surface waters.... Interest in this research crosses many specialties. Oceanographers will be excited because it offers a solution to the long standing methane paradox. Microbiologists will be excited because it shows an aerobic production pathway of methane, which goes against everything that is currently known about methane, and Climatologists will be interested because it's a potent greenhouse gas that we don't have constraints on, and this new pathway is very exciting. ...
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Exciting indeed.
Oh, and scary as hell, too.
ApocaDoc
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Wed, Apr 9, 2008
from Reuters:
Warming trends rise in large ocean areas: study
"Warming trends in a third of the world's large ocean regions are two to four times greater than previously reported averages, increasing the risk to marine life and fisheries, a U.N.-backed environmental study said.
Overfishing, coastal pollution and degradation of water quality were common in all 64 large marine ecosystems studied by scientists who contributed to the U.N. Environmental Program report presented at an international conference on oceans, coasts and islands in Vietnam this week." ...
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That fish are gonna be so hot you won't even need to cook 'em before you eat 'em!
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