Methane Hydrates (Scientific American)

While recognizing the potential danger of these emissions, I am also familiar with their potential use of this resource.  As a fuel.  There has been much research done, including some recent work in the Canadian Mackenzie Delta where short term production was tested.  These resources are widely distributed across the globe and could provide a valuable alternative to other conventional and unconventional  sources of petroleum based energy.  It is considered that if the technology can be developed to safely and economically, Japan would no longer require the import of fuel.  They have massive quantities within a stone's throw of their lands.  As yet, the solution to harnessing the energy in these frozen gas pockets has not been found.

March 5, 2010 | 30 comments

Methane Leaks off Siberian Coast, Speeding Climate Change

Warmer oceans are thawing methane deposits, adding more of the greenhouse gas to the atmosphere

By Lauren Morello and Climatewire   

LOST PERMAFROST: Warming ocean water is thawing permafrost, allowing methane trapped underneath to bubble up from the East Siberian Arctic Shelf.
NATIONAL OCEAN & ATMOSPHERIC ADMINISTRATION EARTH SYSTEM RESEARCH LABORATORY

A large amount of methane is bubbling up from the ocean floor east of Siberia at a surprising rate and could accelerate climate change, researchers said yesterday.

The gas is bubbling up from the East Siberian Arctic Shelf because warming ocean water is thawing permafrost, allowing methane trapped underneath to escape. The amount of methane emitted by that one patch of seabed roughly equals the amount scientists believed was released by all of the world's oceans.

But just how the discovery will affect projections of future warming is hard to say, according to a team of scientists from the United States, Russia and Sweden who published their findings yesterday in the journal Science.

"Seabed deposits [of methane] were considered until recently to be reliably sealed by subsea permafrost," said the study's lead author, Natalia Shakhova of the University of Alaska, Fairbanks. "But what we are having now is up to 10 million tons annually escaping from this seabed. This means permafrost does not serve as an impermeable cap or seal to prevent this leakage any longer."

Shakhova said there is not enough information now to know whether the methane seeping up from the East Siberian Arctic Shelf -- which covers more than 810,000 square miles -- signals the emergence of a significant new source of the potent greenhouse gas. Methane is regarded as 20 to 30 times more potent as a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide.

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