The Methane Menace: What Is It?

It’s comforting and convenient to think of the Earth as ecologically self-regulating. Admittedly the thought of having to move a thousand miles south, if you’re living in London or New York and an ice age sets in, is not entirely comforting – but I’m sure the grandchildren would sort it out somehow. Similarly, as the ice sheets melt, moving inland to the hills could surely be achieved over the weekend, given that you’ve had the presence of mind to buy a house in the hinterland.

Of course, it’s the melting scenario that our grandchildren or great grandchildren will have to deal with. But we all expect it to turn out well in the end. Eventually, the Earth will say to itself, “Jeeze it’s hot in here. I’ll turn on the air conditioning”, and some clever mechanism of physics, biology or chemistry will intervene, and as the Earth starts to cool, everyone will begin to worry about the onset of the next ice age.

Or Maybe Not

Professor Martin Kennedy of UC Riverside recently published an article in the scientific journal  Nature, that suggested we give some thought to methane. There are three greenhouse gases; water vapor, carbon dioxide and methane. Carbon dioxide is undoubtedly the sexy one, because it gets all the press. But there’s a possibility that methane may actually be a much bigger problem.

Here’s the methane issue, briefly stated:

1. Methane is 20 times more effective as a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide, meaning that, weight for weight, it traps 20 times as much heat. The average methane molecule survives in the atmosphere for about 5 – 10 years before turning into carbon dioxide.
2. There is a great deal of methane trapped in the permafrost, in the ocean floor  and under the ice cap in high latitudes, mainly in the North. The estimate is that there are 10,000 gigatons (or 10 teratons?) of methane so trapped. That’s twice as much as all the estimated deposits of oil and natural gas in the world.
3. The permafrost is now melting on all the Arctic-facing coasts and the consequent release of methane is now taking place, to some degree.

The release of large amounts of methane suggests a much different global warming scenario than would be caused by wimpy old carbon dioxide. If large methane releases occurs then, according to Kennedy, the world could warm rapidly at the rate of tens of degrees. Kennedy has researched previous geological eras (millions of years ago) when such methane releases did occur. The consequence was catastrophic climate change. Kennedy believes that the conditions for a new methane age could occur in a decade.

So the possibility is that we won’t have to worry about how our grandchildren will cope with global warming. There’s a relief.

What Can We do About It?

Hope Prof Kennedy is exactly wrong.

Alternatively, we can do, er..; nothing, nought, nil, nix, nada, zero, zilch, zip and diddly-squat.

Click here for all postings on Global Warming.