58 replies to this topic

[Doug1o29]

Little Fish, on 13 December 2011 - 09:25 PM, said:

Methane reacts in the atmosphere breaking down to water and co2. its not stable like co2 which dissolves in rainwater and gets washed out of the atmosphere. I don't know where I got that 1.76, it might have been due to burning rather than destructive reactions in the atmosphere, but a weight of methane decays to a similar weight of co2 which is what you are after as the co2 is measured in tons. humans emit 30,000,000,000 tons co2/year, arctic permafrost contains ~500,000,000 tons methane, so if its 1:1 ton for ton, the arctic methane is equivalent to 1/60 yearly co2 emissions (after the methane breaks down), which is equivalent to about 6 days co2 emissions, or more quantatively - bugger all.

the question to ask is how much co2 do you get when 1 ton of methane breaks down in the atmosphere, since methane's lifetime in the atmosphere is short. the point still stands that even if ALL that methane were to be released in an INSTANT, any greenhouse effect is neglible compared to current co2 levels, so why should I worry about it?

See Post 10.  One ton of carbon as a component of methane, is still one ton of carbon as a component of CO2.  But one ton of methane yields 2.75 tons of CO2 when burned.  It picked up the extra weight from the oxygen.

I'll have to have another look at that article, but the important question is still:  is this something new, or is the ecosystem adapted to it?  Until we can answer that question, we won't know whether you should worry or not.

Methane as a component of the atmosphere has risen pretty much in sync with warming.  When warming leveled off in 1998, so did methane concentration.  But in 2008, methane started up again.  Still too early to tell if warming started up again at the same time.  Global temps were slightly higher during the latter half of the last decade than during the earlier half.  I'm not expecting much change for another year, yet.  Then we'll see.
Doug

[Br Cornelius]

Still ignoring CH4's greenhouse potential in your dodgy calculations

Br Cornelius

[BFB]

May i ask why this is a "shock"? We allready knew this would happen. Also this has happened before.

No doomsday scenario here.

[Little Fish]

Br Cornelius, on 14 December 2011 - 07:46 AM, said:

Still ignoring CH4's greenhouse potential in your dodgy calculations

Br Cornelius

still ignoring what I said three times previously.

it's meaningless since CH4 breaks down quickly in the atmosphere, after 10 years its all gone, all converted to co2 and water. if it takes 100 years to emit all the methane in the permafrost, the first 90 years of methane emission has all gone. so there is no accumulation of "greenhouse potential" after a few years. you are describing an impossible theoretical scenario which can only happen if ALL the methane is released in an instant, and even then its effect diminishes to near zero after 10 years, and even then its greenhouse potential would not be that great, equivalent of ~4 months human co2 emissions. do you want to present some revised estimates of your own? numbers not adjectives.

[Little Fish]

BFB, on 14 December 2011 - 09:30 AM, said:

May i ask why this is a "shock"? We allready knew this would happen. Also this has happened before.

No doomsday scenario here.

recycling old scares, that's all, keeps the boondoggle snakeoil flowing.

[oly]

& keeps attention away from the more urgent issues

[Br Cornelius]

Little Fish, on 14 December 2011 - 09:52 AM, said:

still ignoring what I said three times previously.

it's meaningless since CH4 breaks down quickly in the atmosphere, after 10 years its all gone, all converted to co2 and water. if it takes 100 years to emit all the methane in the permafrost, the first 90 years of methane emission has all gone. so there is no accumulation of "greenhouse potential" after a few years. you are describing an impossible theoretical scenario which can only happen if ALL the methane is released in an instant, and even then its effect diminishes to near zero after 10 years, and even then its greenhouse potential would not be that great, equivalent of ~4 months human co2 emissions. do you want to present some revised estimates of your own? numbers not adjectives.

Each molecule of methane in the atmosphere has a 70x greenhouse effect than one molecule of CO2 over 20yrs.
Over 100yrs that drops to 20x.

Need I correct you more clearly. So for 20 yrs 1 million tonnes of CH4 has the effect of 70million tonnes of CO2. This is signicant because it is a massive amplifier which leads to a more dramatic release of methane.
The fact that it actually breaks down after 15yrs is not the point, it is just like the residence time of CO2  which is short - but the cumulative effects are felt over centuries.

Remember the metaphor of the bath tub with one tap filling it and the plug hole emptying it - if the tap fills quicker than the plug empties the bathtub rises - even though the individual water molecules only have a very short residence time in the bath.

Your getting the basics wrong again.

Br Cornelius

[Br Cornelius]

BFB, on 14 December 2011 - 09:30 AM, said:

May i ask why this is a "shock"? We allready knew this would happen. Also this has happened before.

No doomsday scenario here.

The significance is that this is confirmation of one of the feedback mechanisms which was hitherto simply theoretical.

Just more evidence for the ever growing pile that only the blind cannot see (blind fish anyone).

Br Cornelius

[Little Fish]

Br Cornelius, on 14 December 2011 - 10:04 AM, said:

Each molecule of methane in the atmosphere has a 70x greenhouse effect than one molecule of CO2 over 20yrs.
Over 100yrs that drops to 20x.

Need I correct you more clearly. So for 20 yrs 1 million tonnes of CH4 has the effect of 70million tonnes of CO2.

70 million tons of co2 is equivalent of 20 hours of man made co2 emissions.

man emits 30 billion tons of co2 in a year from burning fossil fuels.
30 billion/70 million = 1/428 years = 0.85 days = 20 hours, so 1 million tons of methane has the effect of less than a days worth of man made co2.
so a hundred million tons of methane is equivalent to 100x20 hours = 83 days = 2.7 months man made co2 emissions.

Quote

This is signicant because it is a massive amplifier which leads to a more dramatic release of methane.

adjectives again, where's your numbers?
are you saying 2.7 months co2 emissions is a "massive amplifier" leading to "a dramatic release of methane"?
2.7 months co2 emissions- are you serious?

[BFB]

Doug1o29, on 13 December 2011 - 09:58 PM, said:

See Post 10.  One ton of carbon as a component of methane, is still one ton of carbon as a component of CO2.  But one ton of methane yields 2.75 tons of CO2 when burned.  It picked up the extra weight from the oxygen.

Its not 2.75 tons. Its 2.74 tons.

[Little Fish]

Br Cornelius, on 14 December 2011 - 10:07 AM, said:

blind fish anyone

blind faith anyone.

[BFB]

Doug1o29, on 13 December 2011 - 09:58 PM, said:

Methane as a component of the atmosphere has risen pretty much in sync with warming.  When warming leveled off in 1998, so did methane concentration.  But in 2008, methane started up again.  Still too early to tell if warming started up again at the same time.  Global temps were slightly higher during the latter half of the last decade than during the earlier half.  I'm not expecting much change for another year, yet.  Then we'll see.
Doug

Because of the same reason given in the article. This is nothing new. We have seen it many times in the past.

[Swamptick]

You can't EVER take an article regarding Russian scientists seriously.

[David Thomson]

Keep in mind that methane is the byproduct of decomposing organic matter.  The organic matter grew and deposited in the ground and seabed long before the permafrost came.  The ice is the anomaly, not the carbon compounds.  The Earth has been thawing out since the last advance of ice over 10,000 years ago, and we are witnessing that process in action.  Even the growth of human population in the past 300 years is due to the gradual thawing of the planet.  We should be grateful to witness life returning to the Earth.  Don't forget, there is only 1/1000 of the biomass on the surface of the Earth today than what there was just a couple hundred million years ago.  This planet can handle a lot more carbon than what we are used to.

[Leonardo]

Little Fish, on 14 December 2011 - 09:52 AM, said:

still ignoring what I said three times previously.

it's meaningless since CH4 breaks down quickly in the atmosphere, after 10 years its all gone, all converted to co2 and water. if it takes 100 years to emit all the methane in the permafrost, the first 90 years of methane emission has all gone. so there is no accumulation of "greenhouse potential" after a few years. you are describing an impossible theoretical scenario which can only happen if ALL the methane is released in an instant, and even then its effect diminishes to near zero after 10 years, and even then its greenhouse potential would not be that great, equivalent of ~4 months human co2 emissions. do you want to present some revised estimates of your own? numbers not adjectives.

You are making the mistake of assuming a 10 year lifetime for atmospheric methane means that after 10 years all the atmospheric methane has disappeared. That is false because continuing emissions will replenish what is lost.

You also quoted a figure of 500 million tons of methane trapped beneath the Arctic permafrost. Where did you get that figure from?

As far as I know, there are no estimates on how much methane will be emitted from permafrost through warming. In fact, climate scientists calculate how much carbon is stored in permafrost, and indicate that carbon will be released either as CO2 or as methane dependent on whether oxygen is available to microbes processing that carbon.

As this site indicates, there is nearly twice as much carbon stored in the Arctic permafrost (1400 gigatons) as there is currently in the atmosphere in gaseous form.

Atmospheric methane accounts for approx. 20% of the forced warming we observe, yet it accounts for only  0.00017% (1.7 parts/million) of our atmosphere. Increases in the amount of atmospheric methane will have consequences proportional to this, so it will not take a very large increase to have a significant warming effect.