Scientists have found evidence that frozen methane deposits in the Arctic – known as the “sleeping giants of the carbon cycle” – are being released into the atmosphere, reveals the The Guardian.
High levels of the potent greenhouse gas have been detected to a depth of 350 meters in the Laptev Sea, near Russia. This raised concerns among researchers, who fear that a new cycle of feedback climate that accelerates the pace of global warming.
Slope sediments in the Arctic contain an enormous amount of frozen methane and other gases. Methane has a heating effect 80 times stronger than carbon dioxide.
The United States Geological Survey, a scientific institution, previously listed the destabilization of Arctic gases as one of the four most serious scenarios for abrupt climate change.
Methane levels at the surface are four to eight times higher than expected, according to the international team on board the Russian research ship.
“Right now, it is unlikely that there will be any major impact on global warming, but the point is that this process has now been triggered,” Swedish scientist Örjan Gustafsson, of the University of Stockholm, said. The Guardian.
The scientists, who are part of a multi-year International Shelf Study Expedition, noted that the conclusions are preliminary.
But the discovery of a potentially destabilized slope of frozen methane raises concerns that a new turning point has been reached that could increase the speed of global warming.
With the Arctic temperature now rising more than twice the global average, the question of when – or even if – they will be released into the atmosphere has been a matter of considerable uncertainty in computer climate models.
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