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Author Topic: This is not good (methane clathrates)  (Read 152817 times)

Laurent

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #50 on: July 16, 2014, 11:48:20 PM »

Lynn Shwadchuck

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #51 on: July 17, 2014, 12:00:45 AM »
More detail at the original link. http://siberiantimes.com/other/others/features/large-crater-appears-at-the-end-of-the-world/

"Anna Kurchatova from Sub-Arctic Scientific Research Centre thinks the crater was formed by a water, salt and gas mixture igniting an underground explosion, the result of global warming. She postulates that gas accumulated in ice mixed with sand beneath the surface, and that this was mixed with salt - some 10,000 years ago this area was a sea.

"Global warming, causing an 'alarming' melt in the permafrost, released gas causing an effect like the popping of a Champagne bottle cork, she suggests.

"Given the gas pipelines in this region such a happening is potentially dangerous."
Still living in the bush in eastern Ontario. Gave up on growing annual veggies. Too much drought.

Laurent

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #52 on: July 17, 2014, 12:06:37 AM »
If that is true we should see plenty of this, there is a lot of fire everywhere in Siberia, they surely can ignite any gaz bubble trapped in the ground...
« Last Edit: July 17, 2014, 12:23:22 AM by Laurent »

Lynn Shwadchuck

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #53 on: July 17, 2014, 12:09:40 AM »
Doesn't sound good, Laurent.
Still living in the bush in eastern Ontario. Gave up on growing annual veggies. Too much drought.

Adam Ash

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #54 on: July 17, 2014, 03:29:36 PM »
A great big black hole in hydrate country here on ole planet Earth.  Who would have imagined that.

Is this an known unknown or an unknown unknown?  Is that just one lonely black swan, or is there a herd of them thundering towards us out of the tundra?

(Sorry for the blather, but there's not much to say about this that makes any constructive sense!)


TerryM

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #55 on: July 18, 2014, 01:07:23 PM »
Lynn
I'm confused. !0,000 years ago I would have thought that sea level would have been much lower than today. Is it possible that this now above sea level area of Siberia has rebounded that far?
Terry

Laurent

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #56 on: July 18, 2014, 01:27:51 PM »
TerryM,

A bit less than 8.000 years ago that was the max of the holocene for the temperatures and the sea level was higher than it is now.
It seems there was a lag of 1000 years between the temp and the SLR.
« Last Edit: July 18, 2014, 01:42:21 PM by Laurent »

Lynn Shwadchuck

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #57 on: July 18, 2014, 01:54:13 PM »
Terry,

I'm out of my depth when it comes to these historical specifics. (Ha! I made a funny.) Laurent seems to be on top of the facts.

If anything is confusing to me it's that Shakhova said the ESAS shelf was tundra 200 years ago.
Still living in the bush in eastern Ontario. Gave up on growing annual veggies. Too much drought.

TerryM

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #58 on: July 18, 2014, 02:50:11 PM »
Laurent
Thanks, I'm much happier with Max sea level ~6.5K BP than 10K BP. Don't know the elevation of the site in question but if sea level was ~3.5M above today, thinking of Siberia as a the bottom of the sea still doesn't ring true.


Lynn
I think you may have dropped a decimal. IIRC the ESAS was tundra 20K BP as opposed to 200 BP :)
Sea level rose spectacularly at the end of the last ice age opening the Bering Strait & flooding much of what is now the Arctic Ocean.
As I understand S&S's concerns it's that all the organic matter that built up during this period froze is trapped under a permafrost cap. When water inundated the ESAS after the ice age it raised the surface temperature considerably. This was land that supported megafauna in the not too distant past so lots of organic material is there. The present heating and mixing of water now that the ice is departing only adds to the problem.
Geo heating is melting the cap from beneath & warm Arctic waters are doing the same from above. At some point the permafrost becomes permamelt & releases all the trapped gasses. I don't think it's a case of if, but rather when this occurs.
An area I'm also concerned with is the former Bering land bridge. There are Pingo like features there & it's subject to Pacific waters. If there is a permafrost cap beneath this area I can't think of a good reason to assume that all the gas from beneath it has vented.
Terry


Lynn Shwadchuck

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #59 on: July 18, 2014, 03:35:26 PM »
Thanks, Terry, I got this 200 business wrong because I watched Shakhova on video and I think her English was unclear. I did have trouble understanding how it could be so recent. I'm vividly clear on all the decomposed flora and fauna under there. I'm lucky I can sleep at night!  ;)
Still living in the bush in eastern Ontario. Gave up on growing annual veggies. Too much drought.

Laurent

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #60 on: July 18, 2014, 07:25:02 PM »
If the ESAS is 50 m deep then it was before 10.000 years ago that the bottom was a swamp.
...I know there is a problem with my previous graph...It seems most of the SLR graphs for the holocene soften the data too much...

Adam Ash

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #61 on: July 19, 2014, 06:04:06 AM »
Ah. OK.  Just GoogleEarth the north west corner of the Yamal Peninsula. 

It is littered with holes of similar size to that recent one.  Most seem to be filled with water. 

An initial impression is that these holes are just sort of sink holes in the swamp, but this latest orifice may provide an enhanced understanding of how these hole features are created. 

Perhaps they may not be formed by a gradual sinking of some vegetative fairy circle or other slow process, but rather by an explosive event followed by a weathering and water fill that leads the newly blasted hole to end up looking like its sisters.   If that hypothesis is to have merit then we would expect to find a series of ages of such holes - some new like this one, and others of intermediate age, and others well weathered. 

I broke the cross on my ARdrone recently, so I don't have the capability to fly her up there from the Antipodes to do a reconnaissance but I'm sure there are some folk closer who can.

Adam Ash

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #62 on: July 19, 2014, 06:26:25 AM »
At
  71.787536°   72.113329°  (Copy paste into GE)
you can see evidence of a steep side slope complete with a mounded edge (which snow has heaped up against), and at
  71.171112°   71.360918°
an example showing a sloping inside then a vanishinly deep centre...

Boom!  Interesting. 

There must be quite a sonic and thermal signature for these events.  To create a 200 to 2000 metre diameter by 100(s?) of metre deep hole in the ground would require more tonnes of TNT than I care to imagine.  I wonder if seismographs and the atom bomb orbiting and ground-based monitoring systems pick up these events?

Examples:
Fresh debris around the crater rim.  750m diameter.  Cloudy disturbed water in the pool so still gassing?
  70.968751°   70.349530°

Fresh debris around the crater rim.  650m diameter.  Clear water so gassing ceased?
  69.698662°   69.536169°

Hypothesis proven, methinks?

OK, that's enough to go on with for today...
« Last Edit: July 19, 2014, 06:43:38 AM by Adam Ash »

SteveMDFP

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #63 on: July 19, 2014, 04:52:11 PM »
At
  71.787536°   72.113329°  (Copy paste into GE)
you can see evidence of a steep side slope complete with a mounded edge (which snow has heaped up against), and at
  71.171112°   71.360918°
an example showing a sloping inside then a vanishinly deep centre...

Boom!  Interesting. 

There must be quite a sonic and thermal signature for these events.  To create a 200 to 2000 metre diameter by 100(s?) of metre deep hole in the ground would require more tonnes of TNT than I care to imagine.  I wonder if seismographs and the atom bomb orbiting and ground-based monitoring systems pick up these events?

Examples:
Fresh debris around the crater rim.  750m diameter.  Cloudy disturbed water in the pool so still gassing?
  70.968751°   70.349530°

Fresh debris around the crater rim.  650m diameter.  Clear water so gassing ceased?
  69.698662°   69.536169°

Hypothesis proven, methinks?

OK, that's enough to go on with for today...

It seems plain that these start with a growing sub-surface cavity, filling with methane.  Such sub-surface gas collections wouldn't explode--there wouldn't be enough oxygen in the cavity to permit combustion. 
I think what's formed here is analogous to what you see when you cook a pancake.  Gas pockets form and grow beneath the gas-impermeable surface layer, and then the roof collapses and a pocket is formed.
Any "explosion" would simply be the pop of a cork from pressure, not combustion.

Xulonn

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #64 on: July 19, 2014, 08:07:49 PM »
Edit:  I just read A-Team's comments on the subject in the dedicated thread, and most of my questions have been answered,and speculations put to rest.

Although I have no experience and knowledge about tundra/permafrost soil dynamics, I would speculate that with the rich stew of organic materials, reactions other than combustion could cause high pressure in a chamber sealed from the atmosphere by impervious, mucky soil, and eventually "pop."   The holes they leave behind could be ringed by close-falling ejecta, unlike meteor hits which often have rays of ejecta extending for some distance, and often in a lop-sided elliptical pattern depending of the angle of the strike.   

These tundra holes seem to be common, eventually becoming filled with water.  It would be interesting if such ponds and lakes, like others in the northern latitudes that I am aware of, develop methane bubbles under the ice in winter. 

Although it's south of the tundra in the taiga, here's good video with Professor Katey Walter Anthony of the University of Alaska Fairbanks talking about Alaska lakes and methane.

« Last Edit: July 19, 2014, 08:42:45 PM by Xulonn »

ghoti

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #65 on: July 22, 2014, 06:13:06 PM »
People working on the SWERUS expedition on the Oden report methane bubbles in the Laptev where they are sampling.

http://www.swerus-c3.geo.su.se/index.php/emma-and-lisas-blogg-leg1/174-lisa-20140721-1500utc

SteveMDFP

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #66 on: July 22, 2014, 07:02:34 PM »
People working on the SWERUS expedition on the Oden report methane bubbles in the Laptev where they are sampling.

http://www.swerus-c3.geo.su.se/index.php/emma-and-lisas-blogg-leg1/174-lisa-20140721-1500utc

Not to cross-post in the forum, but I have a bit of commentary on this development here:
http://forum.arctic-sea-ice.net/index.php/topic,480.msg32108.html#msg32108

bligh8

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #67 on: July 23, 2014, 06:27:53 PM »
That's not the only (and probably not the main) danger on these trips. This open ocean, and storms are common. Last year a research vessel got in trouble in a storm. They ended up getting through it ok, but the boat that was sent out to help them sunk and all on board dies, iirc.

This is truly heroic research these folks are engaging in. Another reason it cranks my gears when some dismiss or disparage them.  >:(

Wili....Most folks do not understand as you said..(Open Ocean Sailing) for any reason. Some folks are just driven to do these things, to this I can relate. One other thing, Boats commit suicide and their captains let them. The idea of a boat just sinking is silly, the captain and crew fail not the vessel.

In other news...no rain here for weeks then 3 days ago, 6.7inches in 30 hrs. Hot and humid here today.

Fair Winds Wili
b

Bruce Steele

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #68 on: August 24, 2014, 07:05:16 PM »
Hey Bligh8,  Off subject..  My crew, his wife and dog, pushed off from Kaua'i in their 31 foot Gemini catamaran and made landfall at Fort Bragg California 33 days later. That big high pressure that dominated the North Pacific early this summer was IMHO their benefactor in success. Slow going but no big storms.
The only advice I gave him was to go early rather than late and with the hurricanes over the last month I guess I was correct. We were able to stay connected over the Internet for the whole trip.
Modern miracles. He has since sailed down to Santa Barbara and is currently sitting on a big mooring of mine outside the harbor. For what it's worth he has decided he needs a bigger boat for the sail west to Polynesia.
 I don't suppose I will ever make any big sail adventures as the farm is a full time commitment. I might as well get a milk cow because there isn't anybody who I can get to feed 76 pigs, two horses and a dozen chickens for more than a day or two ( let alone poop duties ).Irrigating crops is also an issue. I have always considered dairy the ultimate ball and chain ,no breaks , no time off. 24/7 365. After 40 years putting on a wetsuit for a living I guess I can't complain about a lack of adventure. No complaints really. Today is poop day, I get to pick up and compost what the critters left this week. There will be a big orchard in a few years  where the compost piles currently are. One complaint , this drought sucks.
 Please keep us posted if you push off for some distant shore .   

viddaloo

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #69 on: August 25, 2014, 12:00:52 AM »
Scary stuff, for sure.

But hey! Seems will save the day?
[]

viddaloo

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #70 on: August 25, 2014, 07:15:57 AM »
They've been studying methane under the East Siberian Arctic Shelf since the mid 1990's & warn of the possibility of a sudden release. It was one of their expeditions that confirmed the huge methane fluxes in the Arctic Ocean after crews transiting the Northern Passage reported that "the ocean is boiling".

Has anyone here seen or read the dystopic «The Road»? Everyone seems to wonder what caused the collapse in that story, as per design, yet it isn't too hard to think it was methane that killed all the fish, burnt the trees and sent people out on the road to try and survive.
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lisa

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #71 on: August 25, 2014, 05:02:49 PM »
Methane seeps reported off the US Atlantic coast:

News Report:  http://news.sciencemag.org/climate/2014/08/numerous-methane-leaks-found-atlantic-sea-floor

Paywalled paper from Nature Geoscience: Widespread methane leakage from the sea floor on the northern US Atlantic margin (Jul 2014):
http://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/ngeo2232.html
« Last Edit: August 25, 2014, 05:09:39 PM by lisa »

Anne

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #72 on: August 25, 2014, 07:09:45 PM »
Has anyone here seen or read the dystopic «The Road»? Everyone seems to wonder what caused the collapse in that story, as per design, yet it isn't too hard to think it was methane that killed all the fish, burnt the trees and sent people out on the road to try and survive.
Hi viddaloo, yes I read The Road very recently.  Perhaps we should start a new Cli Fi thread over on the "Off-topic/The rest" part of the forum? 

ETA: Just done! The thread is here:
http://forum.arctic-sea-ice.net/index.php/topic,976.0.html#new
« Last Edit: August 25, 2014, 07:19:03 PM by Anne »

viddaloo

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #73 on: August 26, 2014, 03:27:37 AM »
Methane seeps reported off the US Atlantic coast:

What happens to sea–floor methane releases if more and more months 'crash' and go ice–free every year? Seriously increased gas release, for sure, but how long till we have The Road style conditions?

These are my Arctic Sea Ice prognoses based on the available PIOMAS data:

From 2021 September will be free of Arctic sea ice.
From 2022 August to October will be free of Arctic sea ice.
From 2024 July to October will be free of Arctic sea ice.
From 2025 July to November will be free of Arctic sea ice.
From 2028 June to November will be free of Arctic sea ice.
From 2034 June to December will be free of Arctic sea ice.
From 2043 May to December will be free of Arctic sea ice.
« Last Edit: August 26, 2014, 08:40:48 AM by viddaloo »
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zworld

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #74 on: August 29, 2014, 05:09:21 PM »
Methane seeps reported off the US Atlantic coast:

The fear I have had for sometime is that warming ocean waters wont just release the hydrates in the Arctic circle. The biggest stores of methane hydrates occur in temperate waters where greater input from organic debris exists.

In 2009 methane plumes reaching the surface were observed off the N Cal coast. In 2011 off the Atlantic seaboard. Since then the plumes have increased. Now it appears that they may be starting to release over wide areas, as the recent Atlantic data show.

At this point in time, modeling shows that it wont take much more temp increase to release the stores of methane in the upper limit in these areas. When this starts occurring worldwide, we can kiss our asses goodbye.

From the report;

Extrapolating the upper-slope seep density on this margin to the global passive margin system, we suggest that tens of thousands of seeps could be discoverable.

That's the same wording Shakova used about the Arctic findings.

retiredbill

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #75 on: September 03, 2014, 09:12:57 AM »
Bruce Steele, also off-subject, but in Reply #72 you mentioned you had 2 horses. Do you use them for utilitarian purposes? In another thread I wondered if horses could be used for agriculture/transportation post-collapse as they had been before invention of the internal combustion engine.

nowayout

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #76 on: September 03, 2014, 08:30:48 PM »

That's the same wording Shakova used about the Arctic findings.

The (next) tipping point, if you like to translate the cautious wording.  And we won't get off the slope.

Bruce Steele

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #77 on: September 04, 2014, 02:42:16 AM »
Retired Bill, I have one Welch Cob trained to harness. She is buggy trained and I have harnesses and buggy for that but we have only hitched her to a plow once( actually an old harrow with some teeth removed.)
To do any kind of heavy work I would need to get a harness with a collar, as a harness for pulling a buggy has a lighter leather strap that runs across the chest. This is uncomfortable for the horse with too big a load, like a plow. Mostly though they don't get enough use to justify the hay costs. At the local feedstore a bale of alfalfa is $25.00 ! This is Southern California in a drought but feeding horses is expensive almost anywhere. In someplace where rains keep a pasture green most of the year horses are much cheaper to feed, they like pasture and don't need much else if they can get some fresh grass. Need rain and space.
 I have a little electric tiller for light cultivation work in the fields ( big garden/ small farm ) and it is so much easier to put in the battery and get to work rather than putting the harness on /off . I do think horses are nice to be around and herd animals have some lessons to teach. Hard to describe why I like them but if you have a good imagination sometimes they like you back. Or not.  There has been some horses around most my life and I am thankful for that.
 I think pulling together a modest recreation of a farm with 1900 horse technology + some solar/battery tools , LED lights, and a very good location is completely doable.  I also believe you could easily power a diesel tractor with hog fat and fuel preheater for the tractor. With presses, combines, seed cleaners , methanol and some sodium hydroxide you could make some vegy bio-diesel but fat would require less technology. Anyway there will be plenty of old tractors around for a hundred years or so. Most of mine are from the 60's. Cheap
 So with some grazing land for pigs and horses and an old tractor to run only a few hours per  year, a nice plow horse and some tack as well as some lightweight battery power you could get by without fossil fuel, or pretty dang close.  Not saying you could make a living $ wise but you could feed yourself and your family. If a group of likeminded souls who could help each other , baker, metal smith, wheel maker, electrician , bard ,etc. and also keep up their own farms you could might have something like feudalism to work with. 
 Some step down from our current consumption , some big step, seems to me inevitable. People can propose whatever they think might be solutions but testable whole system ideas need time to get running smoothly. Most of what I envision is off the shelf available today but I am leaning heavily on what was working before we went NUTS over last 100 years. Including some solar electrics would lighten the workload and make the transition easier. I am not counting on the grid and although that is extreme it does focus your limits nicely. Water, rain, some nice soil , a decent growing season. A rather large wish list.   
   

viddaloo

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #78 on: September 04, 2014, 03:36:27 AM »
Most of what I envision is off the shelf available today but I am leaning heavily on what was working before we went NUTS over last 100 years. Including some solar electrics would lighten the workload and make the transition easier. I am not counting on the grid and although that is extreme it does focus your limits nicely. Water, rain, some nice soil , a decent growing season. A rather large wish list.   

A major problem will probably be the decent growing season part. How likely is that, when the climate goes NUTS, for crops that take a long time to grow? I'm thinking maybe hunter–gatherer is a safer way to survive, because of this, because of the mobility and due to social conditions. Starving people will most likely rob the farms or eat the crops before the harvest.
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Bruce Steele

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #79 on: September 04, 2014, 06:11:10 AM »
Viddaloo, This drought we are in would test any foraging culture. I do not even see an acorn set this year. If climate change = drought around here I think hunger would be a big problem. A primitive existence would require a large range ...tough to find space, dry perennial springs, no grass for bunnies. Knowing how to stash large food stores for these sorts of conditions would truly be a challenge. I do think it is a skill set that is part of past native cultures but are you into leaching the poison out of your food before you eat it?  Food that is toxic to rodents stores a lot better, two years without refrigeration and what happens in a decade of drought?
 I am talking about historic conditions around the southwest continental U.S.  We will be in a world of hurt if future droughts exceed the droughts that crushed former cultures in the Southwest. They had few thousand years of experience but even that didn't save them. 

Lynn Shwadchuck

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #80 on: September 04, 2014, 01:33:49 PM »
I'm reading Fernand Braudel's Civilization and Capitalism, 15th-18th Century, Vol. I: The Structure of Everyday Life. Once populations got too high to support hunting & gathering, they lived on almost no meat, growing field crops – wheat, rice and maize. Turn that around the other way and once agriculture is unsupportable, the number of acres of foraging land needed per person becomes very high. After plague and/or famine reduced a population, wild plants and wild animals repopulated the area, but not immediately.
Still living in the bush in eastern Ontario. Gave up on growing annual veggies. Too much drought.

Clare

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #81 on: September 07, 2014, 08:29:20 AM »
"Starving people will most likely rob the farms or eat the crops before the harvest."

In the suburb where we live & garden there are a lot of people struggling to manage financially, not starving obviously but poor quality junk food is much less expensive to buy than good meat & vege... ...also we have a gang problem & young 'uns ('prospects') commit crimes to gain cred to eventually be able to join the predominant local gang.

I am sure the following will happen most other places too, is not unique to my neighbourhood, but it certainly gives me a feeling of how things could potentially deteriorate in the future.
:-(

My hubby wondered once if our garden might be a target to people taking our produce & while we have been burgled once (looking for $ & ?drugs after my mum died) & had fruit taken I have decided meat is more what people steal around here. Whole deep freezes full sometimes, ducks from parks & chickens etc but mainly it's rustling of stock from farms.
eg. this last year
http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/news/hawkes-bay/8414370/Hawkes-Bay-lamb-thieves-face-jail-time
These people seemed to be operating backyard slaughter houses.
 
& This was a shocking case at a remote farm 10 years ago, they seen to think rustling was involved in some way here:
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/hawkes-bay-today/news/article.cfm?c_id=1503462&objectid=11314844

But this recent case up north involved avocados = healthy, well sort of cos they had been recently sprayed! They were caught later selling them at an Auckland market:
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/northern-advocate/news/article.cfm?c_id=1503450&objectid=11307601

My in-laws told of the last winter of the war in occupied Holland, when food got desperately short, people ate the bulbs & also Ma told of begging for bread from the German soldiers & of walking out to a farm to glean for potatoes after they were harvested, the farmer turning a blind eye.

retiredbill

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #82 on: September 14, 2014, 03:17:11 AM »
Bruce, thanks for your insights. Of course, using draft animals during
a drought doesn’t make sense. I was assuming the use of inexpensive pasture land
but was concerned about the competition of using the same land for growing food. Is
there much land that can best be used for pasture?

If I understand your position on agricultural technology, there will be sufficient PV panels,
electric motors,  biodiesel-powered tractors, etc. to last around 100 years. Plenty of time
to replenish a stock of draft animals. I don't know about other transportation needs. I
envision a rapid decline in cars, trucks, railroads. But there may be sufficient leeway to
replace them with animals.

viddaloo

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #83 on: September 17, 2014, 08:08:04 PM »
Does anyone in this thread have a clue or a theory as to why methane release from Arctic clathrates seems to be most prominent during Winter and Spring, and not in the Summer/Autumn when the ocean is warmer? Or at all if this really is the case? Thank you for shared insights!
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Laurent

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #84 on: September 17, 2014, 09:26:39 PM »
I would think the melting release fresh water that does protect the arctic from hot salty water of the oceans !?

wili

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #85 on: September 18, 2014, 04:54:49 AM »
IIRC, regular atmospheric methane breakdown requires OH and light and both become predominant in the summer and fall. All the rest of the year it can build up in the atmosphere. And conditions in the early and midwinter can serve to contain much of the methane close to the surface (again, iirc). But you should check other more reliable sources, of course.
"A force de chercher de bonnes raisons, on en trouve; on les dit; et après on y tient, non pas tant parce qu'elles sont bonnes que pour ne pas se démentir." Choderlos de Laclos "You struggle to come up with some valid reasons, then cling to them, not because they're good, but just to not back down."

AbruptSLR

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #86 on: September 18, 2014, 12:28:39 PM »
I note that a comparable pattern occurs in Antarctica/Southern Ocean, only in the austral Spring and Winter (there is a thread in Antarctic folder about methane documenting this pattern), and probably due to the same reason cited by wili.
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viddaloo

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #87 on: September 18, 2014, 12:40:48 PM »
IIRC, regular atmospheric methane breakdown requires OH and light and both become predominant in the summer and fall. All the rest of the year it can build up in the atmosphere. And conditions in the early and midwinter can serve to contain much of the methane close to the surface (again, iirc). But you should check other more reliable sources, of course.

Thanks, wili.

But just to be sure: Are CH4 releases from clathrates bigger in Winter, or is just the CH4 level bigger because OH doesn't break it down?
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wili

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #88 on: September 18, 2014, 11:47:43 PM »
I always assumed that it was not because of increased emissions in Winter, but I'm not sure if anyone has checked that 'on the ground' (or in that case on the sea, ice) to be absolutely sure. There are certainly enough fractures in the ice, especially these days, for methane to make it through that 'barrier' into the atmosphere during the winter.
"A force de chercher de bonnes raisons, on en trouve; on les dit; et après on y tient, non pas tant parce qu'elles sont bonnes que pour ne pas se démentir." Choderlos de Laclos "You struggle to come up with some valid reasons, then cling to them, not because they're good, but just to not back down."

viddaloo

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #89 on: October 28, 2014, 12:44:22 AM »
This is a short, but great, intro to the methane problem (only land–based sources are discussed).

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Pmt111500

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #90 on: October 28, 2014, 03:24:14 AM »

Thanks, wili.

But just to be sure: Are CH4 releases from clathrates bigger in Winter, or is just the CH4 level bigger because OH doesn't break it down?

this. Also biological action on methane by natural systems ceases in the absence of light or warmth (c. +4C). methane is a very poor staple food to any living creature out there. recently melted areas take a while to cool down, so observed methane levels start their yearly rise in late autumn. in finnish language there's even a month named for this, marraskuu (november) basically meaning the 'month of the recently dead or those things that just started to rot', I guess Halloween takes its place in the anglophone world.

umm, an idea emerges that if or when there are no more winters here we should step into a system of three (or maybe six?) seasons, to better explain the world and year. but that's a decision of those coming after. It's not like different systems hasn't been used f.e. samis and lapplanders in the north have had 8 seasons, three of which would likely translate as 'deep winter' for most of the anglophone world.
« Last Edit: October 28, 2014, 03:29:59 AM by Pmt111500 »

viddaloo

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #91 on: October 28, 2014, 04:25:26 AM »
The Sami seasons are of course much more poetic and cultural, but in a way we use 8 seasons in our culture as well: Early spring, late spring, early summer, late summer, early autumn, late autumn, early winter, late winter.

For a number of reasons, 'midsummer' goes into the early summer season. Air and oceans warm later than solstice, so the warmest months are July & August. Just as the coldest months are February & March, at least here in Scandinavia.
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Pmt111500

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #92 on: October 28, 2014, 05:49:52 AM »
and just now I see you're from Norway ::), so you're familiar with these of course. well no harm done.

wili

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #93 on: October 29, 2014, 10:47:39 PM »
vid, what Ptm said. I would expect for methane to start rather late in the melt season and go well into the refreeze season. I have seen indications that some of it is held near the ground/ice surface by atmospheric patterns in part of the winter, but I don't think I still have those links.

Meanwhile:

Ominous Arctic Methane Spikes Continue

 — 2666 Parts Per Billion on October 26th


http://robertscribbler.wordpress.com/2014/10/29/ominous-arctic-methane-spikes-continue-2666-parts-per-billion-on-october-26th/

Quote
Imagine, for a moment, the darkened and newly liberated ocean surface waters of the Kara, Laptev, and East Siberian Seas of the early 21st Century Anthropocene Summer.

Where white, reflective ice existed before, now only dark blue heat-absorbing ocean water remains. During summer time, these newly ice-free waters absorb a far greater portion of the sun’s energy as it contacts the ocean surface. This higher heat absorption rate is enough to push local sea surface temperature anomalies into the range of 4-7 C above average...

More to your point, note this passage, especially:

Quote
The rate of release intensifies throughout summer. But during the Arctic Fall, it reaches a peak. Then, as sea ice begins to re-form over the surface waters, a kind of temperature inversion wedge develops. The surface cools and the ice solidifies — forming an insulating blanket, trapping heat. The insulating layer, in turn, pushes the anomalously hot mid level waters toward the bottom. This process delivers a final and powerful dose of heat to the Arctic Ocean bottom water and sea bed.

Methane release rates spike as the methane flooding up from the sea bed squeezes out through cracks in the newly forming ice or bubbles up through open waters just beyond the ice edge.

ETA: Aha! And this passage seems to be about the 'trapping' effect (though it occurs apparently at higher than ground level).

Quote
as methane releases from the sea and land surface, it becomes trapped in the mid-cloud layer. There, a sandwich of cloud and moisture form a cap beneath which methane tends to concentrate. In this layer, readings can be quite a bit higher than surface measurements. Recent years have shown numerous instances where methane readings in the mid-cloud layer spiked above 2300 parts per billion.
« Last Edit: October 29, 2014, 11:05:45 PM by wili »
"A force de chercher de bonnes raisons, on en trouve; on les dit; et après on y tient, non pas tant parce qu'elles sont bonnes que pour ne pas se démentir." Choderlos de Laclos "You struggle to come up with some valid reasons, then cling to them, not because they're good, but just to not back down."

Apocalypse4Real

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #94 on: November 02, 2014, 03:40:27 AM »
I appreciate Robert Scribbler's description of factors that are in play in Arctic methane release.

However, I am not supportive of the use of one highest range reading of one 12 hour period in the METOP IASI to shape the conversation that this is related to Arctic Methane release. The is a presumption that the image somehow tells us that is where the spike occurred, in reality it does not.

I have blogged further on this issue: http://a4rglobalmethanetracking.blogspot.com/2014/11/methane-spikes-lots-of-hype-no-long.html

A4R

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #95 on: November 02, 2014, 12:23:42 PM »
If it draws folk into the issue, of post USSR methane increases, then surely it has a purpose A4R?

 The other point , for me, is that if Shakhova is correct in her assuming the potential for 'trapped gas' in lenses below ice caps then every so often we ought to expect a 'breach' and one or other pocket to pour out?

As you point out in your piece there could be a myriad of reasons for this spike high above Russia but surely some 'possible reasons' are worse than others?

We have seen 'blowouts' in the Yamal so why not similar just off shore and on a larger scale?

For me I have to imagine sea water penetration ever deeper as voids open up and so more and more opportunity for any major gas pockets to become breached?

One swallow and all that eh? Should we begin to see flocks should we then take more note of such instances?
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Apocalypse4Real

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #96 on: November 02, 2014, 03:09:32 PM »
Hi Grey-Wolf,

I am not questioning or debating Shakhova and Semiletov's findings, nor permafrost melt impacts on methane release from pockets or bacterial action. I have blogged on the findings of the SWERUSC-3 expedition and their findings this summer (see below). There is a reason to be concerned about  Laptev ESS release potential, but that is not related to what I am critiquing in my comments.

Nor am I questioning refreeze, or changes in OH over Siberia or the Arctic Ocean areas during fall and winter. That is also well documented in the research.

There is a difference between a 12 hour spike - which is weather related, and a large release from sea bed sources, which will be trackable in the IASI imagery from low altitude into the 600 mb boundary layer - and which will have an noticeable impact on global mean methane.

See:
http://a4rglobalmethanetracking.blogspot.com/2014/07/major-methane-releases-at-laptev.html

http://a4rglobalmethanetracking.blogspot.com/2014/08/swerus-c-3-more-arctic-methane-found.html

http://a4rglobalmethanetracking.blogspot.com/2014/09/swerus-c-3-second-methane-release.html

Laurent

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #97 on: December 20, 2014, 10:57:03 AM »
Most of Alaska's Permafrost Could Melt This Century
http://www.livescience.com/49184-permafrost-disappears-from-alaska.html

colding

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #98 on: December 22, 2014, 06:03:02 PM »
Methane is leaking from permafrost offshore Siberia:

http://phys.org/news/2014-12-methane-leaking-permafrost-offshore-siberia.html

Laurent

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Re: This is not good.
« Reply #99 on: December 30, 2014, 12:11:16 PM »