Scientific American: Arctic Climate Threat--Methane from Thawing Permafrost

[OKIsItJustMe]

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=methane-a-menace-surfaces

From the December 2009 Scientific American Magazine

Arctic Climate Threat--Methane from Thawing Permafrost

Arctic permafrost is already thawing, creating lakes that emit methane. The heat-trapping gas could dramatically accelerate global warming. How big is the threat? What can be done?

By Katey Walter Anthony

Key Concepts

• Methane bubbling up into the atmosphere from thawing permafrost that underlies numerous Arctic lakes appears to be hastening global warming.
• New estimates indicate that by 2100 thawing permafrost could boost emissions of the potent greenhouse gas 20 to 40 percent beyond what would be produced by all natural and man-made sources.
• The only realistic way to slow the thaw is for humankind to limit climate warming by reducing our carbon dioxide emissions.

Touchdown on the gravel runway at Cherskii in remote northeastern Siberia sent the steel toe of a rubber boot into my buttocks. The shoe had sprung free from gear stuffed between me and my three colleagues packed into a tiny prop plane. This was the last leg of my research team’s five-day journey from the University of Alaska Fairbanks across Russia to the Northeast Science Station in the land of a million lakes, which we were revisiting as part of our ongoing efforts to monitor a stirring giant that could greatly speed up global warming.

…

[sharp_stick]

1. But we stole some emails

parsed the hell out of them and "proved" that all climate scientists are in on a massive conspiracy to make Al Gore rich.

Didn't you get the memo that real data doesn't exist in modern America? It's cold outside today therefore global warming is a hoax.

:sarcasm: tag posted because I'm sick of having to explain sarcasm the those that can't see it without intense effort.

[RaleighNCDUer]

2. by the time the story gets to peer-review and Scientific American

it is already old news.

People have been talking about permafrost methane for years. It doesn't persist as long as CO2, but the release would be nearly continual for decades, and it will have such an impact that it could cause the total collapse of the Greenland ice sheets before 2050 (I think, before 2040), making large parts of the coast uninhabitable - flooding much of NYC, London, bye bye New Orleans...

[OKIsItJustMe]

3. Yup… even Scientific American’s been talking about it…

… which we were revisiting as part of our ongoing efforts to monitor a stirring giant that could greatly speed up global warming …