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Author Topic: Methane - Everything you Didn't Want to Know  (Read 12157 times)

Offline zorgon

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Methane - Everything you Didn't Want to Know
« on: March 26, 2013, 03:41:27 am »
Methane - Everything you Didn't Want to Know

Back at Spook Central, around the same time as the Japanese EQ, there were a lot of stories of mass deaths of fish and birds. I spent months documenting a lot of them and while not all were related to methane, many of them were... and many of the unknowns are most likely to have come from methane releases.

Methane release from Cow Poop has been touted by Global Warming people as a main reason we are getting hotter...





Okay well while it is true that cows (and people) put out a lot of methane, that is not what we are going to look at right now

Methane

Methane is a chemical compound with the chemical formula CH4. It is the simplest alkane, the main component of natural gas, and probably[citation needed] the most abundant organic compound on earth. The relative abundance of methane makes it an attractive fuel. However, because it is a gas at normal conditions, methane is difficult to transport from its source.

Methane is a relatively potent greenhouse gas. The concentration of methane in the Earth's atmosphere in 1998, expressed as a mole fraction, was 1745 nmol/mol (parts per billion, ppb), up from 700 nmol/mol in 1750. By 2008, however, global methane levels, which had stayed mostly flat since 1998, had risen to 1800 nmol/mol.


Whether or not methane levels can cause the global warming we are seeing is up for debate because methane will break down to CO3 and water with some oxygen left over. At room temperature and standard pressure, methane is a colorless, odorless gas. The familiar smell of natural gas as used in homes is a safety measure achieved by the addition of an odorant, usually blends containing tert-butylthiol.

The problem with methane is that it is deadly, and a large concentration can wipe out life exposed to it. In the case of birds and fish it happens quickly.

There is also a possibility that the sudden release of gas can make some of the trumpeting sounds heard around the globe, especially if there is a cavern or other chamber to amplify that sound

Here is a sample gas blow lamp sound effect...

[youtube]6tWkjx-1IKA[/youtube]


Offline zorgon

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Re: Methane - Everything you Didn't Want to Know
« Reply #1 on: March 26, 2013, 03:55:32 am »
So lets start at around the time of the Japanese EQ.  This is also along a fault off California at Redondo Beach. This one is known to have been cause by methane replacing the oxygen in the water but this article blames algae...

Redondo Beach fish die-off: Tests show oxygen levels at 'almost zero'
March 8, 2011




Quote
Researchers have measured critically low oxygen levels in King Harbor after a massive die-off in the Redondo Beach marina.

Brent Scheiwe, program director at the SEA Lab in Redondo Beach, said he took dissolved oxygen level readings in the harbor after the first reports of the dead fish came in Tuesday morning and found them at almost zero.

“The levels were critically low," he said. "There was pretty much no oxygen in the water."

Quote
Scientists are working to determine what caused oxygen levels to drop so steeply that fish estimated to be in the millions suffocated and deposited a silver sheen of carcasses, many of them sardines, among the rows of docked boats. It may be days before the precise cause is known.

Quote
Such fish kills have been popping up around the world in what one Louisiana scientist calls “dead zones.” She has spent a career studying America’s largest one, which strikes nearly ever year in an expanse of the Gulf of Mexico about the size of the state of New Jersey.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2011/03/redondo-beach-dead-fish-oxygen-levels-zero.html

The reason that I will go with the methane release is because  a) The Gulf spill releases a LOT of methane and b) there was a huge release of methane and formation of methane hydrite crystals in mud volcanoes just off shore from Redondo Beach at the same time of the fish die off

Quote
In addition to naturally occurring oil and gas seeps in the Santa Barbara Channel, north of Los Angeles, methane and hydrogen sulfide gases are actively discharging at the crest of a mud volcano only 24 kilometers west-southwest of Redondo Beach, California. The mud volcano is 30m high and its top is about the size of a football field. It formed as gas-charged sediment from depth squeezed up to the sea floor, probably along an active fault at the edge of the offshore Santa Monica Basin. The top of the mud volcano is about 800m below the sea surface, and at this depth the water pressure is 80 times the atmospheric pressure at sea level. As a result, water and methane gas at this pressure "freezes" to form what is termed a methane hydrate. The hydrate ice becomes incorporated in the surrounding ocean-floor sediment. The photo of a cross-section of a sediment core (see below) reveals the rapidly disassociating chunk of hydrate (methane ice).
 
When the core was opened on the deck of the research ship, the intense "rotten egg" smell of the hydrogen sulfide, which is incorporated in the hydrate ice along with the methane, together with the hissing and sizzling sounds of the vaporizing gas, made everyone scramble to make sure there were no sources that might ignite the gases, all the while gasping for fresh air.

http://walrus.wr.usgs.gov/cabrillo/tierra/methane_hydrate.html
Note: "Link has been removed"

Offline zorgon

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Re: Methane - Everything you Didn't Want to Know
« Reply #2 on: March 26, 2013, 04:04:41 am »
Found an earlier report dated March 2006

USGS Report of Methane Hydrate Off Southern California Sparks Media Interest


Above: This discovery core shows white methane hydrate mixed with dark mud. The core penetrated and recovered a sample of the upper 2.1 m (5 ft) of a mud volcano 24 km (15 mi) off the southern California coast in the Santa Monica Basin; for details, see the February 2006 issue of Geology (v. 34, no. 2, p. 109-112). Photograph by James Conrad, USGS.

By Jim Hein, Bill Normark, and Helen Gibbons
March 2006

A U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) cruise conducted off southern California in July 2003 unexpectedly recovered methane hydrate from the summit of a mud volcano, in a piston core taken at 800-m water depth (see "USGS Scientists Discover Gas Hydrate in Southern California During Cruise to Study Offshore Landslides, Earthquake Hazards, and Pollution" in Sound Waves, November 2003). USGS researchers studying that core, and other samples collected during the cruise, recently published their findings in the February 2006 issue of Geology (v. 34, no. 2, p. 109-112). The publication set off a flurry of media coverage, mostly focused on the discovery of the methane hydrate, an icelike crystalline solid in which methane gas molecules are trapped. Methane hydrate, which occurs in the pores of permafrost and sub-sea-floor sediment in many places around the globe, is of interest as

    a potential energy source (various nations are trying to determine how to mine it economically),
    a possible trigger of undersea landsliding (methane gas released during dissociation of the hydrate, caused by changes in the temperature or pressure conditions that allow it to form, has the potential to destabilize surrounding sediment),
    a possible contributor to abrupt global climate change (widespread dissociation of methane hydrate—triggered, for example, by rising sea level and consequent changes in sub-sea-floor pressure—could release large amounts of methane gas, a key contributor to the atmospheric warming known as the greenhouse effect), and
    an unknown variable in the global carbon mass balance (we do not know how much carbon is stored in methane hydrate worldwide, nor how much carbon is trapped in pockets of gas beneath impermeable methane hydrate "caps").

(Visit URL http://woodshole.er.usgs.gov/project-pages/hydrates/ for additional information about methane hydrate and URL http://walrus.wr.usgs.gov/cabrillo/tierra/methane
_hydrate.html for additional information about the 2003 discovery off southern California.)

The mud volcano where the methane hydrate was discovered is in the Santa Monica Basin, just 24 km (15 mi) offshore from Los Angeles, the second largest urban region in the United States. Approximately 300 m in diameter at its base and 30 m high, the feature is formed by mud, gas, and fluids moving upward from the sediment fill and perhaps from deeper sources as well, probably along fault ruptures. Other mud volcanoes in the region may likewise host methane hydrates. The proximity of the recently discovered methane hydrate to shipping lanes from Los Angeles and Long Beach would make this deposit particularly difficult to mine.

The mud volcano was discovered in 1992 by USGS scientist Bill Normark and his colleague from the Geological Survey of Canada (GSC), David J.W. Piper, who spotted it in seismic-reflection data collected during a cruise aboard the GSC research vessel Parizeau to study turbidite sedimentation in the Santa Monica Basin. The mud volcano also appears on the seaward edge of multibeam-sonar data collected by USGS scientists Jim Gardner and Peter Dartnell in 1998. When Normark and USGS scientist Jim Hein conferred to pick sampling sites for the 2003 cruise, the mud volcano was an obvious choice for collecting samples that Hein planned to analyze for chemical evidence of fluids and trace metals moving up to the sea floor along faults.

The gas and associated fluids venting through the sea floor at the mud volcano site are at approximately the same temperature as the surrounding seawater (approx 5°C) and so are termed a "cold seep." Like other cold seeps, the Santa Monica Basin site supports dense populations of bivalves. The site is unique, however, in that the composition of the bivalve shells indicates an unusually large amount of methane gas moving upward through the sediment. The shells are severely depleted in the carbon isotope 13C—in fact, they are the most 13C depleted shells of marine macrofauna yet reported. The scientists interpret this extreme 13C depletion as evidence for the extreme flux of methane. Methane sources include breakdown of organic matter in the basin sediment and possible contributions from older hydrocarbon source rocks. Abundant heavy metals (such as mercury, cadmium, thallium, and silver) indicate leaching of basement rocks by fluid circulating along an underlying fault, which also allows for a high flux of fossil methane.

The paper reporting these findings, entitled "Methanogenic calcite, 13C-depleted bivalve shells, and gas hydrate from a mud volcano offshore southern California," was authored by five USGS scientists—Jim Hein, Bill Normark, Brandie McIntyre, Tom Lorenson, and Chuck Powell—and published by the Geological Society of America (GSA) in its journal Geology. GSA routinely asks authors to write a short paragraph about their paper, which is then incorporated into a press release sent to more than 300 science writers worldwide. The paragraph written by first author Hein caught the attention of Alicia Chang of the Associated Press (AP), who called Hein for an interview and then wrote an article based on the interview, the press release, and the Geology paper. Chang's article was picked up by hundreds of newspapers worldwide, including newspapers from every State in the United States, both major and local. The story appeared on many news Web sites (for example, see URL http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory?id=1552545) and aired on CBS affiliate radio stations around the country after CBS News, N.Y., conducted a phone interview with Hein. Importantly, the USGS' Web site was cited in most of the stories. Ann Cairns (GSA media relations) said that the media response to this paper was among the largest they have seen for papers published by GSA.


Above: Closeup of the mud volcano in a high-resolution seismic-reflection profile created from Huntec deep-tow boomer data collected by the Geological Survey of Canada in 1992. The boomer source and receiver were towed about 200 m below the sea surface; resolution is about 40 cm. V.E., vertical exaggeration.


Above: Seismic-reflection profile collected by the Geological Survey of Canada in 1992. The mud volcano from which methane hydrate was recovered in 2003 is labeled "Hydrate Site." Note that internal reflectors are not visible in or below the mud volcano; they are obscured by gas contained in the sediment and by deformation of the sediment as it was squeezed up to form the mud volcano. South of the mud volcano are additional areas where deeper reflections are not visible, probably because of gas accumulating along horizons as shallow as 60 m below the sea floor. The width of the black line above the mud volcano represents the 30-m-diameter circle within which core samples were collected in 2003.

http://soundwaves.usgs.gov/2006/03/research.html

Here are some more headlines


USGS Scientists Discover Gas Hydrate in Southern California During Cruise to Study Offshore Landslides, Earthquake Hazards, and Pollution
November 2003
http://soundwaves.usgs.gov/2003/11/

Gas Hydrate in the Northern Gulf of Mexico Has Puzzling Characteristics and Could Pose a Hazard to Deep Drilling
July 2003
http://soundwaves.usgs.gov/2003/07/fieldwork.html

Gas Hydrate Studied in the Northern Gulf of Mexico
September 2002
http://soundwaves.usgs.gov/2002/09/

Gas Hydrate Studies
U.S. Geological Survey (USGS)
http://woodshole.er.usgs.gov/project-pages/hydrates/

Scientists Find Frozen Methane Gas Deposit
ABC News
http://abcnews.go.com/Technology

Offline zorgon

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Re: Methane - Everything you Didn't Want to Know
« Reply #3 on: March 26, 2013, 04:10:54 am »
Gas Hydrate Studied in the Northern Gulf of Mexico



Coring from the Marion Dufresne was conducted within three areas of the northern Gulf of Mexico—Tunica Mound, Bush Hill, and Mississippi Canyon—to investigate the effect of different geologic settings and sub-sea-floor conditions on the presence of gas hydrate. Additional coring was conducted in Pigmy and Orca Basins to study pollutant sequestration and contaminant-input history.

Quote
By Bill Winters and Tom Lorenson
September 2002       

A giant piston-coring cruise with multiple objectives was recently completed by a group of scientists from the United States, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Canada, Japan, Greece, Russia, and Mexico to better understand natural-gas-hydrate distribution across the continental slope of the northern Gulf of Mexico. Gas hydrate, an icelike crystalline solid containing high concentrations of methane, is a potential energy resource. It is also a hazard to hydrocarbon exploration and production, and may influence global climate change.

Although the amount of gas hydrate in the natural environment is enormous, little is known about its distribution in sea-floor sediment or even exactly how it forms. Exploring these and other questions was among the goals of the recently completed coring cruise conducted jointly by the Institut Polaire Franais, Paul-ƒmile Victor (IPEV), and the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) aboard the 120-m-long French research vessel Marion Dufresne. The cruise, partly funded by the U.S. Department of Energy, originated in Cancœn, Mexico, on July 1 and ended in Tampa, FL, on July 18.
   
Unlike any U.S. research vessel, the Marion Dufresne has a unique, unobstructed starboard main deck that allows the deployment and recovery of IPEV's "Calypso" corer. That piston-coring system, driven by a 6-tonne weight stand, has obtained cores as long as 64.5 m. In the Gulf of Mexico, 18 giant Calypso piston cores as much as 38 m long were collected under the direction of the chief of operations, Yvon Balut (IPEV), at Tunica Mound, at Bush Hill, and near or within the Mississippi Canyon (see map). The cores are being used to study the distribution of natural gas hydrate through geochemical analyses of pore water and gas samples, as well as physical-property measurements obtained from the cores. The results are also being correlated with seismic records to assess the potential for using such records to locate sub-sea-floor gas hydrate.

The Gulf of Mexico is unique in the world for containing significant amounts of both biogenic gas hydrate (hydrate formed in shallow sediment by microbial production of methane) and thermogenic hydrate (hydrate formed by deep natural gas leaking into the shallow subsurface sediment). The possible presence of gas hydrate in the northern Gulf of Mexico has been inferred from geophysical data, but before this cruise, samples have been recovered from only the uppermost few meters of sediment by shallow coring or submersible vessels, typically on sea-floor mounds. Much of this cruise focused on finding evidence for the existence of gas hydrate away from obvious sea-floor gas-hydrate mounds and at depth in the sediment.

The generation of gas caused by hydrate dissociation was spectacularly demonstrated when the uppermost several meters of one core blew vertically out the end of the core barrel, flew at least 10 m into the air, and landed in the gulf waters next to the ship. The gas hydrate remained on the surface of the water because of its low density and floated away as it dissociated. Other gas hydrate, recovered during the cruise, was present either as particles distributed throughout the sediment or as massive chunks that filled the entire 10-cm diameter of the core liner. The hydrate samples were preserved in liquid nitrogen for future shore-based laboratory testing.

http://soundwaves.usgs.gov/2002/09/

Offline zorgon

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Re: Methane - Everything you Didn't Want to Know
« Reply #4 on: March 26, 2013, 04:12:54 am »
Scientists discover frozen methane gas deposit off California
1/28/06 | Alicia Chang - ap


Quote
Posted on Saturday, January 28, 2006 11:39:14 AM by NormsRevenge

LOS ANGELES (AP) - Scientists have discovered an undersea deposit of frozen methane just off the Southern California coast, but whether it can be harnessed as a potential energy source is unknown.

The size of the deposit is unknown but the researchers believe it to be substantial.

In recent years, there has been a growing interest in tapping methane hydrates, ice-like crystals that form under seabeds and Arctic permafrost.

Scientists estimate that the methane trapped in previously known frozen reservoirs around the globe could power the world for centuries. But finding the technology to mine such deposits has proved elusive.

The newly discovered deposit is located at the summit of a mud volcano 15 miles off the Southern California coast. Scientists were plumbing the Pacific Ocean on an unrelated expedition when they accidentally came across the volcano, which sits on top of an active fault zone in the Santa Monica Basin.

To scientists' surprise, the ecosystem surrounding the methane hydrate site was unlike any of the vast hydrate deposits around the world.

Scientists found seashells and clams with unique characteristics, suggesting the area experiences an extreme flux of methane - gas mixing with water, said Jim Hein, a marine geologist at the U.S. Geological Survey in Menlo Park.

Hein said it would probably be difficult to mine the hydrate deposit as an energy source because of its proximity to shipping lanes and to major cities including Los Angeles. The giant twin ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach are nearby.

The discovery was detailed in February's issue of the journal Geology.

Methane hydrates, which resemble sugar crystals, form over hundreds of thousands of years when methane gas and water are at freezing temperatures and under intense pressure.

The hydrates contain methane, the primary component of clean-burning natural gas, in a highly concentrated form. By some estimates, they contain twice was much carbon energy than all other fossil fuels combined.

Although scientists say a new source of natural gas would provide a near-limitless energy source, some worry about the environmental effects of the gas.

Gas hydrate deposits contain about three times the amount of methane currently in the atmosphere, and some scientists say an increase could lead to global warming and a significant change of the world's climate.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1566941/posts

Offline zorgon

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Re: Methane - Everything you Didn't Want to Know
« Reply #5 on: March 26, 2013, 04:13:58 am »
Gulf Oil BP Spill
Deepwater Horizon oil spill


Not going to go into a lot of detail on the spill here, but one of the reasons it was so hard to plug was the enormous amount and pressure of methane gas...

Quote
The greatest impact was on marine species. The spill area hosted 8,332 species, including more than 1,200 fish, 200 birds, 1,400 molluscs, 1,500 crustaceans, 4 sea turtles and 29 marine mammals. In addition to the 14 species under federal protection, the spill threatened 39 more ranging from "whale sharks to seagrass". Damage to the ocean floor especially endangered the Louisiana pancake batfish whose range is entirely contained within the spill-affected area. The oil contained approximately 40% methane by weight, compared to about 5% found in typical oil deposits. Methane can potentially suffocate marine life and create "dead zones" where oxygen is depleted. During a January 2013 flyover, former NASA physicist Bonny Schumaker noted a "dearth of marine life" in a radius 30 to 50 miles (48 to 80 km) around the well. In March 2012, a definitive link was found between the death of a Gulf coral community and the spill

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deepwater_Horizon_oil_spill

So there you have it, confirmed 'dead zones' mentioned in the Redondo Beach story are indeed caused by methane releases.

And the key point for this thread

"40% methane by weight, compared to about 5% found in typical oil deposits"
« Last Edit: March 26, 2013, 02:19:21 pm by zorgon »

Offline zorgon

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Re: Methane - Everything you Didn't Want to Know
« Reply #6 on: March 26, 2013, 04:19:53 am »
Now on to another upcoming problem... the melting of the polar ice caps...

Record Methane in Arctic early March 2013

The image below, produced by Dr. Leonid Yurganov, shows methane levels for the first ten days of March 2013.



Quote
Methane levels for this period are at record highs in the Barents and Norwegian Seas, i.e. the highest levels ever recorded by IASI, which is is short for Infrared Atmospheric Sounding Interferometer, a Fourier transform spectrometer on board the European EUMETSAT Metop satellite that has supplied data since 2007.

The record levels are indicated on the image below at the top right, while the geographical location of the four domains distinguished in the image are illustrated on the image further below.





Quote
The image at the top of this post displays average methane levels for the period March 1 to 10, 2013, at 600 mb. On individual days and on specific locations, methane levels could be much higher, as illustrated by the NOAA image below showing methane levels reaching a high of 2237 ppb on March 6, 2013, at 742 mb. The empty image further below is added to help distinguish land contours.



Quote
The earlier post Dramatic increase in methane in the Arctic in January 2013 showed that high methane levels lined up closely with the contours of land and sea ice. The same is the case for the record levels of methane in early March, as illustrated by the animation below.


IASI methane levels March 1-10, 2013 against
NSIDC sea ice concentration map March 12, 2013.
Note: this is a 3.09 file that may take some time to fully load.


Finally, two maps showing temperature anomalies. The NOAA image below shows Sea Surface Temperature anomalies of over 8 degrees Celsius on March 8, 2013.



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Air temperatures are more volatile than sea temperatures, as the wind can quickly change the situation. The image below shows how, as the jet stream weakens in speed and becomes more wavier, large patches with over 20 degrees Celsius surface temperature anomalies can extend into the Arctic.



Quote
BTW, the above image also shows large temperature anomalies in Antarctica, which has also shown high levels of methane recently. This will be discussed in more detail in a post elsewhere soon.

Posted by Sam Carana

http://arctic-news.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/record-methane-in-arctic-early-march-2013.html
« Last Edit: March 26, 2013, 02:20:28 pm by zorgon »

Offline zorgon

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Re: Methane - Everything you Didn't Want to Know
« Reply #7 on: March 26, 2013, 02:39:25 pm »
The Day The Oceans Boiled (VARIOUS SEGMENTS)

[youtube]G19Vg24motc[/youtube]

[youtube]0FDvtFL0iYE[/youtube]



[youtube]iDBt07skLbQ#![/youtube]

Offline zorgon

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Re: Methane - Everything you Didn't Want to Know
« Reply #8 on: March 26, 2013, 02:56:46 pm »
The Gates of Hell

Quote
Derweze (Turkmen language: The Gate, also known as Darvaza) is a village in Turkmenistan of about 350 inhabitants, located in the middle of the Karakum Desert, about 260 km north from Ashgabat.



Quote
The Derweze area is rich in natural gas. While drilling in 1971, Soviet geologists tapped into a cavern filled with natural gas. The ground beneath the drilling rig collapsed, leaving a large hole with a diameter of 70 metres (230 ft) at 40°15?10?N 58°26?22?E. To avoid poisonous gas discharge, it was decided the best solution was to burn it off.[3] Geologists had hoped the fire would use all the fuel in a matter of days, but the gas is still burning today. Locals have dubbed the cavern "The Door to Hell".



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derweze

[youtube]TEjoga1yrn0[/youtube]

The Oil Drilling Companies will likely destroy Earth before the Nukes will :D

Offline zorgon

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Re: Methane - Everything you Didn't Want to Know
« Reply #9 on: March 26, 2013, 03:00:58 pm »
Toxic Sinkhole Threatens Southeastern Louisiana



Quote
A giant sinkhole that sprouted up overnight last summer in Assumption Parish, LA is swallowing trees and belching toxic fumes as it expands across the otherwise sleepy swamp waters of  southeastern Louisiana.

The sinkhole, which was reportedly caused by a release of natural gas, has been a debacle for residents.  The most recent flyover footage of the sinkhole is available here.

Robert Mann, a professor of communications at Louisiana State University, published a local resident’s impassioned plea to Louisiana’s Governor, Bobby Jindal, to tackle the problem:

    WHERE ARE YOU BOBBY JINDAL?????

    Need I remind you there is a sinkhole in Bayou Corne/Grand Bayou, which was declared a State of Emergency by your office on August 3rd, where 150 households were forced to evacuate from the area and are living in campers, hotels, rent houses, etc. There are mini earthquakes, methane, benzene and hydrogen sulfide being released into the community. This community has been through hell and back and are still living a nightmare. In my opinion and many others you have completely turned your back on this community, and you have done absolutely nothing helpful to this community. You haven’t even had the decency to come visit the site, do a flyover and meet with residents to show your support and pledge accountability by all parties, Texas Brine and your agencies alike. Your inaction is very upsetting to many people. It is unacceptable and cannot and will not be tolerated. We all understand your aspiration to be president, but what you need to remember is that in the meantime you have a state to run and that is your responsibility, and you have people depending on your leadership. Mr. Jindal, I have asked twice on the news, myself and many others have sent countless emails and letters to your office and to no avail. Seems you are too busy. You simply cannot continue to ignore this disaster and turn your back on a community that is pleading for your help and leadership and you must get personally involved. We await your response, Sir.

As do I . . .

http://www.forbes.com/sites/williampentland/2013/03/03/toxic-sinkhole-threatens-southeastern-louisiana/


Offline zorgon

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Re: Methane - Everything you Didn't Want to Know
« Reply #10 on: March 26, 2013, 03:06:24 pm »
Updating The Louisiana Sinkhole Earthquakes

...with methane that has been bubbling to the surface all over Louisiana as well ...

Quote
Posted on February 28, 2013   by horse237

Earthquakes have stopped work on the sinkhole in Assumption parish (county) Louisiana. The sinkhole had grown to 9 1/2 acres in recent weeks. A huge field of natural gas mixed with petroleum had begun to surface immediately west of the sinkhole. Hydrogen sulfide has been emerging in the area as well. This had already stopped all attempts to flare off butane that had been stored in adjacent salt caverns. In addition one of the caverns is used to store radioactive waste and is being monitored by Sandia National Labs.

The sinkhole is an area where salt caverns had been used by Department of Energy to store butane and propane as part of America’s Strategic Energy Reserve program. There are 3 salt dome caverns to the east of the sinkhole containing 18.8 million barrels of butane and propane. The area has salt deposits which commercial enterprises have hydraulically mined for salt producing a salt brine product which they sell to chemical companies. The hollowed out salt dome caverns are often leased as storage facilities. The caverns at this site are all about twice the size of the Empire State building. There are several caverns that had been empty but have now been filled with methane that has been bubbling to the surface all over Louisiana as well as other places around the world. I believe that methane hydrate around the world has been melting due to increased magma flow underneath the surface. This may be related to increased earthquake and volcanic activity around the globe. There are reports that there is 50 or 60 billion tons of methane hydrate under the arctic ice cap. Methane hydrate has melted en masse in the past and caused extinction level events in wide areas of the earth. Some scientists have cause for concern in the Gulf of Mexico as well as the arctic for such a sudden release of a billion tons of methane.

Methane does burn but it is not as explosive as butane and propane. The Assumption Parish Police Jury said that the seismic monitors indicated too much activity to continue working. The latest project had been to build a barrier to stop the sinkhole from increasing in size. It seems that the salt cavern walls have lost integrity as the Jury said there is a lot of fluid in the area of the DOE storage caverns. This means that any spark could set off an explosion which I have estimated could be in excess of 2 megatons. This is equal to a 6.0 or greater earthquake. The combination of the radioactive waste and a 2 megaton explosion would make a spectacular dirty bomb. New Orleans is 75 miles away. The state capitol Baton Rouge is 50 miles away.

Independent observers have noticed sudden unexplained fires at various locations around the world. Some believe that building have accumulated natural releases of methane and hydrogen sulfide. These have ignited killing people and burning buildings. Officials in Assumption parish have checked buildings for accumulation of methane to prevent fires.

I have written about this sinkhole in the past and about the New Madrid fault zone as well. I do believe we are likely to have a series of major earthquakes on the New Madrid fault in 2013 which will devastate America. Following are some facts from those articles.

The US has more than 300,000 miles (482,803 Km) of natural gas pipelines and 150,000 miles (241,402 Km)  of crude  oil and gasoline pipelines. The New Madrid fault line is in the center of America and is near most oil and natural gas sources. A series of New Madrid quakes would mean that the New York banks would no longer be able to send Americans off to fight wars and to loot foreign nations.

I have predicted that there will be California earthquakes not long after the New Madrid quakes. For the benefit of those who have not experienced an earthquake please note that an 8.35 quake releases as much energy as two 25 megaton Hydrogen bombs. I have advised everyone to drive their cars with as full a tank as possible, The power grid is going down and you will want more than a 2 day’s supply of gas especially if you need to relocate due to riots or fires or a lack of drinking water. Also please be advised that the 1906 San Francisco quake threw a road 20 feet. That would do serious damage to your house, your car and the roads as well as to the water and sewer pipes which are vital to your daily life.

http://vidrebel.wordpress.com/2013/02/28/video-updating-the-louisiana-sinkhole-earthquakes/


Offline zorgon

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Re: Methane - Everything you Didn't Want to Know
« Reply #11 on: March 26, 2013, 03:11:28 pm »
NASA and the NAVY chime in...

Methane Explosion Warmed the Prehistoric Earth, Possible Again
December 10, 2001


A tremendous release of methane gas frozen beneath the sea floor heated the Earth by up to 13°F (7°C) 55 million years ago, a new NASA study confirms. NASA scientists used data from a computer simulation of the paleo-climate to better understand the role of methane in climate change. While most greenhouse gas studies focus on carbon dioxide, methane is 20 times more potent as a heat-trapping gas in the atmosphere.

In the last 200 years, atmospheric methane has more than doubled due to decomposing organic materials in wetlands and swamps and human aided emissions from gas pipelines, coal mining, increases in irrigation and livestock flatulence.

However, there is another source of methane, formed from decomposing organic matter in ocean sediments, frozen in deposits under the seabed.

"We understand that other greenhouse gases apart from carbon dioxide are important for climate change today," said Gavin Schmidt, the lead author of the study and a researcher at NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York, NY and Columbia University's Center for Climate Systems Research. "This work should help quantify how important they have been in the past, and help estimate their effects in the future."

The study will be presented on December 12, 2001, at the American Geophysical Union (AGU) Fall Meeting in San Francisco, Calif.

Generally, cold temperatures and high pressure keep methane stable beneath the ocean floor, however, that might not always have been the case. A period of global warming, called the Late Paleocene Thermal Maximum (LPTM), occurred around 55 million years ago and lasted about 100,000 years. Current theory has linked this to a vast release of frozen methane from beneath the sea floor, which led to the earth warming as a result of increased greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.

A movement of continental plates, like the Indian subcontinent, may have initiated a release that led to the LPTM, Schmidt said. We know today that when the Indian subcontinent moved into the Eurasian continent, the Himalayas began forming. This uplift of tectonic plates would have decreased pressure in the sea floor, and may have caused the large methane release. Once the atmosphere and oceans began to warm, Schmidt added, it is possible that more methane thawed and bubbled out. Some scientists speculate current global heating could eventually lead to a similar scenario in the future if the oceans warm substantially.

When methane (CH4) enters the atmosphere, it reacts with molecules of oxygen (O) and hydrogen (H), called OH radicals. The OH radicals combine with methane and break it up, creating carbon dioxide (CO2) and water vapor (H2O), both of which are greenhouse gases. Scientists previously assumed that all of the released methane would be converted to CO2 and water after about a decade. If that happened, the rise in CO2 would have been the biggest player in warming the planet. But when scientists tried to find evidence of increased CO2 levels to explain the rapid warming during the LPTM, none could be found.

The models used in the new study show that when you greatly increase methane amounts, the OH quickly gets used up, and the extra methane lingers for hundreds of years, producing enough global warming to explain the LTPM climate.

"Ten years of methane is a blip, but hundreds of years of atmospheric methane is enough to warm up the atmosphere, melt the ice in the oceans, and change the whole climate system," Schmidt said. "So we may have solved a conundrum."

Schmidt said the study should help in understanding the role methane plays in current greenhouse warming.

"If you want to think about reducing future climate change, you also have to be aware of greenhouse gases other than carbon dioxide, like methane and chlorofluorocarbons," said Schmidt. "It gives a more rounded view, and in the short-term, it may end up being more cost-efficient to reduce methane in the atmosphere than it is to reduce carbon dioxide."
Reference

Schmidt, G.A., and D.T. Shindell 2003. Atmospheric composition, radiative forcing, and climate change as a consequence of a massive methane release from gas hydrates. Paleoceanography 18, no. 1, 1004, doi:10.1029/2002PA000757.
Media Contacts

Timothy R. Tawney, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD. Phone: 301/614-6573. ttawney@pop100.gsfc.nasa.gov

Krishna Ramanujan, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD. Phone: 301/286-3026. kramanuj@pop900.gsfc.nasa.gov

This article was derived from the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Top Story.

http://www.giss.nasa.gov/research/news/20011210/

METHANE HYDRATE MAP - NRL



Occurrences of Natural Methane Hydrate Deposits Worldwide

This graphic shows current known methane hydrate, or frozen methane gas, deposits worldwide. Methane hydrate occurs in ocean sediments along continental margins beneath the sea floor where water depths exceed 300 to 500 meters (about 1000 to 1600 feet) and cold temperatures and high pressure keep the methane stable. It also exists in permafrost. This unique substance forms when molecules of frozen water encase molecules of methane. The methane itself is created by decomposing organic matter in ocean sediments. Scientists are currently trying to figure out how to tap these huge stores of fossil fuel, without releasing methane into the atmosphere where it would exacerbate global warming. Credit: Naval Research Laboratory




Occurrences of Natural Methane Hydrate Deposits Worldwide

This graphic shows current known methane hydrate, or frozen methane gas, deposits worldwide. Methane hydrate occurs in ocean sediments along continental margins beneath the sea floor where water depths exceed 300 to 500 meters (about 1000 to 1600 feet) and cold temperatures and high pressure keep the methane stable. It also exists in permafrost. This unique substance forms when molecules of frozen water encase molecules of methane. The methane itself is created by decomposing organic matter in ocean sediments. Scientists are currently trying to figure out how to tap these huge stores of fossil fuel, without releasing methane into the atmosphere where it would exacerbate global warming. Credit: Naval Research Laboratory

Natural and Anthropogenic Sources of Current Atmospheric Methane
While most greenhouse gas studies focus on carbon dioxide, methane is 20 times more potent as a heat-trapping gas in the atmosphere. This pie chart shows natural and anthropogenic sources and relative quantities of methane currently released into the atmosphere.

Natural sources include wetlands, termites, decomposing organic materials in ocean and fresh water, and methane hydrate. Anthropogenic influenced sources include livestock flatulence, rice paddies, biomass burning, landfills, coal mining, and gas production, with rice paddies and livestock flatulence being the major sources of methane.

In the last 200 years, atmospheric methane has more than doubled largely due to human influences. Some scientists speculate current global heating could eventually warm the oceans enough to thaw frozen methane beneath the sea floor, leading to an increase of methane in the atmosphere. The findings of this research show that when large amounts of methane were released 55 million years ago, the planet warmed by up to 13°F (7°C). Credit: U.S. Dept. of Energy Technology Laboratory, National Methane Hydrate Program




Methane Explosion Warmed Prehistoric Earth

This graphic depicts the transfer of frozen methane deposits beneath the sea floor to the atmosphere. Generally, cold temperatures and high pressure keep the methane stable beneath the sea floor. But during the Late Paleocene Thermal Maximum (LPTM), around 55 million years ago, scientists believe movement of tectonic plates reduced the pressure in the sea floor and released the methane. When that happened, the methane bubbled out into the atmosphere, where it acted as a greenhouse gas, and heated the planet by up to 13°F (7°C). It is also possible that once the atmosphere and oceans began to warm, more methane thawed and bubbled out. Credit: Debbi McLean, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Multimedia Design Studio
« Last Edit: March 26, 2013, 03:17:00 pm by zorgon »

 


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