Vast methane belch possible at any time

• Autores: Fred Pearce
• Localización: New scientist, ISSN 0262-4079, Nº. 2927, 2013, pág. 16
• Idioma: inglés
• Texto completo no disponible (Saber más ...)
• Resumen

  • A sudden methane burp in the Arctic could set the world back a colossal $60 trillion. Billions of tons of the greenhouse gas methane are trapped just below the surface of the East Siberian Arctic shelf. Melting means the area is poised to deliver a giant gaseous belch at any moment--one that could bring global warming forward 35 years and cost the equivalent of almost a year's global GDP. Concern about a possible eruption has grown since 2010, when research cruises over the shelf by Natalia Shakhova and Igor Semiletov, both now at the University of Alaska at Fairbanks, found plumes of methane as much as a kilometer wide bubbling to the surface.