Over a decade ago, massive craters emerged in the Siberian permafrost. Reindeer herders in 2013 discovered the largest of the cylindrical and mysterious features first found in 2012. The Deryabinsky crater explosion was heard by indigenous villagers over 62 miles away, and the sky had an eerie glow in the Taimyr peninsula.
This part of far north Russia is a region of deep concern for global climate scientists. It is saturated with methane buried in now thawing permafrost and is close to the Laptev, East Siberian, and Kara Sea's continental shelves that collectively form Earth's most enormous continental shelf with hefty stores of terrestrial methane and marine methane hydrates.
The continental shelf contains vast deposits of methane hydrates; it is what renowned climatologist Jason Box said in 2014 that if even a small part of the gas is released, "we are fucked”. Methane hydrates in an ocean environment have historically been consumed by methanotroph bacteria, the organisms' only energy supply before the greenhouse gas reaches the surface and into the atmosphere. Methane bubbles have been detected in seas off of Siberia. This phenomenon can be explored in detail in another diary.
"Methane is more than 20 times more potent than CO2 in trapping infrared as part of the natural greenhouse effect. Methane getting to the surface—that's potent stuff." Box told Brian Merchant in an interview with Vox News.
The explosive craters are located only in Siberia, not Canada or Alaska. They are isolated in Russia, located only in the Western Siberian Yamal and Gydan peninsulas (map image). Only eight have been discovered.
So why do these fiery explosions not occur elsewhere in the frozen soils of Eurasia or North America? Scientists believe that "hot natural gas, seeping up through some kind of geological fault, is building up under the frozen layer of soil and heating the permafrost from below." Siberia is warming five times as fast as the rest of the planet and has experienced multiple terrestrial and marine heat waves over the last few years, indicating that the permafrost may be an active tipping point.
Business Insider writes:
Researchers have confirmed that hot gas, methane, builds up under the permafrost and weakens the frozen soil enough that an explosion can occur as global warming continues unabated.
Now scientists are proposing that hot natural gas seeping from underground reserves might be behind the explosive burst.
The findings could explain why the craters are only appearing in specific areas in Siberia.
The area is known for its vast underground reserves of natural gas, the study's lead author Helge Hellevang, who is a professor of environmental geosciences at the University of Oslo in Norway, told Business Insider.
"When climate change or atmosphere warming is weakening the other part of the permafrost, then you get these outbursts — only in Siberia," he said.
Deryabinsky crater update:
Nordstream has not helped the methane problem in the Arctic, where temperatures are warming four times faster than the rest of the planet.
Methane bubbles on Siberia's tundra.
Why the explosions matter.
