Infusion of gas and oil into Gulf unlike anything in human history, researcher says

Methane 10,000 times normal has been detected in underwater concentrations of oil and gas in the Gulf of Mexico, researchers from the University of South Florida said Tuesday.

And two federal agencies, NOAA and the Coast Guard, confirmed that yes, there are underwater clouds of oil and gas in the Gulf.

BP CEO Tony Hayward had questioned earlier if such “plumes” existed. Thad Allen, Coast Guard point man for the spill response, said “clouds” would be a better term.

USF researchers, who spent two week on the ship F.G. Walton Smith, told reporters they followed an underwater plume 15 miles by 3 miles and 600 feet thick.

"It's an infusion of oil and gas unlike anything else that has ever been seen anywhere, certainly in human history," said Samantha Joye of the University of Georgia, the expedition leader.

Bacteria feeding on the oil and gas have depleted oxygen to the point there were nearly “dead zones.” But researchers said it was hard to know the ultimate impact on fisheries.

Oil and gas in an area tested 40 miles northeast of the Deepwater Horizon well head showed small levels of 0.5 parts per million, NOAA said. Two other areas tested by USF showed inconclusive results and no certain connection to the BP oil spill.

The research will continue, NOAA said. The researchers are to testify Wednesday before the House Energy Committee.

(Sources: Greenwire. MSNBC and CNN)

Provocative NASA study puts road traffic ahead of power plants as cause of climate change near-term

(Picture of auto traffic from Flickr and photographer Lynac)

A new study from NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies says tailpipe emissions will cause the most global warming over the next decade. Next comes heating homes by burning wood and cow dung in poor countries. Third is methane from cows.

Electric power is further down the list, though it will be the prime source of warming by century’s end, the study predicts. The provocative study, by a team led by NASA’s Nadine Unger, was published this month in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Policy implications
Does this mean we should turn away from fighting the coal industry and focus more on electric cars, high-speed rail and aid to third-world countries? Possibly. We may have a little more time than we thought to shut off coal – as far as global warming is concerned.

But this is just one study. It will need to be confirmed by others.

And the reason behind the findings is troubling. It all has to do with the release of aerosols that block the incoming sunlight and have a temporary cooling effect. Tailpipe emissions don’t have much of those, while coal-fired plants do. Some aerosols, such as sulfates and organic carbon, have a very short-term cooling effect (they are rained down in just a few days), while greenhouse gases stay aloft for decades.

Of course this is a double-edged sword. Aerosols have a known harmful effect on human health and on the environment. That’s why industrialized countries have been phasing them out.

A choice we don’t want to make
Do we have to choose between climate change and our health? Unger says, “no,” that we need to phase out unhealthy aerosols, but that an immediate focus on transportation will give us the biggest bang for our buck in the next decade.

A sound way to proceed is by attacking all sources – tailpipes, burning of wood and dung, cattle-produced methane AND power plants. If we can remove many of the sources of greenhouse gases, we won’t need unhealthy particles in the air to block out the sun.

To read about the study and see graphs go to NASA’s Web site.

See Q&A with Unger. (Caution: Don’t be biased by her picture. She’s a pretty blonde.)

If you want to read the study abstract.

(Sources: NASA, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, fastcompany.com)

Permafrost melt under Arctic Ocean could release huge amounts of greenhouse gas methane

(Photo of Arctic Ocean from Flickr and photographer MarmotChaser)

News Update: If there’s anything scarier than carbon dioxide bringing our planet to a boiling point, it’s methane, which is 20 times more potent. Now comes word that massive methane deposits under the Arctic Ocean are starting to bubble up as water temperatures rise from global warming and the undersea permafrost melts. International researchers, working from a ship along the Siberian continental shelf, report finding intense concentrations of methane in several areas over thousands of square miles. The amount of methane under the seabed – likely there since the last ice age – is believed to exceed global coal reserves, and was thought to be contained by a “lid” of permafrost. But methane in the air and water has been measured by researchers and last week, for the first time, they reported seeing it bubbling up, suggesting that small holes have formed in the undersea permafrost. These are preliminary findings of the International Siberian Shelf Study 2008 and are being prepared for publication by the American Geophysical Union. (Source: The Independent UK )

Environmental Defense Fund lists 'high quality' carbon offsets on new Web site

(Photo of methane capture in landfill from Flickr and photographer meaduva.)

News Update: Thinking about buying carbon offsets to make yourself carbon neutral? After thorough examination, the Environmental Defense Fund has approved 11 projects that offer real reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. The projects, listed on carbonoffsetlist.org, are an effort by ED to provide “high quality offsets” for businesses and individuals who want to counter their carbon footprint by purchasing offsets in the $50 million unregulated carbon market that is often unreliable and sometimes fraudulent. The list is the result of hours of investigation and examination of reams of paperwork and features projects such as capture and combustion of landfill methane. No wind or forest projects are included, perhaps because of the difficulty of measuring the exact savings of GHG. ED said other projects will be added in the future. (Sources: ClimateWire, The Daily Green, Environmental Defense)

Draining wetlands could double greenhouse gases

(Photo of Bolsa Chica wetlands restoration in California from Flickr and and photographer Mollivan Jon)


Weekly Angst: Add wetlands to the list if things that can cause global warming. Swamps and marshes are great carbon sinks, storing about 20% of the carbon and methane on the Earth’s land surface.

But as wetlands dry up from climate change, or are drained for development or agriculture, those greenhouse gases have the potential to do as much damage as industrial emissions. This was a topic of discussion and concern for 700 experts from 28 countries who met at last week’s 8th International Wetlands Conference in Brazil.

Wetlands hold some 770 billion metric tons of greenhouse gases, equal to what's now in the atmosphere. And emissions from wetland have the potential to negate all other steps to stop global warming if we don’t act to preserve these places so essential to the planet’s health.

Bad image
Wetlands get little respect. They have long been seen as useless and yucky, interfering with development, farming and other civilized things. So about 60% of wetlands across the world have been destroyed in the last century. Europe drained 90% of its wetlands for farming, the U.S. has drained more than half of its, and the California coastal region destroyed about 95%.

We know wetlands serve as a habitat for wildlife. We also know that in coastal areas they can buffer against hurricanes. We learned that when Katrina devastated New Orleans. If only the wetlands had been left in place, the impact of the storm wouldn’t have been as great.

Wetlands serve as natural “horizontal levees,” that can prevent flooding by storing floodwater. The recent floods in the Midwest reminded scientists that the Mississippi River once could store 60 days of floodwater in its wetlands, where now it can only store 12 days’ worth.

Wetlands – which include marshes, swamps, river deltas, peat bogs, mangroves and river flood plains – produce 25% of the world’s food, purify water and recharge aquifers.

Some thawing of the Arctic wetlands permafrost is probably inevitable at this point, so efforts to stop draining wetlands in more temperate and tropical climates is essential – not to mention restoration.

Restoration
Some restoration projects are under way – in the Everglades and on the Louisiana coast, with each one costing upwards of $5 billion. But it’s much cheaper to preserve the existing wetlands than have to rebuild them, scientists remind us.

In Southern California, the recently restored Bolsa Chica wetlands are now bursting with birds and fish. The project cost $147 million and culminated 40 years of struggle between environmentalists and developers. Part of the problem was a duck blind constructed by hunters. Now the wetlands connect to the Pacific Ocean basin, as they should.

(Sources: ClimateWire, Greenwire, Reuters )

Melting Arctic ice can signal permafrost thaw and more greenhouse gas emissions

News Update 2: Last summer saw a record Arctic sea ice melt and another record is forecast for this year, according to a new study by the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR). When the sea ice melts, the temperature over land heats up as far as 900 miles away, the study found, and is likely to thaw permafrost in Alaska, Canada and Russia. Permafrost is the long-frozen earth beneath the top layer of ground. When it thaws it releases methane, a greenhouse gas much more potent than CO2. It also can cause the collapse of infrastructure, such as highways, houses, oil rigs and pipelines. Last August-October the temperature over land in the west Arctic was unusually warm, more than 4 degrees Fahrenheit above the average for 1978-2006. Rapid sea ice thaw could lead to rapid permafrost thaw, the scientists said. (Source: Reuters PlanetArk)

Methane, a greenhouse gas, rises ‘sharply’ for the first time in a decade; CO2 is up too

(Photo of Arctic marshes and tundra from Flickr and photographer Royal Olive/G. Oliviera)

News Update: Methane in the atmosphere rose last year for the first time since 1998, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which monitors such things. Methane is a concern because it’s 25 times more potent than carbon dioxide as a heat-trapping gas, though there’s much less of it in the atmosphere. The increase last year was 27 million tons. NOAA speculated that it’s probably coming from the economic boom in Asia and from wetlands uncovered by melting ice in the Arctic and also in the tropics. The main worry about methane is that thawing permafrost in the Arctic will release huge amounts of it. NOAA also announced that CO2 rose 2.4 parts per million last year, to 385 ppm. That compares with 280 until the mid-19th century. A safe level is between 350-450 ppm, depending on who you ask. In the ’60s the annual increase was 1 ppm, in the ‘80s 1.5 ppm, and since 2000 about 2 ppm each year. So last year’s jump may show it’s going to another level. CO2, we know, comes primarily from the burning of fossil fuels. For more, and a chart of recent annual CO2 growth, see Science Daily.)

Canada feels effects of climate change

(Photo of retreating Columbian Icefields from Flickr and photographer Bruno Bolzano)

News Update: Retreating glaciers in the west, sea level rise on Price Edward Island and a dramatic drop in water in the Great Lakes are all the results of climate change, according to a new study on Canada. No region is unaffected, says the report by Natural Resources Canada. There are some advantages: more summer tourism and more land available for forests. But the melting permafrost in northern Canada will damage infrastructure (not to mention release of GHG methane), more likely droughts in the prairies will hurt farmers, and water shortages will impact Ontario. On average, Canada has warmed 1.3 degrees Celsius (2.34 Fahrenheit)since 1948, twice the global average. The province of Quebec has heated up 2 degrees C (3.6 F) just since 1993. For more, see globalandmail.com, 3/11

Etc.: Sweden has a target of 49% renewable energy by 2020, under the EU plan. Already at 40%, nearly all Sweden’s energy, except for transportation, is fossil-fuel free. See PlanetArk, 3/6

Car stickers will show a global warming score in California, starting with the 2009 models. They will be rated 1-10, with 10 the best. Other states are likely to adopt the idea. See the blog, Climate Progress.

Cow dung finds powerful new use

If you’ve read anything about dairy farms you know they produce an incredible amount of manure. That manure decomposes and gives off methane, a very potent greenhouse gas. In fact cattle cause more global warming than cars. Some say the ultimate answer is to stop eating meat and dairy products.

Now a dairy farmer in California has come up with another solution -- a way to capture that methane to power homes. And PG&E is buying it. Vintage Dairy Farms and BioEnergy Solutions have a multi-million-dollar facility that washes the you-know-what in a huge vat until it’s 99% liquid. Then it screens out the solids and pumps it into a gigantic covered lagoon that “digests” it. What’s left produces gas which is piped to Northern California to power about 1,200 homes. Several other dairies have expressed interest. They need to get rid of the stuff some way. Source: Reuters PlanetArk
(Photo from Flickr and photographer *~Laura~*)