Capturing Methane Releases From Permafrost

Aesop had a fable "The Boy Who Cried Wolf " Though Aesop didn't intend to sell newspapers with his stories as the Washington Post does. The Washington Post's writers can pick and choose their truths in the composition of their stories. The shock factor of the story has a bit to do with what page the writers story makes or if it even makes it They are well known to twist those truth for their own agenda.

Aesop was trying to teach not make a buck.

There are loads of uses for methane (aka natural gas). The difficulty is in capturing it from a large surface with millions of areas bubbling up. Your idea of covering the land mass with plastic sheating and collecting the gas via piping is as good as any, I'd think. It is so diffuse, though, that a lot of plastic and piping would be required. We can hope that gas vendors are looking at ways to collect it. But gas is often flared off even when it is concentrated, because it is a nuisance.

The concerns, from an article of about two years ago:

• While carbon dioxide gets most of the attention in the global warming debate, methane is pound-for-pound a more potent greenhouse gas, capable of trapping some 20 times more heat than CO2. Although methane is present in much lower quantities in the atmosphere, its potency makes it responsible for about one-fifth of man-made warming.
• The gas is found in natural gas deposits and is generated naturally by bacteria that break down organic matter, such as in the guts of farm animal. About two-thirds of global methane comes from man-made sources, and levels have more than doubled since the industrial revolution.

Now things are worse yet. But we are increasing our CO2 generation levels, so things can be expected to get worse than the predictions (which were already pretty dire).

Perhaps the only viable solution at this point is to tune into Fox news, which has been demonstrated to make people stupider. Then all this goes away, at least in your mind. They have a history of poo pooing all this science stuff. What can a bunch of smart people know?

The trapped methane must be the reason why Top Gear fitted a flame thrower to a snow plough.

OP pretty much answers his own questions with his musings.

Q: What methods could be used to capture a little of this methane for practical purposes...?

A: the same methods presently used to capture, contain and reticulate. A little would be pretty pointless. A lot could even be profitable.

Q: what uses would be most valuable?

A: Same uses it is presently used for but just more of it.

If the idea is to burn naturally occurring methane to produce a less potent green house gas ie CO2 then what impact does the heat released have on the warming equation? We want to start fitting re-breathers onto our cattle and harvesting all man made sources of methane too.

Exchanging one non renewable fuel for another will not help much if it really is helping that is needed.

Climate change and sea level variation is natural.

OZZB put it in perspective and I re-iterate that journalists haven't the faintest idea of what they think they're writing about concerning methane permafrost capture. Had they ever been to the arctic then they might have understood the idea of it's vast expanse. They'd also see that methane release is not subject to singular areas but fluctuates from spot to spot, year by year. Finding those 'spots' is no easy task...........containing them virtually impossible!

The gas is not entirely methane either. It contains residues of rotting flesh and other heavier volatiles. Much of this methane will gum up the orifices used in burning it.

As to peat.......northern Ontario has peat beds that cover most of the northern portions starting at around Timmins. Some of these beds are 00's of feet deep and are easily accessible. Containors made from peat would, however, be a darn good idea. It's sterile by nature making it a good food packaging item. It's also biodegradable.

I wonder how much methane would be required to manufacture a couple of hundred square miles of plastic sheet. And if you would get enough methane to justify it. And then of course, what would you DO with that pile of plastic when it degrades or otherwise becomes uselss. Just let it get flushed into the ocean and into the digestive systems of seals I guess. Just like all the rest of the plastic.

If it can work in a garbage dump, why can't it work in a peat bog? The area can be heated up with plastic covering. I am talking about a the size of a couple of football fields at a time. Recovered heat can be used to speed up the process. The plastic can be burned when it is too old to reuse, the heat can be used for the greenhouses. With an appropriate boiler the peat itself could be dried and burned to accelerate the process in confined areas.

Sounds like an easy experiment to try then. I suspect the mass of the biomass in the form of black flies might well exceed the mass of the methane coming off the bog. You know the provincial bird of Northern Ontario is the mosquito don'tca?

it sounds like a good idea as the permafrost should trap the methane near the surface. i have to questions. how thick is the peat and is it it hot enough at that depth to produce methane?

The methane is already being released naturally, during the arctic summers. Depth of bogs varies, but some is very deep. Covering the bog with plastic would warm it, and increase the flow of methane. Geothermal heat would be above normal because of the natural decaying that is going on. A combination of geothermal, methane heat, electrical heat from methane generators, lighting waste heat, greenhouse effect with insulated greenhouses, peat burning etc. could all be used. Cabbage, lettuce,spinach, beets, carrots, potatoes, and many other plants do not require hot temperatures, but would still need the greenhouses.

I'm not a scientist...unless, of course, I join the Union of Concerned Scientists and at that point I am one of the world's top scientists. Just ask them!

Wood by most accounts is now a "green fuel" in that when it is burned it produces CO2. That CO2 is then taken into a growing tree to make the wood fibre. So, it is considered carbon neutral.

Can't the same be said for peat? It grows, it dies, rots, or gets burned just like wood and produces these carbon containing compounds. Then new peat grows and consumes these same products that it produced for a continuous cycle. It should be known as a green product also.

Just as soon as I join the Union of Concerned Scientists, I'll be credible won't I? Well, maybe not, as these thoughts are probably not what they would have you think.

according to some logging companies, 1000 year old redwood trees are a renewable resource. i wished i was that optimistic.

A very partial list of the problems you will be facing in this project are....

lack of easily accessible markets.

a total lack of existing infrastructure

a whole science, which for the lack of a better name might be called the "science of mud management

the weather.

ownership of the land

stewardship of the land

Racist attitudes

A successful energy creation source will need pipelines, roads, and other infrastructure. Even if you just used local green houses and such without moving any of the energy to markets in the south, you will still need footings for buildings, roads, airstrips and living spaces. Such projects might be viable in the small scale, to help support a village for instance. As such, there may be a need for carbon capture.

The thawing permafrost is a reality. It creates deep pools of mud, cold sucking DEEP mud which can swallow heavy equipment and makes a mockery of road creation. When drilling rigs are built up there, they lay down acres of insulated plywood to keep the sun off the surface...because when it starts to melt, there is no moving anything anywhere, and they make sure they are out of there before it gets too bad.

When the permafrost melts, organisms trapped in the ice come awake and rot available organic matter. This activity warms the area, causing sudden pools of liquid mud to form. Hillsides start to slump. Acres of ground wash away. Thermokarsts are the name for such areas....and the ecological devestation is phenomonal....cubic hectares of soil suddenly become liquid and flow away into rivers, leaving crater like pock marks all over the area. Even if, for instance, you were to build your processing plant to "float", you never know when one side or the other of the material which supports your foundation will suddenly give way and next thing you know, your building is tilting and becoming unuseable.

Hunting lifestyles are going to be curtailed, leaving a self sustaining culture which existed for thousands of years dependent upon outside technology. Which is happening now, of course, however what we notice is that when you don't have anything to sell to the outside world, your community will become unviable.

The discovery of methane as a source of energy is very exciting and may well have some legs. The technical problems of recovering it are not insurmountable...a pile of trash can have pipes driven through it when it is being built, you would have to come up with something different here. Your markets are not going to be the cars circling the beltway in DC, but rather the local people whose lifestyles have been heavily modified by the modern world.

Black flies and mud in the summer. Minus fifty degree plus wind chill in the winter. No theatres, no shopping malls, no cell phones. No alcohol. Lots of fishing. Sounds like a great place to raise your kids....grin! No really!

I remember dropping a wrench over the side of an airplane wing in Slave Lake about twenty years ago. It was forty five below. The steel wrench broke. Darndest thing. Things happen in the cold. And there is a lot of it. Everything you do takes longer, costs more, and is more difficult. Perhaps methane might help. Or more likely, wind generation on a more local level might be better. Not sure. But for absolutely sure, if you want to harvest methane, you got your work cut out for you.

Looking forward to your pilot project.

Thanks for your informative comment. I think you make excellent points. My ideal would only be suitable for an area with roads, or alternate transportation. Probably based around a town that could be marketed to. There would have to be some firm areas of ground for greenhouses, equipment, etc. There is plenty of peat in southern Canada, the northern USA, and similar latitudes around the world, that have roads. You would not pick an area without a good market. Extreme cold might also make my idea futile. It would certainly be hard work, but may fit some rugged individualists who are used to cold weather. My idea is not to lessen methane releases, just to use them. Natural gas is so cheap right now in the USA, it might be cheaper to buy it, and focus on maximum insulation of the greenhouses. That would have to be analyzed. Waste heat from other industries, might be available also, it could be piped in a short distance with insulated piping. I think that the far north or far south, and the oceans are the next frontiers.

Peat is considered a "mining" activity, and is regulated as such by the government. Peat bogs do not put out any methane at all. It is the thawing permafrost which is pumping out the methane, an amount which is estimated to exceed that produced by human activities within the decade. (translation...we don't have a chance to stop it now!)

Peat is now being extensively mined even near my place, south of Ottawa. Northern Ontario is still booming with mines. Last I heard a landowner was in jail for fire bombing the company which expropriated his farmland. Just like any company which does strip mining, they don't really clean up after themselves and emotions can run high. Peat mining is problematic. Probably better to just raise cattle on it....and come up with a device which harvests the cow's farts.

At least you get a steak out of it.

The exploitation of peat seems like such a medieval pursuit.

I was surprised to learn that it was still being mined at commercial levels. I can "understand" subsistence exploitation.

That's cow burps not farts that produce most of the methane. (per NatGeo couple of nights ago)

Peat is a highly valuable and self replenishing resource. The amount used by mankind is small compared to the amount continuously reproduced. It is mainly used in horticulture in North America. It is used for energy also in parts of Scandinavia and other areas. Most natural lakes in the North are gradually being filled with it from the bottom up. That is why so many of them are shallow. Methane hydrates were generated from peat and other plants. They may be the largest future source of energy, unless we come up with something else that is competitive.