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Article is from 2011 when it was probably still safe to talk about methane and extinction in the same breath.
Blame
for Extinction Spreads to Methane Gas
Kyrtomisporis speciosus and other fossils' carbon isotopes helped date a mass extinction. - Science/AAAS
25
July, 2011
Two
hundred million years ago, at the end of the Triassic period, a mass
extinction, often attributed to major volcanic activity, wiped out
half of all marine life on Earth. But new research published in the
journal Science suggests that the extinction was more likely to have
been caused by the release of at least 12,000 gigatons of methane
from the seafloor into the atmosphere.
Volcanic
activity occurred over a period of 600,000 years at the end of the
Triassic, while the extinction took place over a period of just
10,000 to 20,000 years, said Micha Ruhl, an earth scientist at the
University of Copenhagen in Denmark and the study’s lead author.
Dr.
Ruhl and his colleagues studied carbon isotopes of sediments from the
period and found that the extinction event coincided with the giant
release of methane into the atmosphere.
Volcanoes
still played in a role in the process, Dr. Ruhl said.
“There
was a release of CO2 from volcanic eruptions that warmed up global
temperatures and also the ocean,” he said. “Methane is only
stable under certain temperatures. If it gets warm, it is released.”
The
study could be foreshadowing the effect of climate change on Earth,
Dr. Ruhl said. An increase of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere from
fossil-fuel use could warm up the planet enough to release methane
from the ocean floors, he said.
“Methane
is a much stronger greenhouse gas than CO2, so potentially that could
result in a strong increase in temperature and climate change,” he
said.
Two
hundred million years ago, at the end of the Triassic period, a mass
extinction, often attributed to major volcanic activity, wiped out
half of all marine life on Earth. But new research published in the
journal Science suggests that the extinction was more likely to have
been caused by the release of at least 12,000 gigatons of methane
from the seafloor into the atmosphere.
Volcanic
activity occurred over a period of 600,000 years at the end of the
Triassic, while the extinction took place over a period of just
10,000 to 20,000 years, said Micha Ruhl, an earth scientist at the
University of Copenhagen in Denmark and the study’s lead author.
Dr.
Ruhl and his colleagues studied carbon isotopes of sediments from the
period and found that the extinction event coincided with the giant
release of methane into the atmosphere.
Volcanoes
still played in a role in the process, Dr. Ruhl said.
“There
was a release of CO2 from volcanic eruptions that warmed up global
temperatures and also the ocean,” he said. “Methane is only
stable under certain temperatures. If it gets warm, it is released.”
The
study could be foreshadowing the effect of climate change on Earth,
Dr. Ruhl said. An increase of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere from
fossil-fuel use could warm up the planet enough to release methane
from the ocean floors, he said.
“Methane
is a much stronger greenhouse gas than CO2, so potentially that could
result in a strong increase in temperature and climate change,” he
said.
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