What is all that methane in the Arctic Ocean?

The following was a helpful comment on Margo's video that corresponds with our own view of what might be happening:

"Hi Margo, not had time to catch up with all your videos, but was looking at CAMS and Climate Reanalyser today and realised that the methane plumes in the Arctic are actually coming through the ice off the eastern side of Novaya Zemlya and in the East Siberian Sea. How is that even possible?"

What follows is an attempt to address this question.
Is methane coming up from below in warmer Arctic seas?

Yesterday Margo made a video (which can be seen HERE) in which she showed alarming evidence that methane is coming in large concentrations up the east coast of Novaya Zemlya in western Siberia as well as (in smaller concentrations) at the East Siberian Arctic Shelf (ESAS).

At what temperature does salt water freeze?

First a matter of clarification,

In the video I stated that salt water freezes at minus 21 C whereas other sources say minus 6C.

My source for this is: 

"Pure water freezes at 32 degrees Fahrenheit, (0 degrees Celsius) while a salt solution may not freeze until it reaches minus 6 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 21 degrees Celsius)because salt disrupts the movement of molecules entering and leaving the solid."

https://governmentshutdown.noaa.gov

(I have added the conversions to degree Celsius)

Basically the freezing point of water depends on the degree of mixing of fresh and salt water. Arctic water is likely to freeze at somewhere between 0C and -21C.

Here is an illustration of sea surface salinity which shows a high degree of mixing in the North Atlantic but also relatively high levels of salinity in the Siberian sector of the Arctic Ocean.

If you want more on this read this item from Wikipedia

Seawater

Why don't the oceans freeze?

An interesting point from this article was this: 

"Because earth's insulating crust is much thinner under the oceans than under the continents, most of the earth's internal heat escapes into the oceans. Although the temperature of the air at an ocean's surface may be freezing, the temperature of the water deep in the ocean is significantly warmer due to internal heating".

***

Sea surface temperatures are mainly just below freezing

What are the indications that methane might be coming up from below through the ice?

Firstly, here is data from the US Navy site on ice thickness:

The data for sea ice concentration shows 100 % except for areas in the North Atlantic and the Bering Strait.

We come now to the all-important question of sea surface temperature.

Nullschool has a feature with measurement of sea surface temperature (even where there is ice, it seems)

According to that there is a warm area (seen below) of warm ocean that measures up to 16.2C.

For contrast, compare that with the Cook Strait in New Zealand in summer and in the midst of a marine heatwave.

A temperature of 18.2 degrees Celsius!!

If you go a little north from Svalbard the sea surface temperature  is minus 1.8 degrees Celsius.

Note, this area of the Arctic (in the North Atlantic is still ice-free

Meanwhile, temperatures at the south of Greenland are 2.4 degrees Celsius.

As a reminder. this is almost-but-not-quite in darkness.

Sea surface temperatures in Siberia and methane releases

Getting back to the methane...

According to Nullschool temperature to the east of Novaya Zemlya are minus 1.4C.

Given that a proportion of the water will have a certain amount of salinity mixed in which means that the water has not completely frozen and the probable quality of the ice will be very low.

It is a surprise to learn that Nullschool gives sea surface temperatures in areas which are frozen.

According to this, sea surface temperatures are minus 1.8 degrees Celsius.

Taken together, this would indicate that it is indeed possible for methane to be coming up to the surface from below and being released into the atmosphere.

Like the ESAS the seas around Novaya Zemlya are shallow enough for methane from clathrates to reach the surface

"The Pechora Sea is quite shallow, its average depth being only 6 m. The deepest point reaches 210 m. In the southern part of the sea runs the eastward-flowing Kolguyev Current."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pechora_Sea

I would surmise that given that it is winter and there is ice (whatever its quality) that only a part of the methane is being released into the atmosphere.

It is totally unexpected to see methane released into the atmosphere in winter and yet that is what I think is happening.

One can only begin to imagine how all this will look under conditions of ice melt and warmer-still seas.

Caveat and a provisional conclusion

All of the above is based on observations from data sources that we trust are accurate. There is no way to confirm whether this is the case. 

My conclusion is that, given the above and information that has come out in the last few days is that we are in totally uncharted territory.

Some scientists (members of the "Priesthood" as call it) may pretend they know what is going on.

They don't, especially those sitting behind their computers working with their flawed models.

This is how science has always worked:

"Nikita Zimov was teaching students to do ecological fieldwork in northern Siberia when he stumbled on a disturbing clue that the frozen land might be thawing far faster than expected.

Zimov, like his father, Sergey Zimov, has spent years running a research station that tracks climate change in the rapidly warming Russian Far East. So when students probed the ground and took soil samples amid the mossy hummocks and larch forests near his home, 200 miles north of the Arctic Circle, Nikita Zimov suspected something wasn't right."

In conjunction with our own observations it is these two pieces of news from the last few days that have put the wind up me.

Some Arctic ground no longer freezing—even in winter

Data from two Arctic sites suggest some surface layers are no longer freezing. If that continues, greenhouse gases from permafrost could accelerate climate change.

Polygons formed by the annual freezing and thawing of ice wedges just below the earth's surface are visible from above near the Northeast Science Station in Cherskiy, Russia.

Planet’s erratic magnetic field forces emergency update to global navigation system

Unprecedented changes required to ensure accuracy of system that guides everything from aircraft to smartphones