How will these great rivers be
affected by the permafrost thaw?
Not exact matches
One unknown is how the addition of massive flows of freshwater from Siberian rivers, bolstered
by thawing
permafrost, could
affect the system, says study co-author Eddy Carmack, an oceanographer with Fisheries and Oceans Canada in Sidney.
The data is important for climate change models, since the emissions released
by thawing
permafrost could significantly
affect levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.
Reductions in sea ice and other changes may
affect the amount of Carbon Dioxide absorbed
by the Arctic Ocean, while thawing
permafrost is expected to increase emissions of methane.
By the way, with so much open water attracting heat in the summer, won't this have a detrimental
affect on Greenland and the northern
permafrost?
It's significant that the current
permafrost melting involves areas that were not
affected substantially
by the prior positive PDO phase earlier in the century (and presumably ones before that, although probably there would begin to be problems with direct observations of those).
Degradation of near - surface
permafrost (perennially frozen ground) caused
by modern climate change is adversely
affecting human infrastructure, altering Arctic ecosystem structure and function, changing the surface energy balance, and has the potential to dramatically impact Arctic hydrological processes and increase greenhouse gas emissions.
Most of Earth's gas hydrates occur at low saturations and in sediments at such great depths below the seafloor or onshore
permafrost that they will barely be
affected by warming over even 1000 yr.
«The impacts of climate change — including an increase in prolonged periods of excessively high temperatures, more heavy downpours, an increase in wildfires, more severe droughts,
permafrost thawing, ocean acidification and sea - level rise — are already
affecting communities, natural resources, ecosystems, economies and public health across the Nation,» reads an executive order signed this morning
by President Obama.
In order of seniority, the seven feedbacks that seem outstanding are: Water vapour — rising
by ~ 7 % per 1.0 C of warming; Albedo loss — due mostly to cryosphere decline; Microbial peat - bog decay — due to rising CO2
affecting ecological dynamics; Desiccation of tropical and temperate soils — due to SAT rise and droughts;
Permafrost melt — due to SAT rise plus loss of snow cover, etc; Forest combustion — due to SAT rise, droughts, pest responses, etc; Methyl clathrates [aka methane hydrates] now threatened
by rising sea - temperatures, increased water column mixing, etc..
Related Rapid sea - ice loss may increase the rate of Arctic land warming
by 3.5 times —
affecting permafrost Is This the Compost Bomb's Smoking Gun?
We have shown that areas of the ESAS
affected by thermokarst [
permafrost melting], submerged taliks and some other processes could serve as migration pathways for methane to escape to the water column and further to the atmosphere.»
The observed effects of cryosphere reduction include modification of river regimes due to enhanced glacial melt, snowmelt advance and enhanced winter base flow; formation of thermokarst terrain and disappearance of surface lakes in thawing
permafrost; decrease in potential travel days of vehicles over frozen roads in the Arctic; enhanced potential for glacier hazards and slope instability due to mechanical weakening driven
by ice and
permafrost melting; regional ocean freshening; sea - level rise due to glacier and ice sheet shrinkage; biotic colonisation and faunal changes in deglaciated terrain; changes in freshwater and marine ecosystems
affected by lake - ice and sea - ice reduction; changes in livelihoods; reduced tourism activities related to skiing, ice climbing and scenic activities in cryospheric areas
affected by degradation; and increased ease of ship transportation in the Arctic.