Geen methaan 'tipping point' - alweer een klimaatsprookje minder!

the world will reach "catastrophic tipping points" on climate change within 15 years, unless serious action is taken to tackle global warming.

Most Significant Global Warming Tipping Point Theory Bites the Dust

A scientific study on the results of the BP Gulf of Mexico oil spill has yielded some surprising results that appear to disprove fears of methane release as a global warming “tipping point” to catastrophic warming.

The theory as currently incorporated by most climate models requires “tipping points” to go from mild anthropogenic warming to catastrophic global warming. The most plausibleand significant of these potential tipping points has always been the release of methane triggered by warmer temperatures .

Scary stuff. However, the recent BP oil spill has given scientists the chance of an “impossible experiment” where just such a release of methane has occurred. And the results are now in.

ScienceDaily (Jan. 7, 2011) — Calling the results “extremely surprising,” researchers from the University of California, Santa Barbara and Texas A&M University report that methane gas concentrations in the Gulf of Mexico have returned to near normal levels only months after a massive release occurred following the Deepwater Horizon oil rig explosion.

Kessler added: “Based on our measurements from earlier in the summer and previous other measurements of methane respiration rates around the world, it appeared that (Deepwater Horizon) methane would be present in the Gulf for years to come. Instead, the methane respiration rates increased to levels higher than have ever been recorded, ultimately consuming it and prohibiting its release to the atmosphere.” ...

So what are the implications for this most dangerous of tipping points? The researchers say that their empirical findings (note empirical – as opposed to models on a computer) prove that similar methane releases are not a cause for concern so far as global warming is concerned ...

And so another terrifying tipping point bites the dust. Expect to read all about this in the newspapers and to hear about it on TV. Or not. Maybe just here at Hauntingthelibrary.