Part Two / How our Planet is Changing

2.23 Permafrost

All online sources accessed on

  1. about 75 per cent of the shallow hydrates on Earth Shakhova, N., et al., ‘Understanding the permafrost–hydrate system and associated methane releases in the east Siberian Arctic shelf’, Geosciences, 9 (6), 2019: Article 251, https://doi.org/10.3390/geosciences9060251.

  2. ten times faster on the Tibetan Plateau Gao, T., et al., ‘Accelerating permafrost collapse on the eastern Tibetan Plateau’, Environmental Research Letters, 16 (5), 2021: Article 054023, https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/abf7f0https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/abf7f0.

    warmed by around 10°C by the overlying seawater Shakhova, N., et al., ‘Current rates and mechanisms of subsea permafrost degradation in the east Siberian Arctic shelf’, Nature Communications, 8, 2017: Article 15872, https://doi.org/10.1038/ncomms15872.

  3. we have also witnessed methane bubbling Shakhova, N., et al., ‘Extensive methane venting to the atmosphere from sediments of the east Siberian Arctic shelf’, Science, 327 (5970), 2010: 1246–50, https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1182221; Steinbach, J., et al., ‘Source apportionment of methane escaping the subsea permafrost system in the outer Eurasian Arctic shelf’, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 118 (10), 2021: Article e2019672118, https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2019672118.