More On Methane Release and “Global Extinction”

Here is the first article that comes up when I google “methane release”: http://arctic-news.blogspot.com/p/global-extinction-within-one-human.html

So apparently there is some evidence that large methane releases are occurring in the Arctic and subArctic areas, with local temperature anomalies that are frightening: a 20 degrees Celsius increase in temperature.  The methane releases are occurring in Svalbard north of Norway and all over the Arctic.  The predictions of increased temperature are based on the amount of methane released and its atmospheric lifetime and indicate temperatures averaging over 26 degrees Celsius that are likely to extinguish all life.

There are significant holes in this prediciton, however.  The amount of methane clathrate in continental shelf deposits is really unknown and depends on estimates which have varied by several orders of magnitude.  The release of methane has to be documented in measurements that provide global measurements of methane concentration.

Nonetheless, this is the primary source for dire predictions about methane release and sudden global warming.