WARMER ARCTIC MELTING METHYL HYDRATE

The warming of an Arctic current over the last thirty years has triggered the release of methane, a potent greenhouse gas, from methane hydrate stored in the sediment beneath the seabed, reports ScienceDaily.
Scientists at the National Oceanography Centre Southampton working in collaboration with researchers from the University of Birmingham, Royal Holloway London and IFM-Geomar in Germany have found that more than 250 plumes of bubbles of methane gas are rising from the seabed of the West Spitsbergen continental margin in the Arctic, in a depth range of 150 to 400 metres.

Methane released from gas hydrate in submarine sediments has been identified in the past as an agent of climate change. The likelihood of methane being released in this has been widely predicted.