New research shows that melting glaciers in Greenland could free large quantities of methane trapped as hydrates beneath the ice. Scientists warn this process, observed after the last ice age, may repeat as the climate warms.
Researchers led by Mads Huuse at the University of Manchester examined seismic data from 2011 and 2013 along with sediment cores from Melville Bay in north-western Greenland. They identified 50 seafloor pockmarks up to 37 metres deep that formed when meltwater flushed methane hydrates from the sediment during the last glacial maximum between 29,000 and 19,000 years ago.