Home – Home – Jornals – Russian Geology and Geophysics 2002 number 7

Concentrations of water-dissolved methane were measured on the eastern shelf and slope of Sakhalin. Seasonal variability of water structure is chiefly responsible for seasonal differences in methane concentrations in the water body. In the shelf zone the maximum flow of methane to the atmosphere occurs in the cold season; in summer, it is much weaker. The cold season is also the time when the methane-saturated shelf waters reach intermediate depths on the continental slope. In summer, the shelf waters stop sliding down the slope; therefore, no methane anomaly is observed at intermediate depths. Methane concentrations at latitudinal profiles vary from year to year, which is possibly due to variations in seismotectonic activity of the region.
Our observations are important for calculation of the flow of methane from the Earth's interior to water and from water to atmosphere in the western Sea of Okhotsk. The available data show that there are natural sources of methane supply to the atmosphere which depend on season and seismotectonic activity of fault zones, generators and conduits of methane flows. The methane flows in the Sea of Okhotsk participate in the global process of its supply and increase in the atmosphere, which is, likely, responsible for changes in climate (warming) and destruction of the ozone layer.