Holocene mass wasting on upper non‐Polar continental slopes—due to post‐Glacial ocean warming and hydrate dissociation?

[1] Incorporating both late/post-Glacial bottom-water warming and eustatic sealevel rise into a MH (methane hydrate) stability model explains why at least some major submarine landslides (e.g., the Storegga Slide, Norwegian margin) may have been triggered by MH dissociation during the early Holocene (rising sealevels), not during the lowest sealevels of the LGM (Last Glacial Maximum, 18–20 ka). In the case of Storegga, failure may have been initiated either below the upper slope or under the shelf (for fresh pore water, especially with admixed ethane). At water depths below ca. 800m, persistent low bottom water temperatures allowed the sealevel rise to thicken the MH stability zone over time, ruling out Holocene initiation of failure. MH release by Holocene mass wasting cannot have initiated deglaciation.

[1]  Peter R. Vogt,et al.  The Norwegian–Barents–Svalbard (NBS) continental margin: Introducing a natural laboratory of mass wasting, hydrates, and ascent of sediment, pore water, and methane , 1999 .

[2]  E. Peltzer,et al.  Practical Physical Chemistry and Empirical Predictions of Methane Hydrate Stability , 2000 .

[3]  Bruce A. Buffett,et al.  A numerical model for the formation of gas hydrate below the seafloor , 2001 .

[4]  P. Vogt,et al.  Heat flow highs on the Norwegian‐Barents‐Svalbard continental slope: Deep crustal fractures, dewatering, or “memory in the mud”? , 1996 .

[5]  Wenyue Xu,et al.  Predicting the occurrence, distribution, and evolution of methane gas hydrate in porous marine sediments , 1999 .

[6]  C. Ruppel.  Thermal State of the Gas Hydrate Reservoir , 2000 .

[7]  J. Laberg,et al.  The Andøya Slide and the Andøya Canyon, north-eastern Norwegian–Greenland Sea , 2000 .

[8]  George B. Carpenter,et al.  Coincident sediment slump/clathrate complexes on the U.S. Atlantic continental slope , 1981 .

[9]  Carolyn A. Koh,et al.  Clathrate hydrates of natural gases , 1990 .

[10]  G. Dickens,et al.  Methane hydrate stability in pore water: A simple theoretical approach for geophysical applications , 1997 .

[11]  E. D. Sloan.  Physical/chemical properties of gas hydrates and application to world margin stability and climatic change , 1998, Geological Society, London, Special Publications.

[12]  J. Mienert,et al.  The enigma of double BSRs: indicators for changes in the hydrate stability field? , 1999 .

[13]  E. Jansen,et al.  Paleoceanographic reconstructions of surface ocean conditions in the Greenland, Iceland and Norwegian seas through the last 14 ka based on diatoms , 1993 .

[14]  E. Davis,et al.  A new reduction algorithm for marine heat flow measurements , 1987 .

[15]  S. Planke,et al.  Norwegian-Greenland Sea thermal field , 2000, Geological Society, London, Special Publications.

[16]  R. Fairbanks.  A 17,000-year glacio-eustatic sea level record: influence of glacial melting rates on the Younger Dryas event and deep-ocean circulation , 1989, Nature.

[17]  N. Kenyon,et al.  The Storegga slide , 1988, Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series A, Mathematical and Physical Sciences.

[18]  W. Dillon,et al.  Is the extent of glaciation limited by marine gas-hydrates , 1991 .

[19]  G. Miller,et al.  Climate implications of changing Arctic sea ice , 2001 .

[20]  E. Nisbet.  The end of the ice age , 1990 .