A large research study by an international team of scientists led by Christoph Böttner from Aarhus University shows clear evidence of extensive natural hydrocarbon seepage along the Northeast Greenland margin - one of the least explored continental margins on Earth. 

The new discoveries of widespread natural seepage and gas hydrates in NE Greenland represent a significant advance in our understanding of natural seepage across the Arctic. This is important in the light of rapidly changing climate in the Arctic and Antarctic.

“We now provide a detailed picture of the migration of oil and gas from deep beneath the seafloor in Northeast Greenland and their release into the ocean,” says Assistant Professor in Marine Seismic Sedimentology Christoph Böttner, lead author of the study, who conducted the work during his Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellowship at Aarhus University.

Valuable data on migration of gases

The research study combines new academic field studies in the waters off northeast Greenland with geoscientific data sets from previous industry expeditions. This has made it possible to capture in great detail the migration of gases from source to where they enter the sea.

“The wealth of data has given us new insights into how natural methane emissions contribute to the Arctic carbon cycle. It means we have now better means to distinguish between the seepage that has been going on for thousands of years and potential increased release we are seeing because of climate change and the rising sea temperatures,” says Christoph Böttner.

Northeast Greenland a pertinent location for climate research

The study, which has just been published in the scientific journal Nature, is one of the first to systematically map oil and gas seepage from the seafloor off northeast Greenland.

According to Christoph Böttner, northeast Greenland is a particularly interesting place because it is one of the least explored and most inaccessible regions on Earth. It is also a frontier of Arctic transformation under ongoing climate change. This makes it a unique laboratory for studying natural methane and oil seepage and its response to changes in the environment. 

Marit-Solveig Seidenkrantz, Professor at the Department of Geoscience at Aarhus University and co-author of the study, adds:

“Northeast Greenland plays an important role in climate research and in our understanding of the carbon cycle. Oil and gas seepage not only affect carbon fluxes in the ocean and atmosphere, but also life in the sea – from microorganisms to animals and mammals that have adapted to life in the icy waters.”

Climate change means that the Arctic is warming up to 4 times faster than the rest of the globe, making research in the area more urgent.

Frank Werner Jakobsen, co-author of the study and a PhD researcher at the Centre for Ice, Cryosphere, Carbon and Climate (iC3) at UiT The Arctic University of Norway in Tromsø, focusing on Northeast Greenland, explains:

“We provide the first evidence for gas hydrates on the shelf. Gas hydrates are ice-like structures that form from water and gas in the sediments under low temperatures and high pressure. Our study can help us understand whether future thawing could release even more greenhouse gases. At the same time, we are gaining new knowledge about how glaciers and ice, erosion and tectonics have shaped the seafloor and continental shelf in the Arctic over thousands of years.”

Mapping to be used in future climate models

The researchers have calculated that between 677 and 1,460 million tonnes of gas – equivalent to 0.5–1.1 billion tonnes of carbon – has been released into the sea since grounded ice retreated from the shelf around 15,000 years ago. This highlights the fact that natural hydrocarbon seepage, including methane seepage, has been an ongoing process in the area for thousands of years.

The study also suggests that more gas may be released in the future as sea temperatures rise.  It is important to understand the current state of the seepage to predict any future behaviour, points out Christoph Böttner.

“Climate change is already warming the Arctic at a high pace, and we do not even know the status-quo of seepage in many areas. Our study closes an important gap regarding natural seepage of oil and gas but also gas hydrates on the shallow Arctic shelves. The consequences of the observed seepage and implications for global climate and ecosystem are yet poorly understood.”

He recommends that the findings should be factored into the models used by researchers to predict the climate of the future. 

“Our calculations and data set demonstrate that there are sources of greenhouse gases in the Arctic, which are not yet documented. Polar regions are transforming rapidly under climate change with strong implications for global climate and ecosystems, so it is important to be able to understand and estimate the natural methane emissions and to factor them into our calculations of future greenhouse gas effects,” says Christoph Böttner.

Behind the study

• Type of study

This geoscientific study, part of the EU-funded GreenFlux project, combines seismic, acoustic, and sediment core data to map and quantify natural hydrocarbon seepage from the seafloor of Northeast Greenland in the context of climate-driven Arctic change.

• External collaborators

Christoph Böttner led this study as part of his EU-funded GreenFlux project. He was hosted/supervised by Katrine Juul Andresen and Marit-Solveig Seidenkrantz from the Department of Geoscience at Aarhus University. Christoph is now based at the Department of Geological Sciences at Stockholm University. He collaborated with Frank Werner Jakobsen, who is working for the Geological Survey of Norway and doing his PhD under supervision from Monica Winsborrow at the Centre for Ice, Cryosphere, Carbon and Climate (iC3) at UiT The Arctic University of Norway. Tove Nielsen, Oliver Jon Sigurd Millinge, and John Hopper are affiliated with the Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland (GEUS), while John Hopper is also associated with the University of Copenhagen. Jan Sverre Laberg is based at the Department of Geoscience at UiT The Arctic University of Norway. Stephane Polteau and Adriano Mazzini are affiliated with the Institute for Energy Technology (IFE) and the University of Oslo, and Sverre Planke represents both the University of Oslo and industry company Volcanic Basin Energy Research in Oslo. Muhammad Rizwan Asif is affiliated with the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Aarhus University. Finally, Reidun Myklebust represents TGS in Oslo.

• External funding

This work has been funded by the European Union under Horizon Europe grant agreement No 101060851 (GreenFlux). The contribution of MSS was supported from Horizon Europe grant agreement No. 101136480 (SEA-Quester). The contributions of FWJ and MW form part of iC3: Centre for ice, Cryosphere, Carbon, and Climate and were supported by the Research Council of Norway through its Centres of Excellence funding scheme, project number 332635. MW also acknowledges support from ERC grant i2B, 101118519. StP and AM acknowledge funding from the National Centre for Sustainable Subsurface Utilization of The Norwegian Continental Shelf (Research Council of Norway project 331644) and the WELLFATE project 344447). JSL acknowledge support from the Research Council of Norway through the DYPOLE project (grant no. 325984).

Contact:

Dr Christoph Böttner
Assistant Professor in Marine Seismic Sedimentology
Department of Geological Sciences
Stockholm University
Phone +46 (0) 708 33 86 40
christoph.bottner@geo.su.se

Professor Marit-Solveig Seidenkrantz
Head of Department of Geoscience
Aarhus University
+45 27 78 28 97
mss@geo.au.dk

Professor Katrine Juul Andresen
Department of Geoscience
Aarhus University
+45 20 83 79 11
katrine.andresen@geo.au.dk