Source apportionment of methane escaping the subsea permafrost system in the outer Eurasian Arctic Shelf.

The East Siberian Arctic Shelf holds large amounts of inundated carbon and methane (CH4). Holocene warming by overlying seawater, recently fortified by anthropogenic warming, has caused thawing of the underlying subsea permafrost. Despite extensive observations of elevated seawater CH4 in the past decades, relative contributions from different subsea compartments such as early diagenesis, subsea permafrost, methane hydrates, and underlying thermogenic/ free gas to these methane releases remain elusive. Dissolved methane concentrations observed in the Laptev Sea ranged from 3 to 1,500 nM (median 151 nM; oversaturation by ∼3,800%). Methane stable isotopic composition showed strong vertical and horizontal gradients with source signatures for two seepage areas of δ13C-CH4 = (-42.6 ± 0.5)/(-55.0 ± 0.5) ‰ and δD-CH4 = (-136.8 ± 8.0)/(-158.1 ± 5.5) ‰, suggesting a thermogenic/natural gas source. Increasingly enriched δ13C-CH4 and δD-CH4 at distance from the seeps indicated methane oxidation. The Δ14C-CH4 signal was strongly depleted (i.e., old) near the seeps (-993 ± 19/-1050 ± 89‰). Hence, all three isotope systems are consistent with methane release from an old, deep, and likely thermogenic pool to the outer Laptev Sea. This knowledge of what subsea sources are contributing to the observed methane release is a prerequisite to predictions on how these emissions will increase over coming decades and centuries.

Devonian-Carboniferous extension and Eurekan inversion along an inherited WNW-ESE-striking fault system in Billefjorden, Svalbard.

Background: The Billefjorden area in central Spitsbergen hosts thick Lower-lowermost Upper Devonian, late-post-Caledonian collapse deposits presumably deformed during the Late Devonian Svalbardian Orogeny. These rocks are juxtaposed against Proterozoic basement rocks along the Billefjorden Fault Zone and are overlain by uppermost Devonian-early Permian deposits of the Billefjorden Trough, a N-S-trending Carboniferous rift basin bounded by the Billefjorden Fault Zone. Methods: We interpreted seismic reflection (also depth-converted), bathymetric, and exploration well data. Results: The data show abundant Early Devonian, WNW-ESE-striking (oblique-slip) normal faults segmenting the Billefjorden Trough, and a gradual decrease in tectonic activity from the Early Devonian (collapse phase) to early Permian (post-rift phase). Early Devonian-Middle Pennsylvanian WNW-ESE-striking faults were mildly reactivated and overprinted and accommodated strain partitioning and decoupling in the early Cenozoic. This resulted in intense deformation of Lower Devonian sedimentary rocks and in the formation of bedding-parallel décollements, e.g., between the Lower Devonian Wood Bay and the uppermost Pennsylvanian-lowermost Permian Wordiekammen formations. This suggests that intense deformation within Devonian rocks in Dickson Land can be explained by Eurekan deformation alone. Eurekan deformation also resulted in the formation of WNW-ESE- and N-S- to NNE-SSW-trending, kilometer-wide, open folds such as the Petuniabukta Syncline, and in inversion and/or overprinting of Early Devonian to Early Pennsylvanian normal faults by sinistral-reverse Eurekan thrusts. WNW-ESE-striking faults merge at depth with similarly trending and dipping ductile shear zone fabrics in Proterozoic basement rocks, which likely formed during the Timanian Orogeny. Conclusions: A NNE-dipping shear zone, which is part of a large system of Timanian thrusts in the Barents Sea, controlled the formation of WNW-ESE-striking Devonian-Mississippian normal faults and syn-tectonic sedimentary rocks in Billefjorden. Eurekan strain partitioning and decoupling suggest that the Svalbardian Orogeny did not occur in Svalbard.

The International Bathymetric Chart of the Arctic Ocean Version 4.0.

Bathymetry (seafloor depth), is a critical parameter providing the geospatial context for a multitude of marine scientific studies. Since 1997, the International Bathymetric Chart of the Arctic Ocean (IBCAO) has been the authoritative source of bathymetry for the Arctic Ocean. IBCAO has merged its efforts with the Nippon Foundation-GEBCO-Seabed 2030 Project, with the goal of mapping all of the oceans by 2030. Here we present the latest version (IBCAO Ver. 4.0), with more than twice the resolution (200 × 200 m versus 500 × 500 m) and with individual depth soundings constraining three times more area of the Arctic Ocean (∼19.8% versus 6.7%), than the previous IBCAO Ver. 3.0 released in 2012. Modern multibeam bathymetry comprises ∼14.3% in Ver. 4.0 compared to ∼5.4% in Ver. 3.0. Thus, the new IBCAO Ver. 4.0 has substantially more seafloor morphological information that offers new insights into a range of submarine features and processes; for example, the improved portrayal of Greenland fjords better serves predictive modelling of the fate of the Greenland Ice Sheet.

Relating ocean temperatures to frontal ablation rates at Svalbard tidewater glaciers: Insights from glacier proximal datasets.

Fjord-terminating glaciers in Svalbard lose mass through submarine melt and calving (collectively: frontal ablation), and surface melt. With the recently observed Atlantification of water masses in the Barents Sea, warmer waters enter these fjords and may reach glacier fronts, where their role in accelerating frontal ablation remains insufficiently understood. Here, the impact of ocean temperatures on frontal ablation at two glaciers is assessed using time series of water temperature at depth, analysed alongside meteorological and glaciological variables. Ocean temperatures at depth are harvested at distances of 1 km from the calving fronts of the glaciers Kronebreen and Tunabreen, western Svalbard, from 2016 to 2017. We find ocean temperature at depth to control c. 50% of frontal ablation, making it the most important factor. However, its absolute importance is considerably less than found by a 2013-2014 study, where temperatures were sampled much further away from the glaciers. In light of evidence that accelerating levels of global mass loss from marine terminating glaciers are being driven by frontal ablation, our findings illustrate the importance of sampling calving front proximal water masses.

Author Correction: Interplay of grounding-line dynamics and sub-shelf melting during retreat of the Bjørnøyrenna Ice Stream.

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Interplay of grounding-line dynamics and sub-shelf melting during retreat of the Bjørnøyrenna Ice Stream.

The Barents Sea Ice Sheet was a marine-based ice sheet, i.e., it rested on the Barents Sea floor during the Last Glacial Maximum (21 ky BP). The Bjørnøyrenna Ice Stream was the largest ice stream draining the Barents Sea Ice Sheet and is regarded as an analogue for contemporary ice streams in West Antarctica. Here, the retreat of the Bjørnøyrenna Ice Stream is simulated by means of two numerical ice sheet models and results assessed against geological data. We investigate the sensitivity of the ice stream to changes in ocean temperature and the impact of grounding-line physics on ice stream retreat. Our results suggest that the role played by sub-shelf melting depends on how the grounding-line physics is represented in the models. When an analytic constraint on the ice flux across the grounding line is applied, the retreat of Bjørnøyrenna Ice Stream is primarily driven by internal ice dynamics rather than by oceanic forcing. This suggests that implementations of grounding-line physics need to be carefully assessed when evaluating and predicting the response of contemporary marine-based ice sheets and individual ice streams to ongoing and future ocean warming.

Evidence for an ice shelf covering the central Arctic Ocean during the penultimate glaciation.

The hypothesis of a km-thick ice shelf covering the entire Arctic Ocean during peak glacial conditions was proposed nearly half a century ago. Floating ice shelves preserve few direct traces after their disappearance, making reconstructions difficult. Seafloor imprints of ice shelves should, however, exist where ice grounded along their flow paths. Here we present new evidence of ice-shelf groundings on bathymetric highs in the central Arctic Ocean, resurrecting the concept of an ice shelf extending over the entire central Arctic Ocean during at least one previous ice age. New and previously mapped glacial landforms together reveal flow of a spatially coherent, in some regions >1-km thick, central Arctic Ocean ice shelf dated to marine isotope stage 6 (∼ 140 ka). Bathymetric highs were likely critical in the ice-shelf development by acting as pinning points where stabilizing ice rises formed, thereby providing sufficient back stress to allow ice shelf thickening.