A violent volcanic eruption may have revealed a new weapon to tackle a potent planet-heating gas

When an underwater volcano erupted in the South Pacific in January 2022, it sent a cloud of ash, steam and gas approximately 40 miles above the Earth’s surface. It was one of the most violent volcanic eruptions of modern times. It may also have introduced a new weapon in the fight against an enemy. powerful planet heater gasAccording to new research.

Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai volcano erupted with a huge explosion. hundreds of times stronger Than the Hiroshima nuclear explosion trigger a tsunami and a sonic boom that circled the planet twice. Then he did something “unexpected,” according to the authors of the new book. to work It was published Thursday in the journal Nature Communications. He began to clean up some of his own pollution.

The scientists’ discovery came by looking at advanced satellite data of the explosion. “We found a large cloud of formaldehyde that normally shouldn’t be there,” said study author Maarten van Herpen, a physicist and executive director at Acacia Impact Innovation, a Dutch consultancy. Formaldehyde is usually formed when methane, a powerful planet-warming gas, is destroyed in the atmosphere.

The researchers believed they were observing a chemical process previously detected over the Atlantic Ocean.

Scientists have found that when Saharan dust flies over the Atlantic, it mixes with salt spray and forms tiny iron-based particles. When sunlight hits them, they react with methane in the atmosphere, producing chlorine atoms that help break down the methane.

According to the research, something similar appears to be happening at the Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai volcano. Its explosion sent enough saltwater vapor into the stratosphere to fill the surrounding area. 58,000 Olympic size swimming pools with volcanic ash. Research scientists believe that chlorine was formed when sunlight hit the mixture and broke down some of the methane produced by the explosion.

“It emitted methane and then destroyed those emissions through particles in the smoke,” Van Herpen said.

They tracked the formaldehyde cloud for 10 days. “Since formaldehyde was only present for a few hours, this showed that the plume had been continuously destroying methane for more than a week,” Van Herpen added.

Researchers estimate that the eruption produced about 330,000 tons of methane, of which about 900 tons was broken down per day.

Study author and professor of chemistry at the University of Copenhagen, Matthew Johnson, who was involved in the 2023 discovery, said it was “new and completely surprising” that the same process observed in the Atlantic was also occurring in a volcanic cloud high in the stratosphere.

Scientists say their findings could provide a valuable new tool in the fight against climate change.

Methane is approximately 80 times more effective at trapping heat than carbon dioxide over a 20-year period. He is currently accounting for this about one third Global warming and atmospheric concentrations have doubled in the last two centuries.

While reducing carbon pollution that remains in the atmosphere for hundreds of years is key to combating the climate crisis, reducing methane is seen as an easy outcome. It is relatively short-lived and reducing levels could have a significant impact on reducing global warming in the short term.

Atmospheric chemist Pete Edwards of the University of York, who was not involved in the research, said the findings were interesting but “very difficult” to confirm. “Using formaldehyde observations alone to uncover a mechanism, although novel, does not help resolve known uncertainties in our current understanding of atmospheric chemistry,” he told CNN.

Van Herpen said the findings could theoretically be used to eliminate methane emissions at the source. They can also inform geoengineering methods; attempts to artificially lower global temperatures. Iron-based particles can be injected into the atmosphere over the ocean to mimic the chemical process observed after the explosion and remove methane.

But Edwards advises caution. He said the study is based on the stratosphere, while the methane removal strategy will take place in the troposphere. He added that the impacts would be difficult to predict, “with potential unintended consequences on climate, air pollution and ecosystem health.”

Emily Dowd, a climate scientist at the University of Leeds, echoed this. “The proposed chemistry still needs to be tested extensively in atmospheric models,” he told CNN.

The study authors agree that more research is needed. “It’s an obvious idea for the industry to try to replicate this natural phenomenon, but only if it can be proven to be safe and effective,” Johnson said. “Our satellite method may offer a way to help us understand how humans can slow global warming.”

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