Modeling changes in hydrate stabilities associated with Arctic warming and its impact on slope instabilities
Khokan Debnath, Jocelyn L Hayley, Jeffrey A Priest
In the proceedings of: GeoEdmonton 2018: 71st Canadian Geotechnical Conference; 13th joint with IAH-CNCSession: Cold Regions and Permafrost Geotechnics II
ABSTRACT: Large volumes of methane hydrate exist within marine sediments across the Arctic region, such as sediments on the continental margin of the Beaufort Sea. The low temperatures and high pressures required for hydrate stability, and the cold water in this region leads to hydrate being formed at comparatively shallower depths relative to other oceanic sediments. Because of global warming, it is estimated that the ocean bottom temperature of the Arctic region has increased by as much as 1⁰C since 1979. If this trend in increasing ocean bottom temperature were to continue, hydrate dissociation within the sediment may occur potentially causing slope instabilities. In this paper, changes in the seabed geothermal conditions were modeled to estimate the reduction in the hydrate stability zones within the sediment on the continental margin. The change in sediment strength due to gas hydrate dissociation has been incorporated as input variables in to a slope stability model to determine changes in factor of safety associated with hydrate dissociation and assess the potential for slope instabilities.
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Debnath, Khokan, Hayley, Jocelyn L, Priest, Jeffrey A (2018) Modeling changes in hydrate stabilities associated with Arctic warming and its impact on slope instabilities in GEO2018. Ottawa, Ontario: Canadian Geotechnical Society.
@inproceedings{Debnath_GEO2018_614,
author = {{Debnath, Khokan}, {Hayley, Jocelyn L}, {Priest, Jeffrey A}}
title = {Modeling changes in hydrate stabilities associated with Arctic warming and its impact on slope instabilities }
booktitle = {Proceedings of the 71st Canadian Geotechnical Conference; 13th joint with IAH-CNC }
year = {2018}
organization = {The Canadian Geotechnical Society},
address = {Ottawa, Canada} }
title = {Modeling changes in hydrate stabilities associated with Arctic warming and its impact on slope instabilities }
booktitle = {Proceedings of the 71st Canadian Geotechnical Conference; 13th joint with IAH-CNC }
year = {2018}
organization = {The Canadian Geotechnical Society},
address = {Ottawa, Canada} }