A Turkish research geologist visited us for 2 weeks in May and the Turkish Professor gave a talk the included pictures of the first one (Seda Okay) with a handful of burning ice...pretty "cool". If we are funded we may recover frozen methane (methane hydrate) in cores: we will put it in some sealed container and freeze it so its composition can be analysed later.

This methane hydrate is widespread in the world. It needs cold temperatures and high pressures, so except in the Arctic it is beneath deeper water: In Santa Barbara Channel below about 400 m water depth, and offshore mid Atlantic slope maybe a little deeper.

I've heard it is likely the largest fossil fuel resource in the world. The professor, Gunay Cifci, pointed out that the shallow water end of the hydrate is likely to dissociate into free gas: that can cause slope instability and landslides, which can release massive amounts of methane in a rapid way where it would like get into the atmosphere. Methane is a powerfull greenhouse gas, so there have been field test to produce the hydrate by injecting CO2. Not sure about the success of the test: I think it was limited.

But, in a warming world, it sounds like trying to capture and burn methane is better than letting it get into the atmosphere as methane.

Chris