Definitions:
1.) hydrocarbon - an organic compound consisting of only carbon and hydrogen.
2.) methane - an odorless, colorless, flammable hydrocarbon, CH4. It is used as a fuel and contributes greatly to global warming.
Summary:
A question that scientists were asking before last Thursday, was: Where did all the methane from the BP Oil Spill go? The question has been very important, because methane is more than 20 times more effective at trapping heat in the atmosphere than carbon dioxide. However, scientists finally reported on Thursday that bacteria had eaten nearly all of the methane from the spill. Fortunately, the bacteria managed to consume all of the methane before it could rise from the sea bottom and rise up into the atmosphere. Two months after the BP spill, methane was not being consumed in and around the wellhead, and many scientists got the idea in their heads that the methane would rise to the atmosphere. The oil spill was an "accidental experiment" and showed that particular bacteria with an all-methane diet, would multiply rapidly. Many other organisms dealt with the other hydrocarbons involved in the spill, such as ethane and propane.
Discussion:
The fact that the bacteria consumed all of the methane in the ocean before it could reach the atmosphere is very fortunate, especially considering the fact that nearly 200,000 tons of methane -- more than any other single hydrocarbon emitted in the accident -- were released from the wellhead, and nearly all of it went into the Gulf. Also, the methane-consuming bacteria were the last to arrive to the oil spill. I decided to write about this article because of the fact that methane is so effective in trapping heat in the atmosphere and so much of it was emitted in the oil spill. I wanted to know where all of it went, and by reading the article, I discovered the answer. If the bacteria hadn't multiplied so quickly by consuming the methane, then a significant amount of the hydrocarbon would have risen to the atmosphere and caused climate change, something that should be avoided.
Questions:
1.) Was there anything different about the bacteria that consumed the methane?
2.) When was all of the methane completely consumed?
Sources:
Article:
Zabarenko, Deborah. "Bacteria Gobbled Methane from BP Spill: Scientists."
Scientific American. Scientific American, 6 Jan. 2011. Web. 9 Jan. 2011.
<http://www.scientificamerican.com/
article.cfm?id=bacteria-gobbled-methane-bp>.
Image:
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=bacteria-gobbled-methane-bp
