Meanwhile, permafrost emissions, which are seen as naturally occurring, are not counted against government pledges aimed at curbing emissions and were not in the spotlight at UN climate talks

Scientists have said that greenhouse gas emissions from its thaw could eventually match or even exceed the European Union’s industrial emissions due to the sheer volume of decaying organic matter. Permafrost covers 65 percent of Russia’s landmass and about a quarter of the northern landmass. “Methane has never increased in the atmosphere at the speed it is today … I think this is linked to our permafrost.” “This is one of the coldest places on earth and there is no permafrost,” he says. Zimov, who has studied permafrost from his scientific base in the diamond-producing Yakutia region for decades, is seeing the effects of climate change in real-time. In one of the planet’s coldest places, 130km (81 miles) south of Russia’s Arctic coast, scientist Sergey Zimov can find no sign of permafrost as global warming permeates Siberia’s soil.Īs everything from mammoth bones to ancient vegetation frozen inside it for millennia thaws and decomposes, it now threatens to release vast amounts of greenhouse gases.

Ice age 1