Degassing two killer lakes isn’t working so well
Lakes Nyos and Monoun in Cameroon are building towards releasing toxic gases again. In the 1980s, the two lakes vented their payload and killed nearly 1800 people. Primarily carbon dioxide, the concentrations in the lake are building again, despite having a ventilation pipes installed in 2001 to prevent this sort of thing from happening again. The gas is created by volcanic activity beneath the lakes, and although the pipes are working, scientists fear that they are not working fast enough.
They speculate that adding more pipes could help alleviate the problem, and that current pipes will only remove an estimated 10% of the total gas in the next year.
“This slow removal extends the present risk to local populations,” says Kling. “Our model indicates that 75-99% of the gas remaining would be removed by 2010 with two pipes in Monoun and five pipes in Nyos, substantially reducing the risks.”
There are two ways of de-gassing the lakes, the current method in place at the two lakes is the “autonomous soda fountain” method which consists of a vertical pipe between the lake bottom and the surface. A small pump raises the water in the pipe up to a level where it becomes saturated with gas, which lightens the water column. The saturated water rises to the surface creating a spectacular 68-foot water fountain which can be turned on and off at will via radio from shore. Once the process is primed, there is no need for the pump to operate because the process perpetuates itself.
There are three “killer lakes” in the world that release gases: lakes Nyos and Monoun, and Lake Kivu in Rwanda. Lake Kivu differs in that its killer gas is made up of carbon dioxide and methane. Because methane is valuable, several commercial enterprises have undertaken harvesting the methane from the lake to make some money as well as prevent deadly “overturn” which seems to occur once every 1,000 years or so, which kills all of the wildlife in the lake, and around the lake. Lake Kivu is much larger than Nyos and Monoun, but its circumstances are a little bit different in that harvesting the gas is a profitable — as well as life-saving — enterprise.
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“… , trigger mechanism of the limnological catastrophes, who be happened in CAMEROON on lake “MONOUN” in 1984 and on lake “NYOS” in 1986 , was switched on by influence of the atmospheric precipitations in 1983.
Limnological catastrophes on lake “MONOUN” in 1984 and on lake “NYOS” in 1986, were caused by the instantaneous ejections of the gaseous carbon dioxide from the sediment stratums under the lake’s bottom.
The Degassing the waters of the lakes “NYOS” and “MONOUN” can not prevent from the repetition in lakes “NYOS” and “MONOUN” of the limnological catastrophes, similar to the catastrophes of 1984 and of 1986 , in which the trigger mechanism was switched on by the influence of the atmospheric precipitations.
Under influence of the atmospheric precipitation the trigger mechanism of the the limnological catastrophes in the lake “Nyos” and the “Monoun” , in any time may to be switched on and in a certain time hereon will happen of the limnological catastrophes.”
Comment by NS — June 8, 2006 @ 1:39 pm
http://www.nyos.lv/?l=2&m=1&c=&p=
THE DISASTROUS CONSEQUENCE OF THE REDUCTION INTO TWENTY METERS OF THE LEVEL OF THE WATER IN LAKE “NYOS” IN CAMEROON , WHICH ARE NOT TAKEN INTO ACCOUNT IN REPORT ABOUT ASSESSMENT OF THE DAM ON LAKE “NYOS” BY MISSION “Joint UNEP/OCHA Environment Unit”, WHO HAD VISITTED CAMEROON IN SEPTEMBER 2005.
The Reduction into 20 metres of the water level in the lake “Nyos” significantly magnifies probability of the mortal catastrophe in contrast with probability of the catastrophe in the natural conditions. The strengthening the existing dam (without reduction of the water level) on the lake “Nyos” does not magnify probability of the catastrophe.
Comment by NS — June 22, 2006 @ 1:28 am
whoah mayte i still dont understand how to degass the lake.
Comment by Anonymous — March 2, 2008 @ 11:45 am