Personally, I think a very big cull is the solution!

And who would you cull ? You ? Your family ?
And how would you do the cull ? Gas chambers ?
Grow up.

Edit:- Deleted.

Methane has no long-term stability in the atmosphere.

Sorry, your point please?

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No need to apologise Roy!

No need to apologise Roy!

Nawr eich bod yn cael eu colli fel fi

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This is really interesting,
coal seam fires discharge 40 tons of mercury into the atmosphere every year !
and in Australia the "Burning mountain coal fires have been burning for over 6000 years ! With all the focus on "global warming " and the available technology ,you would think someone would try to make it a priority to attempt to extinguish this waste of resources and major contributor to the problem !

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coal_seam_fire 

Global warming is all down to moneymaking. The latest gimmick. Look at Al Gore in USA he is one of the pushers of this and he is making a fortune out of it. Dr Pachauri of the IPCC is another. WWF is hoping to make billions selling Carbon Credits as well as the forgers.
It is us again who has to pay the bill.
With all these heavy gasses, CO2 and methane around should not the underground mines be full of gass?

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Now that intelligent discussion is resumed, could someone with the scientific knowledge give a rough breakdown of gasses emitted by burning coal seams?

My fancy is that sulphur dioxide could come into the equation somewhere, but I am only guessing.
When I was young (no not the 1920s) I remember a burning seam at the old Grove Colliery near to where I live (Great Wyrley, Staffs). I remember a fissure in the ground, very hot and with a lot of choking gasses coming up out of it. I can also remember seeing crystals of some sort forming in there. All those years ago though, memory plays tricks.

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Now that intelligent discussion is resumed, could someone with the scientific knowledge give a rough breakdown of gasses emitted by burning coal seams?

Don't think that is possible at the moment. The churnalists on the net have been re-hashing the info all over the place. A good summary from one article:

[i]Quantifying the amount of pollution that underground fires create is as difficult as spotting them. The smoke escaping through vents contains carbon dioxide, methane, mercury and at least 40 toxic compounds — "a whole soup of nasty stuff," according to Glenn Stracher, a geologist at East Georgia College in Swainsboro, Ga., who studies the emissions. But that soup's ingredients vary from hour to hour, even vent to vent, and some of the gases also escape through adjacent soil. "It's not like the oil well in the Gulf, where you measure how much is coming out per unit of time," Stracher says. "Making calculations is a tricky business." He and other researchers readily admit that global coal fire emission estimates — 40 tons of mercury spewing into the atmosphere annually, and 3% of the world's annual CO2 emissions — are imprecise. But the negative implications for human health and global warming, they say, are clear.

Taken from this piece:

http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,2006195,00.html 

Just read it.
" a faint hint of acrid odors " - from the article. That is how I remember the fire at Grove, but more than just "a faint hint".

If you were down wind and even some distance away, you could still smell it.

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Now that intelligent discussion is resumed, could someone with the scientific knowledge give a rough breakdown of gasses emitted by burning coal seams?

My fancy is that sulphur dioxide could come into the equation somewhere, but I am only guessing.

Burning coal (essentially carbon with some impurities) generally produces carbon dioxide (if sufficient oxygen present in the atmosphere) of carbon monoxide (if insufficient oxygen). Often the coal (and surrounding strata) contain pyrite hence sulphides (generally Hyrdogen Sulphide (eggy smell) are also possible to be given off.

Also note that methane, carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide and hydrogen sulphide are given off naturally by the mines or pushed out by rising water, and in the uK are allowed to vent to the atmosphere - there should be a paper somewhere on the DEFRA website about emissions from UK Coal mines - and on some occasions coal mine methane is use to generate electricity

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Interesting stuff, there are some facts & figures on coal mine methane & it's recovery for power generation here on ACMMO Site, seems to be rather under utilised in the UK at present.

http://www.decc.gov.uk/assets/coal/cct_-_uk_mine_methane_-_facts_and_figures_-_acmmo_general_brief_10_08_07.pdf 

Also if anyones interested in setting up there own, this document seems to have all the relevant contacts too 😉

http://www.decc.gov.uk/assets/coal/dticbmdoc.pdf 

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Very interesting stuff. Not only is the mines producing methane but there is also the large infill land fill tips. Localy the tips are vented to the external air. Firms local to the smaller supplies ie. tips and mines could save by tapping into this cheap fuel.
This looks far more usefull than windmills and not as unsightly.

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I believe Cefn Coed Colliery on the Dulais valley,had methane extraction donkey`s years ago,it shut in 1968,to supply its own power and export surplus into the grid.

Also Tower Colliery had a similar set-up.

Imagine if every Methane problem Colliery had extraction pipes fitted before their shafts were filled in such haste back in the 80`s.

Some back of a fag packet calculations:
Proven oil reserves approx 1,000,000,000,000 barrels = 100,000,600,000,000 kg. Given low weight of hydrogen component, call this carbon content
Proven coal reserves = 847,000,000,000,000kg

Therefore total carbon content of fossil reserves approx 1,000,000,000,000,000 kg
Burn this, then we generate approx 3,000,000,000,000,000 kg of CO2

Current mass of CO2 in atmosphere = 3,000,000,000,000,000 kg

Therefore burn all proven resources and amount of CO2 in atmosphere is doubled.

May have misplaced a 0 somewhere, so other fag packet calculations welcome for comparison.

Robin

Ah Robin
You haven't allowed for increased absorption by plant life and the natural recycling of carbon relative to this, also natural absorption by the oceans. There are a lot of other factors as well, just shows what a complicated science it all is.
I wonder if anyone has done any study on the relationship between CO2 content and plant growth?

During my mining related researches I cannot help but notice how the increase in vegetation on sites appears to have accelerated in more recent years. I don’t think that I am on my own when I say that studying old photographs in relation to the current condition of a site is fascinating, maybe I should get a life!

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I sort of assumed that over 100 years, organic and inorganic carbon sinks would be negligible compared to carbon sequestered into the earth as fossil fuel reserves over a period of 100+ million years. I shall have a fag packet attempt at sinks after lunch!!

Total biomass = 560,000,000,000,000kg

Assume that 20% of biomass is Carbon, so total carbon in biomass = 100,000,000,000,000 kg

So, if just sinking into living organic matter, you would have to increase biomass tenfold.

Other 3 possible sinks are:
dissolve in seawater
deposited as carbonate
deplosited as organic matter

Ah Robin

I wonder if anyone has done any study on the relationship between CO2 content and plant growth?

During my mining related researches I cannot help but notice how the increase in vegetation on sites appears to have accelerated in more recent years. I don’t think that I am on my own when I say that studying old photographs in relation to the current condition of a site is fascinating, maybe I should get a life!

Thinking over the years has been that increased CO2 leads to an increase in plant growth. But some recent studies have concluded the opposite is true. One study:
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2002-12/su-ccs120202.php 

Were you talking plant growth underground or above Roy? I ask because in a recent ecology study it was found that plants were adapting much quicker to alien environments than thought. It was particularly noted in mine spoil heaps where unexpected plants have adapted very quickly in ecological terms.

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I had to say it Roy
But the increase in plant growth could be due to the sheer amount of bloody rain we have had in recent years
















In the land of the blind , The one eye'd man is king !

During my mining related researches I cannot help but notice how the increase in vegetation on sites appears to have accelerated in more recent years.

There are so many factors to consider:

Depending on how far back you go, and on the kind of terrain, the rise and fall of various grazing animals - dramatic changes in rabbit populations over the years, changes in the use of common land for grazing etc, the spread of invasive alien species such as japanese knotweed - these are just three that are all human created influences on the landscape that have nothing directly to do with climate change etc etc.