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Molecular and isotopic characteristics of gas hydrate-bound hydrocarbons in southern and central Lake Baikal

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Abstract

We investigated the molecular composition (methane, ethane, and propane) and stable isotope composition (methane and ethane) of hydrate-bound gas in sediments of Lake Baikal. Hydrate-bearing sediment cores were retrieved from eight gas seep sites, located in the southern and central Baikal basins. Empirical classification of the methane stable isotopes (δ13C and δD) for all the seep sites indicated the dominant microbial origin of methane via methyl-type fermentation; however, a mixture of thermogenic and microbial gases resulted in relatively high methane δ13C signatures at two sites where ethane δ13C indicated a typical thermogenic origin. At one of the sites in the southern Baikal basin, we found gas hydrates of enclathrated microbial ethane in which 13C and deuterium were both highly depleted (mean δ13C and δD of –61.6‰ V-PDB and –285.4‰ V-SMOW, respectively). To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report of C2 δ13C–δD classification for hydrate-bound gas in either freshwater or marine environments.

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Acknowledgements

We greatly appreciate the assistance of the shipboard crews of RV G. Yu. Vereshchagin during the Lake Baikal expeditions. The CF-IRMS measurements were supported by Yukihiro Saito. This work was supported by funding agencies in Japan (Japan Society for the Promotion of Science KAKENHI 18206099, 19550077, 21254006, and 21360219, and the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology KAKENHI 19740323), the Flemish Fund for Scientific Research (FWO-Vlaanderen), the Bilateral Flemish-Russian Federation Project, and the Integration project of RAS SB 58. We are also grateful to anonymous reviewers for their constructive comments and suggestions.

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Author notes

  1. Jeffrey Poort

    Present address: Laboratoire de Géosciences Marines, Institut de Physique du Globe de Paris, 4 place Jussieu, Paris, 75005, France

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Kitami Institute of Technology, 165 Koen-cho, Kitami, 090-8507, Japan

    Akihiro Hachikubo, Hirotoshi Sakagami, Hirotsugu Minami, Yutaka Nunokawa, Satoshi Yamashita, Nobuo Takahashi & Hitoshi Shoji

  2. Limnological Institute, SB RAS, 3 Ulan-Batorskaya St., Irkutsk, 664033, Russia

    Oleg Khlystov

  3. I.S. Gramberg All-Russia Research Institute for Geology and Mineral Resources of the World Ocean (VNIIOkeangeologia), 1 Angliysky Ave., St. Petersburg, 190121, Russia

    Alexey Krylov

  4. Shimizu Corporation, 3-4-17 Etchujima, Koto-ku, Tokyo, 135-8530, Japan

    Shin’ya Nishio

  5. National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology, 2-17-2-1 Tsukisamu-Higashi, Toyohira-ku, Sapporo, 062-8517, Japan

    Masato Kida & Takao Ebinuma

  6. Vinogradov Institute of Geochemistry, SB RAS, 1-a Favorsky St., Irkutsk, 664033, Russia

    Gennadiy Kalmychkov

  7. Renard Centre of Marine Geology, Ghent University, Krijgslaan 281 s8, Ghent, 9000, Belgium

    Jeffrey Poort

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  1. Akihiro Hachikubo
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  2. Oleg Khlystov
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  13. Gennadiy Kalmychkov
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Akihiro Hachikubo.

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Table S1

Molecular and stable isotope compositions of hydrate-bound hydrocarbons at all sites. cmblf: centimeters below lake floor, n.d.: not determined (PDF 95 kb)

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Hachikubo, A., Khlystov, O., Krylov, A. et al. Molecular and isotopic characteristics of gas hydrate-bound hydrocarbons in southern and central Lake Baikal. Geo-Mar Lett 30, 321–329 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00367-010-0203-1

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