In the natural gas-saturated geosystems, diverse causal relationships (chains) of various hazardous and catastrophic phenomena are formed that occur under the direct triggering effect of the Earth degassing processes. The level of natural threats to human life and the safe functioning of industrial objects increases under the influence of self-ignition and gas explosions, one of the main causes of which is the electrization of air and electrostatic discharges. To ensure the safety of the homosphere, it is necessary to conduct special studies to take into account the threats from potentially explosive processes of degassing of the Earth.
The mud volcanic mechanism of the Earth degassing has a larger scale of distribution and insufficiently studied specificity of manifestation forms compared to those existing at the present level of knowledge. Due to the insufficient level of knowledge about the number of potentially hazardous natural objects, additional studies can lead to a radical revision of their genesis. In particular, as the result of detailed studies of heaving mounds on the bottom of the eastern Beaufort Sea, many of them were recognized by the Geological Survey of Canada as mud volcanoes.
An analysis was made of the number of powerful gas blowouts and explosions with the formation of giant craters on the Yamal Peninsula in 2014-2021. The authors came to the conclusion that the genesis of several of them has all the signs of mud volcanism with cryogenic specificity, in which, due to the presence of the cryosphere, pieces of frozen rock of predominantly clay composition are ejected instead of liquefied clay mass.
It is required to identify potentially hazardous gas-saturated objects and understand their genesis. This will allow to reduce the risks of uncontrolled gas blowouts that threaten the functioning of the infrastructure of the oil and gas industry in the Arctic, and make a negative contribution to the climate changes, as well as to switch to the rational use of the gas contained in these objects.
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