Research Article| December 01, 2005 Gas Fluxes from Flood Basalt Eruptions Stephen Self; Stephen Self 1Volcano Dynamics Group, Department of Earth Sciences, The Open University, Milton Keynes, MK7 6AA, UK Corresponding author: Stephen.Self@open.ac.uk Search for other works by this author on: GSW Google Scholar Thorvaldur Thordarson; Thorvaldur Thordarson 2Department of Geology and Geophysics University of Hawai'i at Mānoa 1680 East-West Road, Honolulu HI 96822, USA Search for other works by this author on: GSW Google Scholar Mike Widdowson Mike Widdowson 1Volcano Dynamics Group, Department of Earth Sciences, The Open University, Milton Keynes, MK7 6AA, UK Search for other works by this author on: GSW Google Scholar Author and Article Information Stephen Self 1Volcano Dynamics Group, Department of Earth Sciences, The Open University, Milton Keynes, MK7 6AA, UK Thorvaldur Thordarson 2Department of Geology and Geophysics University of Hawai'i at Mānoa 1680 East-West Road, Honolulu HI 96822, USA Mike Widdowson 1Volcano Dynamics Group, Department of Earth Sciences, The Open University, Milton Keynes, MK7 6AA, UK Corresponding author: Stephen.Self@open.ac.uk Publisher: Mineralogical Society of America First Online: 09 Mar 2017 Online ISSN: 1811-5217 Print ISSN: 1811-5209 © 2005 by the Mineralogical Society of America Elements (2005) 1 (5): 283–287. https://doi.org/10.2113/gselements.1.5.283 Article history First Online: 09 Mar 2017 Cite View This Citation Add to Citation Manager Share Icon Share Facebook Twitter LinkedIn MailTo Tools Icon Tools Get Permissions Search Site Citation Stephen Self, Thorvaldur Thordarson, Mike Widdowson; Gas Fluxes from Flood Basalt Eruptions. Elements 2005;; 1 (5): 283–287. doi: https://doi.org/10.2113/gselements.1.5.283 Download citation file: Ris (Zotero) Refmanager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest filter your search All ContentBy SocietyElements Search Advanced Search Abstract Subaerial continental flood basalt volcanism is distinguished from all other volcanic activity by the repeated effusion of huge batches of basaltic magma (∼102-103 km3 per eruption) over short periods of geologic time (<1 Myr). Flood basalt provinces are constructed of thick stacks of extensive pahoehoe-dominated lava flow fields and are the products of hundreds of eruptions. Each huge eruption comes from a dyke-fed fissure tens to hundreds of kilometres long and lasts about a decade or more. Such spatial and temporal patterns of lava production do not occur at any other time in Earth history, and, during eruptions, gas fluxes of ∼1 Gt per year of SO2 and CO2 over periods of a decade or more are possible. Importantly, the atmospheric cooling associated with aerosols generated from the SO2 emissions of just one flood basalt eruption is likely to have been severe and would have persisted for a decade or longer. By contrast, warming due to volcanogenic CO2 released during an eruption is estimated to have been insignificant because the mass of CO2 would have been small compared to that already present in the atmosphere. You do not have access to this content, please speak to your institutional administrator if you feel you should have access.