Subglacial Chemical Reactions Consumed Greenhouse Gases and Prolonged Ancient Snowball Earth Glaciations for Millions of Years

Institute of Science Tokyo study finds subglacial chemical reactions consumed CO2 during snowball Earth, explaining why some glaciations lasted millions of years.

By: AXL Media

Published: Mar 10, 2026, 4:28 AM EDT

Source: The information in this article was sourced from Institute of Science Tokyo

Subterranean Chemistry Challenges the Classical Snowball Earth Model

A new geochemical study led by the Earth-Life Science Institute at the Institute of Science Tokyo reveals that Earth's most extreme ice ages were not the inert, frozen periods once imagined. Traditionally, scientists believed that global glaciations effectively shut down the planet's carbon cycle by covering continents in ice and preventing liquid water from reacting with rock. However, numerical models developed by Dr. Shintaro Kadoya and his team demonstrate that chemical weathering persisted in subglacial environments, where geothermal heat and ice insulation maintained liquid meltwater. This discovery suggests that the planet’s primary cooling mechanism remained active even while the surface was entombed in ice.

The Paradox of Neoproterozoic Glacial Durations

The research provides a critical answer to why the Sturtian glaciation lasted up to fifteen times longer than the subsequent Marinoan glaciation, despite both occurring between 720 and 635 million years ago. While the standard carbon cycle theory suggests that volcanic CO2 should have accumulated steadily until greenhouse warming melted the ice, geological evidence of minerals like dolomite suggested that continental weathering never fully ceased. By accounting for these subglacial reactions, the new model illustrates how the consumption of greenhouse gases beneath the ice could offset volcanic emissions, effectively "trapping" the planet in a frozen state for tens of millions of years.

Meltwater Dynamics at the Glacial Base

The efficiency of this subglacial carbon sink is dictated by a delicate balance between the supply of liquid water and the delivery of fresh, crushed rock via glacial erosion. As continental ice sheets moved across the land, they ground down the underlying crust into fine reactive powder, which then interacted with geothermal meltwater. According to the findings published in Earth and Planetary Science Letters, this system reaches a stable chemical state that can consistently draw carbon dioxide out of the environment. This process transforms the base of a glacier into a massive chemical reactor that actively resists the warming effects of volcanic outgassing.