Work

Preliminary Results on Hydrogen Concentration Time Series in Spring Gases from the Pamir–Western Himalayan Syntaxis: Variability and Tectonic Instability

Year: 2025

Type: article

Abstract: Identifying reliable geochemical signals that reflect crustal stress evolution remains a major challenge in earthquake monitoring. Spring fluids, due to their deep circulation and rapid response, provide an important window into fault-zone processes. This study presents three years (May 2022–March 2025) of hourly hydrogen gas (H2) concentration monitoring in spring gases from the Muji Basin on the northern Pamir Plateau, integrated with meteorological and seismic data. H2 concentrations exhibited a stable diurnal pattern, positively correlated with water and air temperatures and negatively correlated with atmospheric pressure. Short-term anomalies during seismically quiet periods may reflect a combination of temperature-dependent solubility effects and transient degassing caused by localized gas accumulation and sudden release under heterogeneous fault and aquifer conditions. During seismically active phases, sustained increases in H2 concentrations were also recorded; however, such anomalies did not consistently precede earthquakes, instead reflecting broader phases of tectonic instability and episodic fault-zone degassing. These findings highlight the potential of long-term H2 monitoring to improve our understanding of the coupling between crustal stress, fluid transport, and degassing processes in tectonically active regions.

Source: Applied Sciences

DOI: 10.3390/app15179736