An Increasing Trend of the Diffuse CO2 Emission from Teide Volcano (Tenerife, Canary Islands): A Premonitory Geochemical Signature of Volcanic Activity Changes at Tenerife?

Puerto de la Cruz, Tenerife (Canary Islands,Spain)

We report the results of 11 soil CO2 efflux surveys at
the summit cone of Teide volcano (SCT), Tenerife. The
surveys were undertaken from 1997 to 2009 to determine
the scale of total CO2 emissions at the SCT and
to evaluate the temporal variations of CO2 efflux and
their relationships with the volcanic-seismic activity.
Our results reveal significant fluctuations, which do not
seem to be masked by external variations, standing out
from the rest the ones measured in 2001, and the increasing
trend observed from 2007 to 2009, both having
similar shapes, intensities, and emission rates. The
significant pulse observed in total CO2 emission in 2001
provided the first geochemical observation supporting
unrest of the volcanic system, as it was addressed later
by anomalous seismic activity recorded in Tenerife Island
during April 22-29, 2004 (IGN). The new increasing
trend observed from 2007, might be precursor of new
anomalous volcanic-seismic activity in the next future,
suggesting that subsurface magma movement is the
cause for the observed changes in the total output of
diffuse CO2 emission at SCT.