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2009-07-28 -Signs, Portents, and the Weather-

Hydrocarbons Forming without animal/plant matter? In The Deep Earth?

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Posted by 3dc 2009-07-28 00:00|| || Front Page|| [11131 views ] Top

#1 ION WORLD NEWS > STUDY: GLOBAL WARMING TO MAKE WORLD HOTTER IN NEXT FIVE YEARS [2014-2015].

Posted by JosephMendiola">JosephMendiola 2009-07-28 01:00|| NA]">[NA] 2009-07-28 01:00|| Front Page Top

#2 I would say that pretty much explains the recent "ultra-deep" oil find off the coast of Brazil about 4-1/2 miles under the earth's surface in rocks that should never have been exposed to the surface. The 6,000 feet of salt above the oil find would have come from when Africa and South America were rifting apart and sea water would break in to the rift and be evaporated. Basically, any rocks in the Atlantic that are beyond the continental shelves of South America and Africa have never had surface vegetation since the "mid-atlantic ridge" formed.

Posted by crosspatch 2009-07-28 02:31|| 2009-07-28 02:31|| Front Page Top

#3 "4-1/2 miles under the earth's surface "

Should be: 4-1/2 miles under the ocean's surface.

Posted by crosspatch 2009-07-28 02:31|| 2009-07-28 02:31|| Front Page Top

#4 There have been some Russian geologist that was runnibg with this theory for decades.

Posted by g(r)omgoru 2009-07-28 03:01|| 2009-07-28 03:01|| Front Page Top

#5 Which gets back to an inconvenient point that the 'experts' are still hypothesizing about how oil really formed. No one knows with absolute certainty.

Posted by Procopius2k 2009-07-28 08:23|| 2009-07-28 08:23|| Front Page Top

#6 Thomas Gold has pushed this theory for a while.
Deep Brazilian find does not require it - actually pretty classical set-up: proto-rift holds nutrient-rich lakes and seas that grow lots of source biota, with anoxic bottom waters that preserve them when they die & sink. Potential reservoir rocks (perhaps sand dunes, perhaps carbonate reefs) are deposited. The seas are periodically sealed off and evaporate, leaving salt layers that make outstanding seals to keep any oil and gas from escaping (salt provides the superb seals in Iran and Kazahkstan that hold thousands of feet of oil and gas column trapped.) Continued subsidence and burial leads to heating and pressurizing of the source biota to where oil, and then gas are generated. The part that surprises me is that the rocks were not overcooked to the point of destroying the oil.
There are however some good arguements to support the deep Earth source concept for SOME accumulations though. Some West Texas (and I think Russian) gas fields contain very unusual concentrations of Helium, which must have come through deep Earth outgassing, as far as anyone has proposed. That doesn't mean the methane and ethane did too - just that they got caught by the same seal. And I have seen some claims of (traces of) hydrocarbons in deep boreholes into non-sedimentary rocks - could be deep Earth outgassing source.
But marker geochemistry, basin analysis, and other oil science seems to pretty well explain 99.9% of commercial oil and gas accumulations through biologic processes.

Posted by Glenmore 2009-07-28 08:26|| 2009-07-28 08:26|| Front Page Top

#7 The Russkies had this idea for a long time, but it was advocated in the US most famously by Thomas Gold. I heard a talk by him at Fermilab in the IIRC early 90s. Very interesting, but not compelling. I'm not surprised that abiotic oil is possible, but that doesn't mean it is the main source of petroleum deposits.

Posted by Spot">Spot 2009-07-28 08:36|| 2009-07-28 08:36|| Front Page Top

#8 At 4 miles deep the temperature must be upwards of 400F.

Ouch.

Posted by Lord garth 2009-07-28 08:43|| 2009-07-28 08:43|| Front Page Top

#9 Salt is a relatively good thermal conductor (for a 'rock') and so the reservoirs just below it should be a little less hot than normal thermal gradients would predict, apparantly enough to keep the oil from degrading to badly.

Posted by Glenmore 2009-07-28 12:53|| 2009-07-28 12:53|| Front Page Top

#10 The Russians seem to have a great deal of expertise in the matter of high pressure hydrocarbons. In Soviet times, they made quite a bit of hard cash by selling gem diamonds. De Beers had to pay out to protect the monopoly. Many folks, including some at CIA, wondered if the Russians had perfected manufacture of gem diamonds.

http://www.edwardjayepstein.com/diamond/chap17.htm
http://edjayepstein.blogspot.com/2009/05/russian-take-over-of-diamond-cartel.html

Posted by Plastic Snoopy 2009-07-28 14:26|| 2009-07-28 14:26|| Front Page Top

#11 wondered if the Russians had perfected manufacture of gem diamonds.

Or Russia sits on the Siberian Traps just loaded with all sorts of deep earth minerals.

Posted by ed 2009-07-28 14:39|| 2009-07-28 14:39|| Front Page Top

#12 there is no such thing as fossil fuel, only misidentification of its origins.

Titan has a surface covered in hydrocarbons of all types. no rottend plants or animals under pressure had anything what sover to do with any oil any where.

Meteor impacts left vast pools of oil exposed on jupiter which disappeared in about 8 months later. Last week another impactor created even more oil which will take some time but it too will seep into the fractures left post impact.

all oil is a by product of catastrophe physics be they meteor impacts or earthquake related.

the universe is teaming with heavy hydrocarbons...all because of the transitions which occur after mega collisions have occurred.

there is no fossils in fossil fuel only contaminents within rocks that oil might pass during its flow or holding periods.

Posted by Grerelet Bucket6078 2009-07-28 15:08|| 2009-07-28 15:08|| Front Page Top

#13 Ya lost me when you mentioned large pools of oil exposed on Jupiter. The surface of Jupiter has never been viewed - that is if there is a surface.

Interesting Jupiter surface tidbit - some theorize any possible solid core of Jupiter could be surrounded by a layer of diamond. A BIG layer of diamond.

Posted by Hellfish 2009-07-28 20:09|| 2009-07-28 20:09|| Front Page Top

#14 last weeks impact as viewed by telescopes. http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2009-112

When shoemaker Levy the misidentified astroid string hit Jupiter it left earth size black ozz, oil that is, that stayed visible for 8 months before seeping into the fisures created by the impacts.

Last weeks event produced the same stuff....
oil that is, texas tea, black gold...the next thing ya know hellfish is a millionaire, kin folks say, hell move away from here, so hell packs up his family and moves to Titan where the oils as thick as hells kitchen.

Posted by Grerelet Bucket6078 2009-07-28 22:29|| 2009-07-28 22:29|| Front Page Top

#15 glenmores surmise....is like an ahhha moment in reverse.

Posted by Grerelet Bucket6078 2009-07-28 22:31|| 2009-07-28 22:31|| Front Page Top

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