[Glendora Christianson]

Re: End of Civilization . . . Is Jesus Coming?

Dear Lord! That article was disturbing. I wonder how much all that liberal glum affects the resale value of my Hummer? Anyway, I won't be selling it too soon as the pink ones are hard to come by and Elmer is installing a 12,000 gallon gas tank in our back yard just for me! CONCERNED GLYNNDIE

[ScienceisforFools]

Re: End of Civilization . . . Is Jesus Coming?

which also indicates that Jesus is coming soon!

And yet, we are still waiting.

[lukasekman]

Re: End of Civilization . . . Is Jesus Coming?

As a result of the imminent oil crisis, the U.S. Department of Family Values have risen the Rapture Condition (RapCon) level from 3 to 2.

[krunsch]

Re: End of Civilization . . . Is Jesus Coming?

Commercial fertilizers are made from ammonia, which is made from natural gas, which will peak about 10 year after oil peaks;

Thirty years ago it was stated that oil will last for thirty years. Today it is estimated that oil is going to last another thirty years. Sure it's not goin to last forever, but it is going to last much longer than we think.

Furthermore, natural gas is not the only way to generate hydrogen. Carbon monoxide and water are sufficient, and carbon monoxide can be gained from buring coal. Actually most carbohydrids can be gained from coal. It is dirty, yes, air quality will suffer, but coal will last much longer than oil, probably the next 200 years. As soon as oil gets scarce, its price will increase and these means will become favorable.

I guess it will still take a bit of time till our civilization breaks down, if it ever does.

[Mary Etheldreda]

Re: End of Civilization . . . Is Jesus Coming?

I guess it will still take a bit of time till our civilization breaks down, if it ever does.

Oh it will, and soon when Jesus comes.

Even Billy Graham knows the End Times are nigh.

Billy Graham sounds alarm for 2nd Coming


\0/

[WilliamJenningsBryan]

Re: End of Civilization . . . Is Jesus Coming?

Thirty years ago it was stated that oil will last for thirty years. Today it is estimated that oil is going to last another thirty years. Sure it's not goin to last forever, but it is going to last much longer than we think.

Furthermore, natural gas is not the only way to generate hydrogen. Carbon monoxide and water are sufficient, and carbon monoxide can be gained from buring coal. Actually most carbohydrids can be gained from coal. It is dirty, yes, air quality will suffer, but coal will last much longer than oil, probably the next 200 years. As soon as oil gets scarce, its price will increase and these means will become favorable.

I guess it will still take a bit of time till our civilization breaks down, if it ever does.

Your thinking is typical of LIEberals who are not acquainted with Godly Republican economics. There will always be 30 to 100 years of proven reserves of coal, oil and gas because it is not economically justifiable to spend capital to search for them beyond that time frame.

New research indicates that there may be millions of years of natural gas in the earth and gives the proponents of abiotic oil a new argument in their favor. Your quoting of a common industrial process (carbon monoxide and water) begs the question of where you're going to get all that carbon monoxide.

It probably won't be running out of oil and gas that brings Jesus back. My guess it that it will have something to do with the mooselimbs and Obama.

Methane in Earth's Mantle May Be Energy Source

Untapped reserves of methane, the main component in natural gas, may be found deep in Earth's crust, according to a recently released report in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).

These reserves could be a virtually inexhaustible source of energy for future generations.

A team of researchers from the Laboratory, Carnegie Institution’s Geophysical Laboratory, Harvard University, Argonne National Laboratory and Indiana University, South Bend, showed that methane forms under conditions that occur in Earth’s upper mantle through a series of experiments and theoretical calculations.

Methane is the most plentiful hydrocarbon in Earth’s crust and is a main component of natural gas. However, oil and gas wells are typically only drilled 5 to 10 kilometers beneath the surface. These depths correspond to pressures of a few thousand atmospheres. One atmosphere equates to 14.7 pounds per square inch of pressure.

Using a diamond anvil cell, the scientists squeezed materials common at Earth’s surface — iron oxide (FeO), calcite (CaCO3) (the primary component of marble) and water to pressures ranging from 50,000 to 110,000 atmospheres and temperatures more than 2,500 degrees Fahrenheit—to create conditions similar to those found deep within Earth. Methane (CH4) formed by combining the carbon in calcite with the hydrogen in water. The reaction occurred over a range of temperatures and pressures. Methane production was most favorable at 900 degrees Fahrenheit and 70,000 atmospheres of pressure.

The experiments show that a nonbiological source of hydrocarbons may lie in Earth’s mantle and is created from reactions between water and rock—not just from the decomposition of living organisms.

“The results demonstrate that methane readily forms by the reaction of marble with iron-rich minerals and water under conditions typical in Earth’s upper mantle,” said Laurence Fried, of the Physical and Life Sciences Directorate. “This suggests that there may be untapped methane reserves well below Earth’s surface. Our calculations show that methane is thermodynamically stable under conditions typical of Earth’s mantle, indicating that such reserves could potentially exist for millions of years.”

The study is published in the Sept. 13-17 early, online edition of the PNAS.

The mantle is a dense, hot layer of semisolid rock approximately 2,900 kilometers thick. The mantle, which contains more iron, magnesium and calcium than the crust, is hotter and denser because temperature and pressure inside Earth increase with depth. Because of the firestorm-like temperatures and crushing pressure in Earth’s mantle, molecules behave very differently than they do on the surface.

“When we looked at the samples under these pressures and temperatures, they revealed optical changes indicative of methane formation,” Fried said. “At temperatures above 2,200 degrees Fahrenheit, we found that the carbon in calcite formed carbon dioxide rather than methane. This implies that methane in the interior of Earth might exist at depths between 100 and 200 kilometers. This has broad implications for the hydrocarbon reserves of the planet and could indicate that methane is more prevalent in the mantle than previously thought. Due to the vast size of Earth’s mantle, hydrocarbon reserves in the mantle could be much larger than reserves currently found in Earth’s crust.”

Authors of the PNAS study are: Henry P. Scott, Indiana University, South Bend; Russell Hemley and Ho-kwang Mao of the Carnegie Institution’s Geophysical Laboratory; Dudley Herschbach of Harvard University: Fried, Michael Howard and Sorin Bastea of the Laboratory.
—Anne M. Stark

https://www-pls.llnl.gov/?url=science_and_technology-chemistry-methane

[Basilissa]

Re: End of Civilization . . . Is Jesus Coming?

YMethane in Earth's Mantle May Be Energy Source

Untapped reserves of methane, the main component in natural gas, may be found deep in Earth's crust, according to a recently released report in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).

These reserves could be a virtually inexhaustible source of energy for future generations.

A team of researchers from the Laboratory, Carnegie Institution’s Geophysical Laboratory, Harvard University, Argonne National Laboratory and Indiana University, South Bend, showed that methane forms under conditions that occur in Earth’s upper mantle through a series of experiments and theoretical calculations.

Great! Now all scientists have to do is the easy part - prove that their theoretical calculations are right and come up with extracting the gas from the mantle. Easy as pie