More evidence for "Abiotic" oil
My belief is that oil comes not from living organic matter but produced from the primordial earth. It was then locked deep within the earth as the earths crust formed.. This theory comes from Russian scientist in the 1950’s. (Its not a new theory) Below I note the main reasons why the “Fossil fuel” theory should be refuted.
1. There is massive amounts of oil. Every time the industry says “they are running out of oil” they find more. They have been claiming that they are running out of oil for 100 years (with a big scare in the 1970’s) and as time has gone on the have always found more reserves. The oil industry itself has consistently underestimated the oil reserves especially if “recoverable reserves” are considered rather than proven reserves.
How much oil is there? There is a Massive difference between “ known oil in place” and“proven oil reserves”
By definition “Proven oil reserves” are those reserves claimed to have a reasonable certainty (normally at least 90% confidence) of being recoverable under existing economicand political conditions, with existing technology. At present for the whole world this is estimated to be 1.35 Trillion barrels. For the USA this is at present is estimated to be 22 Billion Barrels ( Conventional drilling for oil). For Canadian tar sands it is 173 Billion barrels. Therefore as technology increases or the price increases “known oil in place” ( read below) can become “proven oil reserves”
“ known oil in place” is what geologist estimate is the total amount of oil that is there. For USA, it is 3 Trillion Barrels, if all oil shale’s are included, (1000 times proven reserves). The Bazhenov. field in Western Siberia, in Russia has recently been estimated to be 80 times the size the of the Green river formation in the USA the largest previous known formation. See web article below. (http://www.forbes.com/sites/christopherhelman/2012/06/04/bakken-bazhenov-shale-oil/) For the Canadian tar sands 1.7 – 2 Trillion Barrels, a minimum of 10 times proven reserves. The Venezuelan, government claims a reserve of bitumen even greater than Alberta's, Estimated total of Canada+ Venezuelan 3 -5.4 Trillion Barrels. .
Map of known tar and oil shale’s on the planet and articles.http://thetyee.ca/News/2010/09/09/OilSandsWorld/ http://thetyee.ca/Opinion/2011/01/14/TarSandsWorldsDirtiest/
2. Initial theory of Fossil oil. When the initial theory of “Fossil oil” appeared around 1890 the scientific community did not know that the primordial earth had a atmosphere consisting of mainly Carbon Dioxide, Methane, Water vapor and Ammonia. Nor did they know that these compounds existed on the gas giants and some of their moons in our solar system. The theory was therefore by default because they could not think of any other place the oil could come from.
3 Russian oil exploitation. There are presently more than 80 oil and gas fields in the Caspian district alone which were explored and developed by applying the perspective of the abiotic theory which produce oil from the crystalline basement rock. (Krayushkin, Chebanenko et al. 1994) Crystalline basement rock forms below sedimentary rock. Clearly the oil could not form above basement rock and then seep through it. Similarly, exploration in the western Siberia cratonic-rift sedimentary basin has developed 90 petroleum fields of which 80 produce either partly or entirely from the crystalline basement.
4 Depth that oil is found. Oil is being found at depths of 30,000 feet. The deepest fossils known are from 16,000 feet. How could oil form from fossils if some oil is 14,000 feet below any of the deepest fossils.
5 Chemical differences of Crude Oil to that in life.
The various elements that make up the cell ( Life) and Crude Oil are:
Element | Weight % in life | Weight % in oil | Ratio: Life / oil | Element is: |
Hydrogen | 10.2 | 14 | 1:1.37 | Concentrated |
Oxygen | 66 | 1 | 66:1 | De-concentrated |
Carbon | 17.5 | 84 | 1:4.8 | Concentrated |
Nitrogen | 2.4 | 1 | 2.2:1 | De- Concentrated |
Sulfur | 0.2 | 2 | 10:1 | Concentrated |
Phosphorous | 0.9 | 0.00015 | 10000:1 | De- Concentrated |
Calcium | 1.5 | 15* ppm | 1000:1 | De- Concentrated |
Magnesium | 500ppm | 5* ppm | 100:1 | De- Concentrated |
Vanadium | Trace(1 ppm) | 1200 ppm ** | 1200:1 | Concentrated |
* Maximum found in Pakistani oil fields
** Vanadium is present in fossil fuel deposits such as crude oil, coal, oil shale and tar sands. There is considerable variation in concentration.. In crude oil, concentrations up to 1200 ppm have been reported.
Chemical nature of Crude Oil. Crude oil is mainly hydrocarbons with very little oxygen and consists mainly of the following compounds.
- Paraffin’s, general formula: CnH2n+2 (n is a whole number, usually from 1 to 20) straight- or branched-chain molecules can be gasses or liquids at room temperature depending upon the molecule examples: methane, ethane, propane, butane, iso-butane, pentane, hexane
- Aromatics, general formula: C6H5 - Y (Y is a longer, straight molecule that connects to the benzene ring) ringed structures with one or more rings. Rings contain six carbon atoms, with alternating double and single bonds between the carbons typically liquids examples: benzene, naphthalene
- Napthenes or Cycloalkanes general formula: CnH2n (n is a whole number usually from 1 to 20) ringed structures with one or more rings. Rings contain only single bonds between the carbon atoms typically liquids at room temperature examples: cyclohexane, methyl cyclopentane
- Other hydrocarbons Alkenes general formula: CnH2n (n is a whole number, usually from 1 to 20) linear or branched chain molecules containing one carbon-carbon double-bond can be liquid or gas examples: ethylene, butene, Isobutene Dienes and Alkynes general formula: CnH2n-2 (n is a whole number, usually from 1 to 20) linear or branched chain molecules containing two carbon-carbon double-bonds can be liquid or gas examples: acetylene, butadienes
This nothing like the compounds in life, which tend to be carbohydrates, Cm(H2O)n Polysaccharides(e.g., starch and glycogen), cellulose in plants and chitin in arthropods), amino acids (Some Nitrogen) and fats and fatty acids (Glycerol based). The “oil experts” say the decayed products of life are buried deep underground and cooked under heat and pressure to obtain crude oil. ( OK but I have yet to see validated chemical reaction to produce crude oil under those conditions. )
However Ultra Violet (UV) free radical polymerization seems quite possible with the action of UV light from the sun on the primordial atmosphere. I suspect something like below.
CH4 + hv ----------------------------- CH3• + H ( Free radical)
CH3• + CH3• ------------------------- C2H6 (Ethane)
CH3 CH3 + hv --------------------------------- CH3 CH2• + H
CH3 CH2• + CH3 CH2• ----------- C4H10 (Butane)
CH3 CH2 – CH2 CH3 + hv ------ CH3 CH• - •CH CH3 + 2H
CH3 CH• - •CH CH3 ® CH3 – CH – CH - CH3 (Butene)
Higher molecular weight polymers can be formed by more addition of methane / ethane and obviously for higher chain molecules (C6+) cyclic compounds. The higher the molecular weight / boiling temperature the more likely the hydrocarbon will “rain out” of the atmosphere.
There are also papers describing that electrical discharge ( Lightening in atmosphere) can also polymerize methane to higher molecular weight hydrocarbons.
UV polymerization of methane is also suggested for Titans (Saturn’s moon) atmosphere of methane into ethane and higher molecular weight alkanes
Earth : Average distance from sun 149.6 million km
Saturn : Average distance from sun 1.43 billion km == 9.5 times distance therefore 91 times less UV light per unit area than earth ( R2)
Saturn : Average distance from sun 1.43 billion km == 9.5 times distance therefore 91 times less UV light per unit area than earth ( R2)
If it can occur on Titan then it could certainly happen on the primordial earth.
7 Oil found under salt domes: Conventional theory says that oil is under salt domes because the salt was deposited through drying of lakes and seas. Fossil life was buried underneath the salt layer ( How? Why not within the salt!) then all is deeply buried. The salt being a weak rock buckled under pressure ( Yes ) forming salt domes. I think that the buckling of the salt causes cracks in the underling rock and so allows abiotic oil to come up from deep below and is trapped beneath impermeable rock / salt layer.
8 Life recycles, generally not buried in the earth. When a plant or animal dies very little is truly buried. Mostly it is re-cycled by insects, micro-organisms, fungus’s, bacteria and Actinolites.
9 How much oil have humans used? Estimates vary, Istvan Lakatos and Julianna Lakatos-Szabo of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences estimate 700 Billion barrels. John Jones in the School of Engineering, at the University of Aberdeen, UK estimate 944 Billion barrels. Today oil consumption estimated at 90 Million barrels per day. Therefore 32.5 Billion barrels per year. Therefore in 29 maximum of years this will be we will double the oil we have used. ( At no growth).
9 Economics of oil What this means is that all the oil companies have to do is to drill deeper into basement rock where there has been folding or cracking underneath so that oil seepage could occur and they are likely to find conventional oil. Although drilling deeper is more expensive it is not prohibitively so and as technology increases going deeper will be more economic. The other important issue is this. As explained above there are massive amounts of unconventional oil. The amount of money spent by oil companies on Research and Development for extracting unconventional oil will almost certainly reduce the extraction and processing costs. Shell recently estimated that it could extract shale oil at $30 a barrel and the present 2012 price is $70-$90 a barrel.
The price of oil today is almost nothing to do with the cost of getting it out of the ground. The reality is that the high price is due to speculation ( World price for oil) and deliberately induced shortages both in crude oil production and refinery production.. I have read that oil could be extracted in shallow wells ( Saudi Arabia) at a profit of $5 a barrel. Even the Canadian tar sands may only require $25 per barrel. Speculation is very finicky. If it is thought there was a over abundance of oil then the “world price” could drop dramatically and conversely a shortage large price increases and we are seeing large fluctuations in price over short periods of time.
The environmental cost are not in the equation for costs. For instance if climate change effects food production or global warming causes the sea level to rise the cost of coastal flooding is not considered.
Green party policy. Therefore to stop using oil must be political. It cannot be economic because technology will keep the price down and present oil speculation is questionable for long term high prices. Green Party policy must be “ Stop drilling for more oil” Even if for instance they were to find a massive oil field in Canada that was “cheep oil” we cannot allow the oil companies to extract it.
We need to take political stand for the future and the environment and ignore the present false economics of oil.
To emphasize this the Green Party should stop calling oil a fossil fuel and name it by its more accurate name of “abiotic fuel”. ( This also includes natural gas.)
The last thing the planet and the human race needs is more oil!
Alan Bergey
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