Thre are many examples of hydrocarbons in space including massive clouds of alcohol. There is no real proof that the 20 million barrels a day just this county uses is from fossils. In fact there are documents from the late 50 showing the gov. Is well aware that oil is abiotic. Wouldn't it be one of the last things they would want the public to know about understanding the fortune they collect from oil companies. For the science deniers, what proof is there that decayed plant or animal life turns to oil? 20 million barrels a day, at what point do you consider an alternate theory.
Almost all of the methane that we burn as for energy purposes is methane that has long ago been sequestered and kept out of the atmosphere. Methane is also produced and our landfills produce methane as well.
In answer to question as to if methane is a somewhat renewable resource I would have to say that it is. http://www.motherearthnews.com/diy/home-... - Producing our own methane on a scale large enough to supplement the sequestered stores of methane is unlikely to be sufficient to truly consider methane as a renewable resource.
Here is the big question that you are not asking. Would our use of our manufactured processes of methane produce less harm to the atmosphere when burned than the fossil fuel methane reserves? To give an honest answer to that you would need to calculate the "cradle to grave" costs of each in terms of their carbon footprint. I do not know these costs, so I cannot answer that question.
I will say that it is refreshing to see you ask a more positive question than you are prone to asking. I say this because natural gas is by far the cleanest burning fossil fuel we have available to us. I would prefer to see you use the methane digester to fuel your stove than for you to use a coal fired stove or a coal fired energy plant.
Can I vote on best answer now?
Jim Z - Your knowledge is extensive in this field. Thanks for the information! ... and thanks Ottawa Mike for bringing it up!
The continual production of these materials is never-ending. The only reason I see them being finite is if we find that life is limited or that we will overpopulate this planet to a point of over-consumption. The laws of physics might be used to show that neither are possible.
We currently use 20 million barrels of oil a day here in the U.S. 42 gallons (1 barrel) = 5.61458 cubic feet (at 60 degrees F) which means that we use 112,291,600 cubic feet of oil per day or 40,986,434,000 per year (which is less than 1/3rd of a cubic mile). Makes me wonder how fast the Planet can manufacture fossil fuels? Do you think that the Planet could be remanufacturing fossil fuels at a rate of 1 1/2 cubic miles per year on its own? Just a thought.
Fossil fuels are not "a freak of nature". They are a "product of nature".
I would say yes because if it weren't for the compressed decay and the decay itself. It isn't as damaging as oil or coal more commonly found near natural gas/methane sources, bu still emits a great deal of CO2 when burned as a fuel. Haven't dug any holes on mars or titan lately to know for sure
Methane seems to be associated with ancient life. Geologists have traditionally found it occupying the same strata that fossils are found.
The methane we use mostly comes from deep-rock formations. That methane is most definitely a fossil fuel, because it is composed of very old organic matter subducted to larger depths, thousands of feet, where the heat cracks the larger organic molecules into methane (there is a sweet spot in terms of depth of rock formations, where rock from deeper produces methane and rock from shallower produces oil). You can tell this because the isotopic composition of the carbon in "fossil fuel" methane is different from "biological" methane produced from anaerobic respiration or anaerobic decomposition.
The chemistry of oil and gas formation is relatively interesting and old. A lot of the papers were published in German in the 19th century. If you spend a few minutes with google you can verify those statements above. More or less. The extent to which I've slightly garbled things I learned long ago doesn't really bother me, since you don't care about the answer anyway.
edit: I have to chuckle at our resident geologist. Here is what Wikipedia says about abiotic production of methane:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abiogenic_p...
It is not surprising his knowledge is out of date. It's like the old quip about how it's not the stuff he doesn't know, it's the stuff he does that just ain't so. You both need to get out more and not read so much from right-wing sites. The objective stuff is more challenging for you, I suspect, but at least acknowledging it's out there would make you both look less crazy, or paid.
edit2: You might also be interested in this article:
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/arch...
Might be behind a pay wall, but it's worth subscribing to the mag to read it.
edit3: Jim, you should (but you won't) read the "State of Current Research" section here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abiogenic_p...
you will see what I wrote is roughly consistent with the wiki entry. I'll leave evaluation of what you wrote in the context of the wiki entry to others, since I get accused all the time of not being nice enough.
edit: Jim: Are you kidding me? You are equating what you have personal experience with in shallow layers over timespans of maybe years at most with what goes on at much greater depths, much higher temperatures, over timespans that are millions of years longer. And I'm the bad scientist here?
There are rivers of methane on Titan as you pointed out yet here on Earth we have to say that all methane is organic (e.g from buried remains of life). This comes from the old theory that the earth was formed from a magma. When I went to school, the cold fusion theory (Damn did I say that. I meant the Cold Accretion theory) was favored for the formation of the Earth. It appears the Earth had formed from at least a partial melt but perhaps some of the original methane is left. If it is, it would migrate upwards due to forces of bouyancy. There is methane sometimes found in very deep wells sometimes in granites that shouldn't have any trace of life. Theories on its origin are varied.
It is irritating to me that some theories are enforced by the thought facists (Dook is a member in standing). Theories should be recognized as theories. In fact there are other theories. It may in fact be a combination of things.
As someone who deals in hydrocarbon fate and transport on a daily basis, I understand more than most about the problems in petroleum getting from the source rock to the stratigraphic traps in the classical theories of petroleum formation. Since so much has been learned in the fate and transport of hydrocarbons in the environmental field in the last 20 years, I think they might want to revisit some of the old theories on the formation of petroleum and gas fields.
If methane is less finite as you put it, then perhaps petroleum is formed form reworked methane by extremophile (methanotrophic) bacteria and its fate and transport is mostly vertically upward with the methane.
Fortunately, Unlike GCNP, I didn't get my degree from Wikipedia. I had previously read their article on abiotic oil. It was kind of bizarre and it seemed to be someones thesis. I don't think Russian theories are worth much. The signatures of life are in oil. It would have to form from life. There are other ways that isotopes can be sorted. A proper scientific attitude is to recognize a theory when it is a theory.
Note GCNP, it is you that is outdated and tired. Why don't you try informing yourself instead of believing everything you are told to believe.
GC, It sounds to me like you are just making it up. Subduction occurs at plate boundaries. It isn't theorized that methane forms deeper and oil is formed shallower. It is true that theories of oil formation are problematic because there isn't sufficient pressure in shallow rocks where oil is theorized to form. This has been explained by theorizing "cells" within the shale increasing pressure and then releasing the oil. As I said it is problematic in that it hasn't been proved to exist at least not to my knowledge.
Mae, what you claim is incomplete. Methane is found in association with petroleum and coal. All three are found in association with each other. Clearly there are methanogenic bacteria and they consume biologic material in an anaerobic environment. As I pointed out, methane has also been found in other places such as the deep wells drilled by Russia and others that are far below sediment deposition.
GC, you are right. I don't feel like reading it again. I read it before and it was written by someone trying to debunk abiotic oil. Some of it was good and informative. They did a good job of describing the different theories. I don't think they all are equal in their likelihood. I remember that he suggested something to the effect of 8 out of 10 test wells didn't find anything. There were still 2 wells that showed positive results so I found it bizarre. I noticed they didn't discuss the problems with the classic theory of oil formation and transport to stratigraphic traps. The classic theory suggests that oil forms as I suggested in organic shales. Little drops of oil then move with the groundwater to places where the underground lithology traps them. The problem I have with this theory is that I deal with free product gasoline all the time. It doesn't behave this way. It doesn't travel drop by drop. It can only move through coarse grained soils. It typically can only move a hundred feet or so. You can envision it yourself. What is going to happen to a drop of oil moving through sediment. It will adhere to the the grains and it will disperse and it will dissolve in the groundwater and it will get eaten by bacteria. The articles you linked to are one sided. To me it was almost like he was looking for brownie points. He did a good job of providing some history but his conclusions are his own.
It sure becomes obvious to me that alarmists who pretend to be concerned about the "science" are actually unconcerned about it. They are peons who are too stupid to know how stupid they are but what is worse, they are dangerous stupid morons that push their idiotic cult over the prosperity and freedom of the world.
First, let's start with some facts we hopefully agree on. Fossil fuels are formed by natural processes of buried dead organisms which are typically millions of years old. One of the concerns (other than CO2) is that they are a finite resource.
But let's look at natural gas whose main component is methane. It can certainly be produced as a fossil fuel described above. But it also has other ways of being produced. It seems to be different than oil or coal. For example, there is plenty of methane on Saturn's moon Titan and I'm fairly certain there are no buried dead organisms nor life of any type for that matter.
So what is methane classified as technically speaking? Part fossil fuel, part something else?
Is it possible methane is not a finite resource or not as finite as other fossil fuels?
