Earth's Mantle: Untapped Oil Source?

Oil, one of the most important, valuable substances on the planet may form in an unexpected place, according to a new study -- the crushing hot furnace of Earth's mantle.

The petroleum we rely on to fuel our cars and heat our homes were formed over millions of years as ancient, dead algae and plankton were compressed in layers of sediment and heated. Because of this, oil companies know to look for new reserves in places that are, or once were shallow marine environments.

For decades, though, scientists have toyed with a tantalizing alternative theory of petroleum formation: What if chemical reactions between water and minerals deep in Earth's mantle could send black gold bubbling up into the crust?

Alexander Goncharov of the Carnegie Institution of Washington in Washington, D.C and a team of researchers have shown that just such a thing is possible. They heated methane (CH4) up to 1,500 degrees Kelvin (2,240 degrees Fahrenheit) and mimicked the squeezing effect of being buried under over 100 kilometers (62 miles) of solid rock.

The results were astonishing -- methane readily transformed into butane (C4H10) and propane (C3H8), two common components of crude oil.

dsc.discovery.com...

I saw this the other day. It makes the idea of fossil fuel kind of undone. It seems this is a product of the earth not of dead plant matter as previously thought.

Yes, good for you Scoobie doo!!! Star, and flag for a good topic. There's lot's, and lot's of oil in the Earth.

I come from some of them ther'oil' people. It's somewhat of a common thought amongst many that the oil is naturally reproduced, and does replenish.

Shhhhhhh.

Better keep this thing covert.

Prices might go down without scarcity!

"Uhm...uhm....Oil is NOT abudant! Repeat, Oil is NOT abudant. It will always be expensive."

Now, what are they gonna do?

Surprising this has even been released.

EDIT: Oh wait...yep...knew there had to be a catch.

It's a big "if."

Analyses of the world's oil has confirmed that nearly every drop of fuel recovered from Earth's crust was once a living thing. At best, propane and butane from the mantle could be contributing tiny, insignificant amounts to the world's known petroleum reserves.

Okay. That's how they got it released. Duh.

[edit on 1-8-2009 by lagnar]

You fellas allow yourselves to be controlled, seriously.

So long as america remains dependent on one main energy source, oil, we will continue to be at mercy with the oil corporations, we will continue with the corporate wars for the future to come, we will continue to cost middle and working class americans their hard earned cash. This isnt just about peak oil, this is about american breaking itself off from depending so much on the foreign affairs of other oil countries, its about providing alternative energ so that americans dont have to be stuck with what the speculators want them to pay.

Damn get a reality check. The insurance corporations have ya'll for a right, the oil corporations are taking ya'll for a ride.

So what would happen is hot magma shot up though the earth and hit a oil pocket deep underground.Would it exsplode and cause a earthquake in that area.Would it blow a large hole in the ground and create a volcano.Would it just burn up and the empty pocket fill with hot magma.So what would happen.

[edit on 2-8-2009 by GORGANTHIUM]

Okey, the earth makes oil, but no , wait, we must cover the old story, it is still dead animals. these people rather lie more than correct an mistake.

lets say the oil needs to be there just as much as the oil in the gear-box of your car, we'd get much much earthquakes if we replaced that with water..

try driving your car with water instead of oil, it is going to overheat fast and get wrecked.

I have sayd this for years, but people thought I was craZy....

Analyses of the world's oil has confirmed that nearly every drop of fuel recovered from Earth's crust was once a living thing. At best, propane and butane from the mantle could be contributing tiny, insignificant amounts to the world's known petroleum reserves.

"These latest experiments show without doubt that methane will form heavier hydrocarbons like what you'd find in oil," Henry Scott of Indiana University South Bend said. "It could renew interest in deep hydrocarbons, but it's not going to overturn our ideas on how oil forms."

Sad that people don't read the whole article.

Edit to make it stand out more.

[edit on 2-8-2009 by Kaytagg]

Originally posted by Kaytagg

Analyses of the world's oil has confirmed that nearly every drop of fuel recovered from Earth's crust was once a living thing. At best, propane and butane from the mantle could be contributing tiny, insignificant amounts to the world's known petroleum reserves.

"These latest experiments show without doubt that methane will form heavier hydrocarbons like what you'd find in oil," Henry Scott of Indiana University South Bend said. "It could renew interest in deep hydrocarbons, but it's not going to overturn our ideas on how oil forms."

Sad that people don't read the whole article.

Edit to make it stand out more.
[edit on 2-8-2009 by Kaytagg]

but it's not going to overturn our ideas on how oil forms.

Yes, the Ideas stand, thats my point, their IDE is correct, no matter what they find later, that was and is my point..

These people's Ideas and Could be's are allways right, even if they were to find oil on the moon, what do you think they will say ?? REALY !

I understand all the oil hating and such, but all in all, it's really a pretty good source of energy. The problem is it's not renewable. That's not to say you can't synthetically create oil with blue algae and such, but you have to look at more than the raw product. Specifically you have to look at how much energy you have to put into the system to get energy back out of the system.

Oil drilled out of the ground is very good, in this respect. It costs virtually no energy to take a barrel of oil out of the ground (that cost grows more and more every day, because easily tapped reserves are being perpetually depleted)

So for all the blessings oil has given us, it will one day be obsolete. But it's not like it's a bad product or anything. It's quite good, and is still quite good. It's just becoming a lot more expensive to extract -- and that's the problem.

Don't expect oil to be cheap in the future. The price is going to keep going up and up and up.

It has to be around $70 a barrel just to offset the costs of finding new reserves.

reply to post by Kaytagg


I think this will only delay alternative energy source for decades still.
Nothing good aout this, now they gonna delay disclosure also, since the madman running the globe who makes money by the bundles of this will try their best to do just that !!!

reply to post by wayouttheredude

I saw this the other day. It makes the idea of fossil fuel kind of undone. It seems this is a product of the earth not of dead plant matter as previously thought

it was never previously thought that way by me. i know b.s.
when i here it. started a bunch of arguements w/ that one.

We have the alternative ready to go... all we have to do is grow it. Algae oil, we could convert the desert southwest into one big "enclosed" algae farm (glass pipes) and produce all the energy we need. Look it up yourself, 1000 to 10,000 times the fuel output of corn or soybeans and grown on land that does not "feed" people.

See: www.abovetopsecret.com...

[edit on 2-8-2009 by infolurker]

As far as I am aware this is called abiotic origins of oil.

I read a paper a few years ago and it has been studied by the russians for many a moon..

Every 10-year-old knows that oil comes from the decomposed remains of dinosaurs, a theory first floated by Russian scholar Mikhailo Lomonosov in 1757. According to this theory, rock oil forms over millions of years from the action of heat and pressure on animal remains buried in sediment. The so-called "fossil fuel" theory remained largely unchallenged for 200 years until Russian academics, led by Nikolai Kudryavtsev, suggested that hydrocarbons (from which oil derives) are generated deep within the Earth from inorganic materials.

The notion that petroleum is abiotic (not related to living organisms) in origin has been accepted as scientific fact in the former Soviet Union for 50 years, yet Western science clings to the contradictory fossil fuel theory.
This is no idle academic debate.
If the Russians are right, oil regenerates deep within the Earth and there is no looming fuel shortage.
If the fossil fuel theorists are right, then oil is a finite commodity and the pumps will run dry within a few decades. This being the case, the price of just about everything will shoot up.

Oil geologist Colin Campbell is one of the foremost proponents of the "peak oil" theory that says roughly half of all known reserves have been consumed, and new discoveries are insufficient to meet the planet's future needs. If he's right, the current oil price of $ 50 a barrel is just a way-stop en route to much higher fuel prices. Campbell posits a bleak future where oil shortages lead to "war, starvation, economic recession, possibly even the extinction of homo sapiens".
According to Campbell, the size of oil reserves is virtually a state secret in many countries, and some oil producers previously inflated their reserves to wring higher production quotas from OPEC, which are based partly on reported reserves. He says the world has so far produced 944 bn barrels, with "realistic reserves" estimated at 853 bn barrels, substantially lower than the 1,278 bn estimated by Oil & Gas Journal.

Allowing for a further 142 bn barrels still to be discovered, Campbell says peak oil will occur next year.

www.gasandoil.com...


very exciting i am sure...

There is an alternative theory about the formation of oil and gas deposits that could change estimates of potential future oil reserves. According to this theory, oil is not a fossil fuel at all, but was formed deep in the Earth's crust from inorganic materials. The theory was first proposed in the 1950s by Russian and Ukranian scientists. Based on the theory, successful exploratory drilling has been undertaken in the Caspian Sea region, Western Siberia, and the Dneiper-Donets Basin

www.enviroliteracy.org...

Hey! Great! What are we waiting for!? Let's go get it!!!


/satire off.

This is the best way to make our own oil from landfill waste!!!!!

reply to post by Scooby Doo


I read a report the other day that drilling is taking place in Greenland where ice has melted away to leave clear land for drilling..... I also know there is Oil in Ghana, Africa....... so, it seems there is plenty out there after all.......

[edit on 2-8-2009 by TruthxIsxInxThexMist]

Humans are so stupid that they keep draining and burning something that they don't even know if has a propose on Earths inner workings.

I really think that oil can be found all over Earth at different depths for obvious reasons and it has a important part when it comes to the relation of Earth's core and the Sun.

But let's just drain everything up, burn it all so we can spend 90% of our lives inside metal boxes trapped in traffic and see what happens. It's just better because science will never learn that the nature doesn't generate nor keeps any trash or useless # for long periods of time.

That's probably the only way that they will realize that, just like they are slowly learning that 97% of the human DNA labeled as Junk is not that junky and humans organs that were taken for useless are now starting to be seen as critical players on how the human body works.

But they are right, it's way easier to keep polluting and playing with the environment than start switching to other clean energy sources that already exist. It makes so much more sense!

reply to post by Scooby Doo


I've read of this before. That dissolving dinosaurs was the source for all this petroleum was a long shot. This in a manner of speaking infers oil was "lubrication" for the living planet. Interesting thread!

reply to post by Kaytagg

Analysis of the world's oil has confirmed that nearly every drop of fuel recovered from Earth's crust was once a living thing.

Now- someone explain Titan to me. In orbit around Saturn, cold as heck, AND FILLED TO THE BRIM WITH HYDROCARBONS. What- was Titan hot, wet, and filled with plant life? Sorry. Not buying it. See- the idiots who's lives are centered around that idiot box would actually believe this tripe.