Posted on 12/02/2005 7:00:55 PM PST by seastay
New study shows methane on Saturn's moon Titan not biological NASA scientists are about to publish conclusive studies showing abundant methane of a non-biologic nature is found on Saturn's giant moon Titan, a finding that validates a new book's contention that oil is not a fossil fuel.
"We have determined that Titan's methane is not of biologic origin," reports Hasso Niemann of the Goddard Space Flight Center, a principal NASA investigator responsible for the Gas Chromatograph Mass Spectrometer aboard the Cassini-Huygens probe that landed on Titan Jan. 14. Niemann concludes the methane "must be replenished by geologic processes on Titan, perhaps venting from a supply in the interior that could have been trapped there as the moon formed."
The studies announced by NASA yesterday will be reported in the Dec. 8 issue of the scientific journal Nature.
"This finding confirms one of the key arguments in 'Black Gold Stranglehold: The Myth of Scarcity and the Politics of Oil,'" claims co-author Jerome R. Corsi. "We argue that oil and natural gas are abiotic products, not 'fossil fuels' that are biologically created by the debris of dead dinosaurs and ancient forests."
Methane has been synthetically created in the laboratory, Corsi points out, "and now NASA confirms that abiotic methane is abundantly found on Titan."
The realization that hydrocarbons are produced inorganically throughout our solar system was a key insight that led Cornell University astronomer Thomas Gold to write his 1998 book, "The Deep Hot Biosphere: The Myth of Fossil Fuels." Gold wrote:
It would be surprising indeed if the earth had obtained its hydrocarbons only from a source that biology had taken from another carbon-bearing gas – carbon dioxide – which would have been collected from the atmosphere by photo-synthesizing organisms for manufacture into carbohydrates and then somehow reworked by geology into hydrocarbons. All this, while the planetary bodies bereft of surface life would have received their hydrocarbon gifts by purely abiogenic causes. Gold wryly noted that he was sure there had not been any "big stagnant swamps on Titan" to produce the biological debris that conventionally trained geologists think was required on Earth to produce oil and natural gas as a "fossil fuel."
"If petroleum and natural gas are abiotic as we maintain in 'Black Gold Stranglehold,'" Corsi commented, "then the 'peak oil' fear that we are going to run out of oil may have been based on a giant misconception."
Paradigms in science change slowly and with great resistance, he noted, "But NASA has given us today incontrovertible evidence that Titan has abundant inorganic methane."
"If the scientists have ruled out that biological processes created methane on Titan, why do petro-geologists still argue that natural gas on Earth is of biological origin?" Corsi asked.
This is good news. It means oil is a renewable resource.
I'll keep checking my back 40.
maybe they will find aliens eating in taquerias on Titan, that would explain the methane
So what will the greens whine about when they learn that we don't have to conserve petroleum? Will we drill in ANWR? Enquiring minds want to know!
Peak oil is based on what is actually getting pumped out of the ground. Whether it was from dead dinos, or crushed rocks, the sobering realities are that the current most productive oil fields are the ones discovered in the 50s or earlier. Oklahoma and Indonesia fields have already past their peak production.
The University of New Hampshire has an interesting program in which they propose to grow oil-producing algae. They say it could provide up to 10% of the nation's oil needs:
http://www.unh.edu/p2/biodiesel/article_alge.html
Kinda puts a kink in the "oil-is-a-finite-resource" mantra.
well there is plenty on titan!
Only if you insist on it being produced the old-fashioned way... 50-year-old scotch and 50M-year-old oil.
However if you could grow it in your bathtub, that would be very cool... something I'm sure the oil companies will try to stop..
All we have to do is burn up all the remaining oil getting it over here...
I thought it was long known that Titian had methane. Isn't it frozen?
No it doesn't. On the contrary, it indicates that oil isn't a renewable resource. No one has suggested a method for rapid oil formation --- without question we are burning it much faster than it is being created, if indeed it is being created.
Rockets don't use petroleum...
We can't drill on Titan! It might have life forms that we might disrupt! Or beautiful methane seas that some movie star might want to build a mansion next to...or...
And how do methyl hydrates, which just sit on the bottom of the ocean, fit into this picture?
We may be burning it faster than it is being created, but that does not rule out oil being renewable. That just means it is being replaced slower than we are using it. Renewable, yes. Inexhaustable, no.
Calling it fossil fuel always has sounded like a fairy tale fabricated by idiots.
I believe some fields that seemed to be "tapped out" have later been found to have "re-filled". Whether that means oil is a renewable resource may be debatable. But it seems to me that the supply of oil available to us on earth may be several orders of magnitude greater than we think.
Well it isn't Gold's theory.
Yeah, this was suggested and pointed out during the Titan/Saturn threads when the probe was dropped.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.