Huge hydrogen stores found below Earth's crust

Vancouver Sun ^ | April 15, 2002 | Robert Matthews

[thrcanbonly1]

Studies by the team of common rock types such as granite and olivine have revealed extraordinarily high levels of trapped hydrogen.

This whole article is BS enviroweenie wishful thinking. Granite is a type of rock, but olivine is a mineral.

Geology doesn't get more basic than that, and the writer even screwed that up.

[SevenDaysInMay]

Water is the Mother of all greenhouse gases.

[apochromat]

Did you see the same picture of Lieberman in the paper that I did? Talk about abundant energy....

[cookcounty]

NOW how are the Saudis going to pay the $100 billion lawsuit they're going to get hit with from the 9-11 families?

See Daniel Pipes article in NY Post today, showing that this is legal, the promise not to sue does not protect active elements, only passive (i.e., the airlines, the security companies, the WTC architects) and based on Lockerbie, they could expect to collect $100B from those who helped and contributed to Al-Qaeda. and there's a LOT of millionaires that gave to Osama.

[Paulus Invictus]

Half vast.

[Pushi]

Not a problem! We can develop gills.

[cookcounty]

"The level of oxygen in the air will be regulated automatically by the natural combustion of forests, houses, etc...."

HOUSES!!

Hey, I'm from Chicago, and we ain't no more house combustin' just ta give you regyoulatered air!

---Mickey O'Leary

[DJtex]

From: Pond Scum as Fuel Factories

"Hydrogen may become an ideal fuel when the supply of oil and natural gas runs out, but the problem has been finding a way to produce it cheaply. Scientists now say the answer may be ordinary pond scum. Green algae, a simple plant that grows all over the world, has the unique ability to convert water and sunlight into hydrogen gas, researchers said Monday....When living in ordinary air and sunlight, it uses photosynthesis like other plants.

When the algae is deprived of a key nutrient, sulfur, and forced to live in an oxygen-free environment, the plant takes up an alternate lifestyle in order to survive. Under these conditions, the algae makes hydrogen.

One liter of algae culture, a little over a quarter of a gallon, produces three milliliters of hydrogen, about a tenth of a fluid ounce, per hour, said Melis. Researchers believe this efficiency can be increased at least 100-fold, but that has yet to be demonstrated. Algae growing in a small pond, he said, may eventually be enough to power 10 cars."

3ml/hr x 100-fold increase = 300ml/hr per liter x 4 days = 30,000ml per liter of pond scum.

i.e. 10 gal. = 1,000 liters of H2 every four days; the water in a queen-size waterbed (300 gal) = 30,000 liters of H2 per week.

Note: After four days, the algae must return to regular photosynthesis for a few days to renew itself.

[ChadGore]

http://quake.wr.usgs.gov/research/structure/CrustalStructure/

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HOW THICK IS THE EARTH'S CRUST?

We present a new contour map of the thickness of the Earth's crust. We use a 10 km contour interval plus the 45 km contour. This contour map was created directly from the 5 deg. by 5 deg. gridded crustal model CRUST 5.1 (Mooney et al., 1998) plus complimentary information. An initial contour map was created using the command "grdcontour" in GMT, and the resultant map was adjusted in Adobe Illustrator to honor individual point measurements and newly available information from Russia. The final contour map honors all available seismic refraction measurements for features with a dimension greater than 2 degrees. To a first approximation, the continents and their margins are outlined by the 30 km contour. That portion of the continental interior enclosed by the 40 km contour, and regions with crustal thickness of 45 to 50 km are found on all well surveyed continents (i.e., North and South America, Australia, and Eurasia). Continental crust with a thickness in excess of 50 km is exceedingly rare and accounts for less than 10% of the continental crust. These observations, now available on a global basis, provide important constraints on the evolution of the crust and sub-crustal lithosphere.

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Back to The Earth's Crust

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OK, so it's 10km (6.2 miles) thick in the oceans, and ~40km (25 miles) thick on land.

[aruanan]

Something interesting Gold points out about the critics who say that at such temperatures hydrocarbon compounds couldn't exist: they fail to take into account the extremely high pressures. These would prevent dissociation and would facilitate the formation of longer chain hydrocarbons.

[zog]

SLICK! And a side benefit is that blue green algae is nutritious as all get out.

[apochromat]

Maybe some people should put algae on the roof!

That's a nice contribution, by the way.

[Dat]

The low yield of energy from burning hydrogen compared to gas, however, means that vast quantities of rock would have to be mined.

I thought it was the other way around.

[altair]

Hydrogen gas has been hailed as the ultimate clean fuel, as it produces only water when burned.

Water vapor is a greenhouse gas and I thought all greenhouse gasses were evil. Gotta stop Global Warming, you know.

[altair]

The oceans will easily absorb all the water created by human burning of hydrogen.

That will raise the level of the ocean and sink Tuvalu. Bad idea.

[weikel]

They will try to burn the hydrogen wells this totally F's them over.

[weikel]

The bulk of oil is used for gas and energy fuel we have enough here to make plastics.

[weikel]

The amount of water creation and oxygen creation will be miniscule and the problems will be solved besides the byproduct will be fresh water( not saltwater) which they can use in some parts of the Country.

[weikel]

LOL good parody of the Buchanite cryto commie agents on FR.

[Physicist]

A discovery like this should have the Arab oil countries evacuating their pants enclosed bowels.

It never fails. The promise of limitless energy is held up, and all Freepers can see is the narrow political goal of giving the Arabs their come-uppance. Cheap energy would change the world in ways you've never imagined. Every transient political interest would be wiped clean away.

It's as if the Finger of God is pointing the way to the stars, and all you see is the dirt under his fingernail.

(As for the article, I doubt its wild claims will be upheld. Fortunately, we already have a method by which we could have very cheap energy, if only we weren't too craven to use it effectively: nuclear fission.)