National Geographic News
July 30, 2009
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/07/090730-deep-fossil-fuel-supply/About three to five miles below the surface are fossil fuels we now know of and use everyday; scientists have conjured a hypothesis that there are "fossil free" fuels being made forty to ninety-five miles below the surface. The same scientists are now experimenting with methane (a main part of natural gas) to see if this is possible and if we can create this "fossil free" fuel on our own, and not having to wait for the Earth to refill oil pockets over the decades (it's found to be doing this where oil has been removed from already). This idea of "fossil free" fuel was first developed by Soviets during the 1950s.
So in crushing methane between two diamonds to 20,000 times stronger than below sea-level and heating it to temperatures above 2,240 degrees Fahrenheit, a mixture of ethane, propane, butane, molecular hydrogen, and graphite was made. This mixture is very similar to natural gas found in the Earth's crust.
Since natural gas is low in supply and it's already a non renewable resource, "fossil free" fuel that's made by materials we already have plenty of sounds amazing! The only negative would be that we don't know if the "fossil free" fuel is as reliable as natural gas. Furthermore, the new fuel would be more expensive because we'd find it one-hundred miles below Earth's surface or it'd be man-made (the latter is more plausible).
Questions:
1) Do you think "fossil free" fuel would put just as bad of an effect on the environment as regular fossil fuels? What would some of the effects be?
2) Who would be opposed to this new fuel? Who would support it?
3) What would there be dangers similar to nuclear energy because of the heat exposure? If so what would some of the dangers be?
I think this sounds like a great idea, and am not surprised that scientists have been looking into doing something like this for a long period of time. I mean, it only makes sense to try to find a new resource as the ones we have (or most of the ones we have) will eventually run out. However, the only problem I can see with creating our own fuel other than the fact that it will be costly is the fact that we would still be burning it. When you burn a substance, the smoke would continue to be released into the atmosphere and continue to increase the green house gases and hurt our environment in turn. So though it was a good idea to help replenish our supplies, it would be costly and still have a negative impact for the years to come after we start initial proceedings in creating and burning it.
ReplyDeleteThis article reminded me of a book I've been reading recently. It's called "A Piece of Cake" and is a memoir by a woman named Cupcake Brown (I saw the book on Barnes and Noble and had the lRC order it for me to read.) In the book, Cupcake endures many hardships when she is only 11 years old (her mother is killed, she's physically, verbally and sexually abused, forced to work as a hooker to make money, and much more.) One of the hardships she faces is drug addiction. One of the drugs she smokes, crack, requires her to light up the pipe she uses to smoke it, but she's so poor at one point she no longer can afford to buy the materials she uses to light up the pipe. She resorts to stealing some kind of burning alcohol or some ethanol substance which she substitutes for instead; talking about burning and fire just made me remember about the lengthy descriptions she wrote of the incident.
2. One of the nations opposed to new fuel would probably be Saudi Arabia, and other countries which provide us with all our oil. Since they have most of the oil supply, we depend on and buy from them our supply of fuel. If we suddenly substituted to a new fuel, Saudi Arabia would be losing a lot of money from this transaction, and would be opposed to it. America and other nations trying to "go more green" (but have some money to spend too) would probably endorse the product as it's helpful in saving some of the environment's natural riches which may not be around forever.
I think that this is a good idea considering that it would be much eaisier to obtain since we can make it and we wouldnt have to pay major fossil fuel companies for their supplies. I just think that they have to learn more about the environmental problems that it could possibly cause, because even though we are looking for a source of energy that will have a basically endless supply, eventually we wont be able to breath because our air will be filled with toxins. Then we wont need fossil fuels because we wont be alive.
ReplyDeletei think that this is sort of like using nuclear power because although it would be easier to obtain, there are still environmental problems and also economic (price) differences between these and fossil fuels. the big difference between the two is that nuclear power will definatly NOT last forever but we are not sure about how this will exactly work.
1. i do think that it will have an equally as harmful effect on the environment because from what it sounds like it is suppose to be like natural gas witch does pollute the atmosphere. i think that the worst effects will be on the amount of greenhouse gasses which effects global climate change.
This sounds like a really good idea yet it seems to have its drawbacks. You already mentioned some of the drawbacks so looking at those it does not seem to be the best thing. If we can get it to replace natural gas when we run out of natural gas that would be really nice. Considering that this will be more expensive than natural gas we may want to find a way to make it cheaper so many more people can use it. I think that we can use this as a new resource in the years to come when we start to develop it more and find better ways to make it. All in all though it seems like this is just a start to something good to come.
ReplyDeleteThis reminds of how we talked about finding newer resources in science. It also reminded me of how there is a nuclear power plant in New Jersey. At the power plant in New Jersey there is no cooling facility so they just pump out the cleaned cooling water of the nuclear fission into the water. So thinking that nuclear energy generates heat we could use it do two things. One to make the energy as we have i now and two we could maybe find a way to pressurize the materials for this fossil free natural gas and then use the heat from the nuclear power plant to heat up the materials for more fossil free natural gas.
2. I think that many people might be opposed to it because of how we pump things into the earth's crust. Although many people might also be for it because we can create more natural gas. Environmentalists might be opposed to this though because we do not know the negative effects of this yet.