Posted on 10/10/2009 9:04:41 PM PDT by neverdem
OKLAHOMA CITY — A new technique that tapped previously inaccessible supplies of natural gas in the United States is spreading to the rest of the world, raising hopes of a huge expansion in global reserves of the cleanest fossil fuel.
Italian and Norwegian oil engineers and geologists have arrived in Texas, Oklahoma and Pennsylvania to learn how to extract gas from layers of a black rock called shale. Companies are leasing huge tracts of land across Europe for exploration. And oil executives are gathering rocks and scrutinizing Asian and North African geological maps in search of other fields.
The global drilling rush is still in its early stages. But energy analysts are already predicting that shale could reduce Europe’s dependence on Russian natural gas. They said they believed that gas reserves in many countries could increase over the next two decades, comparable with the 40 percent increase in the United States in recent years.
“It’s a breakout play that is going to identify gigantic resources around the world,” said Amy Myers Jaffe, an energy expert at Rice University. “That will change the geopolitics of natural gas.”
More extensive use of natural gas could aid in reducing global warming, because gas produces fewer emissions of greenhouse gases than either oil or coal. China and India, which have growing economies that rely heavily on coal for electricity, appear to have large potential for production of shale gas. Larger gas reserves would encourage developing countries to convert more of their transportation fleets to use natural gas rather than gasoline.
Shale is a sedimentary rock rich in organic material that is found in many parts of the world. It was of little use as a source of gas until about a decade ago, when American companies developed new techniques to fracture the rock and...
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Since they all produce CO2, does anybody knows the basis of this claim?
What’s most important is that we forbid ourselves to use this method of tapping nat gas while showing the rest of the world how to do it. For the children.
(Units of energy usefully extracted) / (tons of CO2 emitted) sounds like one such measure.
“Italian and Norwegian oil engineers and geologists have arrived in Texas, Oklahoma and Pennsylvania to learn how to extract gas from layers of a black rock called shale.”
And the idiots here in NY have a moratorium on it until “further environmental study”.
The envirolunatics will have us living in caves in the dark and lighting farts to keep warm.
New ways to tap dat gas?
The good news never seems to quit. I am happy that some elements of my energy-related talks from 3 years ago can be shelved for a long time to come — so long as politics doesn’t mess things up.
Natural gas produces far less carbon(CO2) per btu when burned than coal and less than #2 and #6 fuel oil.
Enviros won’t like this. Our future is in windmills and solar. We can’t explore for more fossil fuels. They are evil aren’t they? Al Gore said people should demonstrate to keep building coal fired power plants.
Whoops ND! I’m shot! Eyes are a bit bleary, addressed you as if you where NormsRevenge by accident. Apology offered.
” lighting farts to keep warm”
h
Hey I believe there will no flatulence in the future.
Dems are going to tax it out of existence
Different hydrocarbons have differing quantities of Carbon and Hydrogen relative to each other, and thus different reaction products with MORE or LESS CO2 in proportion.
Methane is CH4 for example, and burns to form one CO2 and two H2O plus 891kj
Butanol is C4H9OH and burns to form four CO2 plus five H2O plus 2670 kj
So ROUGHLY it supplies 3X more energy but 4X more CO2 and only 2.5X more H2O.
SO SOME IDIOTS might say natural gas makes less CO2 and thus is “better” and not as bad for “global warning aka ACC”
BUT -—> newsflash -—> Water Vapor H2O is a more potent greenhouse gas than CO2 is BY FAR!
But horrors how can pure water be bad compared to that ugly carbon...????
Oh wait a minute - after all, we ARE CARBON-based life forms according to space aliens.
So isn’t carbon a good thing? Carbon and Water (hydrogen and oxygen actually) are the essential elements of life.
OH it is all so confusing....
And it is cool today, snowing in Denver - where is MY warming warning when I need it.
I thought this was going to be about tapping the methane from cows!
Don’t you mean tipping the methane from cows?
Hey .. We have Plenty of GAS we can tap and it’s all coming out of Washington.
:)
Of any hydrocarbon fuel, methane has the highest ratio of hydrogen to carbon in its molecules.
Burning coal produces 100% CO2, burning liquid hydrocarbons produces slightly more H2O than CO2, while burning methane CH4 produces twice as much water as CO2 for roughly the same amount of energy.
Please ignore the fact that water vapor is a global warming gas too...
It is a continuation of the self-flagellation of Obama regarding the US. We must first die as a nation in every way so that others can be lifted up to show we care more about peace, blah, blah...GAG ME WITH A SPOON, already.
This will have to be banned of course.
“Hey .. We have Plenty of GAS we can tap and it’s all coming out of Washington.”
True, but it all stinks.
Now that’s bipartisan of you! What a maverick! Crossing the isle to form consensus! Moderate!
Why should we have it better than some Neanderthal? It’s not like we won or anything!
Yesss!! It is my wish to accomodate prosperity for all, hope for some, change for the many, with the universal peace that only a new understanding, an understanding that for too long, we have at times been too arrogant to see. Because we can no longer accept the status quo even as we face the challenges of the naysayers whom we will be only too happy to put a cap in their asses.
This is a really curious article
1) You are essentially correct...burning natural gas produces water and CO2...both of which are “greenhouse” gasses.
2) Odd that the article refers to the supplies as “Global” Supplies...why not just say that it will increase “Supplies” (without “Global”)
3) This is not a new method
= = =
Assuming that the NYT is a mouthpiece for the Democrat party, I would tend to think that this non-news article is setting up a fall back position for the case that cap-and-tax legislation fails. Obama can still be made the hero by promoting a technology (one that already exists and does nothing for his cause).
LOL
True, It Does Stink ‘but’ I can attest to the fact that it Does Indeed .. burn rather well. 8)
It strikes me as a bogus statement by a technically ignorant reporter.
How bad do you want to know? Should I dredge up my Thermo text (chapter on combustion chemistry) and run some numbers?
Methane CH4. Oil has more carbons for each hydrogen. Both parts give out energy when burnt in oxygen.
Not that it matters though. We want MORE CO2. Archeology shows the plants used to be much more lush in the past. Bigger, more fruitful, because of more CO2.
Globaloney is just a lie to perpetuate the same old leftist biases. Same stuff they were pushing in the 60s/70s.
The ecosphere is already saturated with water. You may have noticed those miles deep thingies called oceans covering 3/4 of the earth’s surface.
It is debatable whether increasing CO2 by 10% or 20% by burning hydrocarbons will make a difference in the earth’s temperature. It is not debatable that adding water vapor will NOT make a difference.
When there is room for more water vapor in the air, liquid water evaporates to provide it.
I live in the Marcellus Shale region in PA.
The drilling is taking place, but the NIMBYs and liberals are trying to find any reason to setuop roadblocks to drilling.
Even the state (Gov Fast Eddie Rendell) proposed higher taxes on the natural gas drilling industry....an industry in its infacy in Pennsylvania. Oh, he also proposed a technology tax on that young industry as well.
Watching all this take place illustrates why states like Pennsylvania have negative industrial growth.
and you can convert your car for about $250 IF the EPA didn’t charge $10,000 foir a permit to do it.
Sorry, no debate-increasing the amount of CO2 by 20 % will have zero impact
CO2 is about 400 parts per million of the atmosphere.
That is less than 1/2 of a unit per 1000
If a yard stick was a chunk of atmosphere, CO2 would take up 1/32 of an inch.
20 % of diddly squat = diddly squat.
Is this in reference to your chili recipe?
No beans in real chili my friend.
“The ecosphere is already saturated with water”
So, you are walking around in a dense fog right now? As is everyone else on earth?
Average Global Relative humidity at the surface is 78%. At higher altitudes it drops, being 37% at 30,000’.
Left out the sarc tag. The shale (actually, *any*) NG rigs I have seen are quite benign, usually a small cluster of gear in the middle of “nowhere” once in operation. Enviros, however, deeply fear shale exploration once it includes liquid hydrocarbon product because they fear massive ugly pits with accompanying steam generating gear and a dig out/break up processing operation that creates tremendous amounts of waste oil and potential groundwater pollution. And those that I have seen are indeed pretty ugly.
It was on the front page of the NY edition, not the national. Go figure. It was otherwise buried in the energy/environment section, IIRC.
Shale is a sedimentary rock rich in organic material that is found in many parts of the world. It was of little use as a source of gas until about a decade ago, when American companies developed new techniques to fracture the rock and...Thanks neverdem.
I have worked in and have been oil and gas exploration (drilling) my whole life and I have no idea what you are trying to describe.
Massive ugly pits? accompanying steam generating gear and a dig out/break up processing operation that creates tremendous amounts of waste oil and potential groundwater pollution? The “pits” are drilling fluid and the steam (water vapor) seen is from subsurface heat not some monster machinery spewing waste oil (beleive me damn little oil is let go at $70 a bbl).
http://www.oilwatchdog.org/images/blog/5448270/estoniashale.pnp.png
http://redgreenandblue.org/files/2008/11/oil-shale-mining.jpg
http://www.sfgate.com/blogs/images/sfgate/green/2008/10/06/Bauert9633_PKivioliresized.JPG
http://www.econbrowser.com/archives/2005/09/Stuart_pit.jpg
You’re misreading my point. I am stating what the enviros fear, not what I project. I’m in favor of developing these resources. Once these fields are in operation, they can be cleaned up and worked pretty well. I understand that in the 80’s many of these projects were abandoned when the tax benefits were revoked. Unfortunately, some of those abandoned sites are the squeaky wheel that gets their attention.
Natural gas (methane) is CH4 - the hydrogen bonds are where the energy is. Other hydrocarbons have more carbon for less hydrogen, proportionately.
Mining of oil shales
and extracting natural gas from fractured shale
are two completely different things.
Correct.
However, since liquid water is widely exposed to the atmosphere, the system is at equilibrium. Liquid water evaporates and water vapor condenses. The addition of a miniscule amount of water vapor will not change these conditions.
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