serryjw
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Sat May-06-06 03:34 PM
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Friend sent me an email from another friend that says we have more than plenty of oil shale in Colorado & Wyoming to last centuries. I have an idea of what it is. It sound like it requires more energy to extract than is fessible..Where is the water going to come from? Is the plausible or some HUGE rebates for BIG oil companies to destroy the environment?
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Exultant Democracy
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Sat May-06-06 03:56 PM
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1. The problem isn't that we are running out of oil right now |
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the problem is that we are running out of cheap oil. Deeper mining and more extensive refinement techniques will be required and it will cause even more ecological damage then it does already. You can find oil almost everywhere if you dig down deep enough, a lot of people don't remember but Pennsylvania used to be the oil capital of the United States.
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benburch
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Sat May-06-06 04:05 PM
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2. And most of the oil in PA is still in the ground. |
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PA mostly escaped stripper well technology because by the time it existed the wells were long since closed, and would have had to be re-bored. Wasn't economical. Well, economical takes on a whole new definition at $50+ a bbl.
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serryjw
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Sat May-06-06 04:12 PM
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3. So what is the problem with drilling |
brokensymmetry
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Sat May-06-06 04:28 PM
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4. You don't drill for it - therein lies the problem. |
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You have to mine the shale and expose it to lots of heat and pressure to extract the oil. Or you could heat the rock (before it's been mined), and cool the surrounding rock so the oil won't migrate. Then you can extract it. Of course, all this takes lots of energy. Water too, as I recall.
I've read that oil shale has roughly the same energy content as an equal mass of potato. So we may get oil out, but it won't be cheap oil.
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greenman3610
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Sat May-06-06 04:49 PM
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5. the race is on between alternative tech and death-tech |
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Edited on Sat May-06-06 04:50 PM by greenman3610
the price of oil makes both alternative energy and enhanced oil production/ oil shale/ tar sands feasible.
Both will be pursued - we have to make as much noise as possible and resist environmentally disastrous extraction- raise the cost for troglodytes still going that way - and do as much as possible to grease the way for the alternatives. Meanwhile, the cost of solar, wind, and biomass keep coming down - eventually they will win on the merits if we can keep from destroying the planet before that.
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woodstockny
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Sun May-07-06 10:02 AM
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6. Do you really think solar wind is viable? |
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And if so, what does this imply about the importance (or control) of weather management research?
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DU
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Thu May 09th 2024, 12:04 AM
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