Abiogenic oil hypothesis : complete crackpottery?

[drbubb]

Not to put too fine a point on it, but: Tommy Gold’s abiogenic oil hypothesis is complete crackpottery. A number of years back I attended a special session at a Geological Society of America meeting on results from the deep drillhole at the Siljan Basin in Sweden, which was drilled to test Tommy’s notions. It was to be a step to making Sweden the “Saudi Arabia of the North” (an actual quote from one of the Swedish officials).

 

Shoddiest science I’ve ever seen. For just one example, a bunch of oily gunk which had been trumpeted in the popular press as an oil show was shown (by gas chromatography) to be degraded drilling lubricant. But to this day you can still read all over the net about the “80 bbls of oil” found 10 km down that The Scientific Establishment Ignored.

 

One Swedish official said at the meeting that they “believed” in Gold’s idea. Well, I guess they didn’t believe hard enough, because the hole was as dry as they come. It _doesn’t_ happen, in a serious oil exploration hole, that hydrocarbons are so sparse that you mistake drilling lubricant for them! And making such a mistake merely indicates the grossest incompetence. By the way, if you want to see a serious evaluation of the Siljan hole, see John Castaño’s paper in US Professional Paper 1570 (”The Future of Energy Gases.”) PP 1570 is available as a PDF from the USGS web site.

 

The Swedes finally pulled the plug, after sinking tens of millions into this hole. But I have no doubt that some more very expensive dry holes will be drilled in the near future. After all, what do we perfessional geologists know? But there’s an old saw about the burnt hand teaching best…

 

/source: .62: http://wallstreetexaminer.com/blogs/winter/?p=1224

[malco]

What did a couple of hick town bicycle makers know about aerodynamics that theSmithsonian Institute did not know?

 

Well, quite a lot as it happens. The Wright Brothers flew and Samuel Langley (the Secretary of the Smithsonian) did not.

 

Similarly, what did a timber merchant know about aircraft that the professionals did not? Well he must have known quite a lot as his company is still with us today in the form of the Boeing Aircraft Corp.

 

Or mathematicians know about prime mover plant? (Sir Charles Parsons and the steam turbine; Sir William Grove and the fuel cell).

 

Or RAF pilots about aircraft engines?( Sir Frank Whittle and the jet engine)

 

I would actually expect major breakthrouhs in energy to come from outside the normal channels from people coming in at a different angle from another subject area.

 

That said, abiotic oil theory is one of those funny belief systems that keeps hanging around in the absense of any real evidence. There are cases where an oil reservoir has been fed from a deeper or neighbouring reservoir, but that is quite different from spontaneous formation of hydrocarbons in any large amounts.

[Steve Netwriter]

Has the source of oil been proved ?

If not, it is still just a theory.

[drbubb]

Has the source of oil been proved ?

If not, it is still just a theory.

 

The evidence is... such oil does not exist at all

 

But perhaps malco is right, and the mavericks will make the real breakthroughs.

 

I just remembered, my great-grandfather was a working on a perpetual motion machine...

Almost cracked it too...

[Steve Netwriter]

No, I meant "is there proof of where the oil we get now comes from?".

I know the common explanation. I just don't know whether that actually has any proof !