Hydrocarbons Forever? Consider the Geobioreactor

The environmental movement and most of the public are being deeply disingenuous and internally inconsistent by claiming that we are running out of hydrocarbons. Geobioreactors (discussed below) are an important contribution to understanding that these people are full of it.

Think about it. We're part of an interconnected ecosystem. Every living thing on Earth is consuming stuff made or discarded by other life forms. Further, all of that biological production, consumption and recycling is done in relatively short order.

Except for humans. We - or so the myth goes - found the one and only source of energy that has been just sitting there for just about forever waiting to be consumed. And because the pathology of our civilization is locust-like, we'll consume it all and leave nothing.

What hubris! These people spend their time extolling the fact that we are no different from any other inhabitant of the Earth ... and extolling the fact that we are different from every other inhabitant of the Earth - but only in a bad way.

So, I've given up calling oil and natural gas fossil fuels. The evidence that they have anything to do with the decay of previously existing life is not growing. The evidence that they are being created currently - in real time - is growing.

Here's the latest. Luca Technologies released a paper last week outlining the existence of, and a plan for the exploitation of, multiple geobioreactors. A geobioreactor is a naturally occurring ecosystem deep underground in which bacteria consume carbon-rich hydrocarbons and expel less-carbon-rich hydrocarbons. Essentially, they turn dirty fuels  (like coal, oil shale, and crude oil) into cleaner fuels (methane or natural gas).

For the uninitiated, this is a big deal because the problems associated with burning hydrocarbons come from the carbon part. When you burn a hydrocarbon, what is (ideally) released is water and carbon dioxide. The former comes from the hydrogen, and the latter from the carbon. The more of the latter, the dirtier and more problematic the fuel.

It gets better. They can feed these microbes! Inject the nutrients they like better and they produce more. Just like you and me. Ouila - natural gas farms.

Even better, the environmental movement stresses the problems of coal and oil shale precisely because there is so much of this stuff around. We have several thousand years supply of those resources, so you can't really discourage use (for whatever reason) by claiming we're running out. You have to rely on a cleanliness argument, that really does hold (some) water. Unless the stuff becomes cheaper to clean, which apparently is what a geobioreactor does.

Now, the economically viable exploitation of this phenomenon is speculative. But, really, that isn't the point. Fifty years ago the idea that there was life down there was speculative - but the Russians found out otherwise. Twenty years ago the idea that there was life down there was speculative in the West - but we've found otherwise (in a wide variety of locations - not just coal fields). Ten years ago the idea that there was life in oil deposits was speculative - but we found otherwise. This year it is no longer speculative that the life down there is making natural gas because it likes to. The trend isn't speculative - only the viability of it is.

Now, I know what you're saying. These geobioreactors (assuming they exist) are nonetheless feeding on "fossils". This misses the point. The bigger picture is that they are doing this in real time - and that we are then just one more cog in the big decay ecosystem ... and an internally consistent part of that ecosystem. Thus, the claims that human behavior is somehow different with respect to hydrocarbons has no foundation. This is the core of environmental correction policies for hydrocarbons - we need to do something to correct a problem that we already created. If there is no problem, then there is no need for corrective policy - and really it is policymakers and policy that are the big problem with environmental issues. Gosh ... everyone likes things cleaner. Some of us just don't want to be hit with a stick to make us cleaner - governments are just too good at the hitting part.