Re: replenishment

["J. Barkley Rosser, Jr." <rosserjb@xxxxxxx>]

William,
     Even if there is lots of oil ultimately available
(although at what cost to get at these deep pools?),
the widespread use of oil generates major negative
externalities for global climate.  We would be much
better off massively reducing our reliance on it and
other fossil fuels for that reason, irrespective of its
ultimate availability or lack thereof.
Barkley Rosser
----- Original Message -----
From: "William B. Ryan" <william_b_ryan@xxxxxxxxxx>
To: <pkt@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Cc: <rosserjb@xxxxxxx>
Sent: Tuesday, April 30, 2002 3:19 PM
Subject: Re: replenishment


>
> To conserve digital space I've posted the full text of a recent interview
> with Thomas Gold at http://www.geocities.com/new_economics/gold.htm
>
> "...Why would that be unlikely, given the traditional view of oil forming
> from organic matter in buried sediments?
>
> "Because the oil is all the same, while the sediments in that region
> are completely different: different ages, different materials. There's
> no sedimentary material that is uniform throughout the region, that has
> any coherence. And this just never struck him. His response was, 'In
> geology we don't try and explain things - we just report what we see.'
>
> "Hubbert's views changed the wealth of nations. The belief that oil would
> run out, and that those with a source could always increase the price,
> caused the early-'70s oil crisis. That, to my mind, is a completely stupid
> attitude that shifted many billions of dollars away from some countries
> and toward others.
>
> "You clearly already had some sort of alternative model in mind.
>
> "I knew something that, to this day, the petroleum geologists in this
> country don't seem to know - that astronomical observations had detected
> large amounts of hydrocarbons on various planetary bodies in our solar
> system. We didn't have the very good results that we now have from Titan
> showing seven different hydrocarbons. But I knew that there were perfectly
> sound astronomical observations showing hydrocarbons to be common on
> planetary bodies. So it seemed natural that there should be similar
hydrocarbons
> within the Earth, slowly seeping out."
>
>
>
> --
> William B. Ryan
> william_b_ryan@xxxxxxxxxx - email
> voicemail/fax - 1-866-678-3967 - toll free
>
>
>
> ---- "J. Barkley Rosser, Jr." <rosserjb@xxxxxxx> wrote:
> >      That there may be deeper pools of oil does not
> > disprove the dinosaur or other biological origin theories
> > and certainly does not make oil a "renewable" or
> > "non-finite" resource, although it may suggest that
> > there is more of it than many believe.
> > Barkley Rosser
>
>