Burning ice

Did you know there is a type of ice that can burn while someone holds it? Don't believe me? Well, look at the picture below. It's not a trick!

Methane hydrate burning in someone's hands.

Alright so it's not really ice. But it looks and feels like ice. It's really methane hydrate, a specific type of gas hydrate. The word hydrate is a term used in organic chemistry to indicate that a substance contains  water. So a gas hydrate is a gas trapped in a ice-like cage of water molecules. It's really the methane burning while the water melts - not exactly burning ice but that's what it looks like!

A diagram of how gas hydrates form.

In addition to looking super cool when it burns, methane hydrates have some important impacts on energy and climate change. Methane hydrate forms in sediments beneath the ocean floor requiring low temperatures and high pressures to form but its usually located shallower than oil reservoirs. The methane hydrates are a problem for the guys drilling wells because it could blow-up. But methane is also a source of energy (natural gas) and ideally the methane hydrate could increase the amount of domestic energy products but we would need to figure out how to extract it. Methane is very bad for our atmosphere (actually worse than CO2) and if the methane hydrates were to melt and release the methane it could be the tipping point to start an even faster global warming.

In a paper published in a 1996 issue of  Science, one of the most highly regarded scientific journals, Steve Holbrook, Hartley Hoskins, Warren Wood, Ralph Stevens, and Daniel Lizarrale report their findings of the amount of methane hydrates in three wells located in the Blake Ridge area, offshore South Carolina. (I lived in SC for 10 years without knowing we had gas hydrates or any energy near!) This paper came out during the early investigations into methane hydrates and everyone was still unsure how much of this stuff was out there. These guys concluded that the volume of hydrates located in the area offshore of South Carolina had been over estimated and that global estimates could be 3 times too high. 

The location of Blake Ridge offshore of SC.

Methane hydrates are found by acquiring seismic data over the location. A seismic survey is where a boat tows a source (air gun - makes vibrations) and receivers (hydrophones - they listen for the reflected vibrations) over the ocean floor. The methane hydrates are found by the presence of a bottom simulating reflector (BSR) in the data. Basically the difference from the presence of gas hydrates creates a reflection that shows up as a line in the seismic profile. The image below depicts the data from the 1996 paper.

Seismic data of the bottom simulating reflector (BSR) highlighted in blue. 

So in 1996 it looked like estimates for methane hydrates were not going to be as large as originally thought but because they could actually provide us with energy and could cause more climate change the research continued. It was actually written into the Energy Act of 2005 that the research would keep getting funded. And now after years of more research the estimate of  global methane hydrate volume is around 700,000 Tcf (trillion cubic feet) which is enormous when compared to the 200 Tcf of worldwide natural gas reserves! Since 1996 lots of methane hydrate was found in the Arctic permafrost and Gulf of Mexico. The estimates from the seismic data were too simplified and the complexity of gas hydrates is now better understood. The first methane was produced from a well going through the permafrost in northern Canada in 2008. Experiments continue but it looks promising that this form of energy can be produced safely. But the future is never certain and with the worry of releasing too much into the atmosphere it is worth taking the risks to get more energy? What do you guys think? Are you just fascinated with the burning ice?

Oil drilling: a dirty job

How does working two weeks each month sound? Well if you're working the 9 to 5 job or crazy graduate student hours it might sound like a deal. But the work this kind of  job requires might be a bit beyond what you're willing give. Just look at how tough of a time Mike from Dirty Jobs is having:



Now imagine doing that kind of job on an offshore drilling platform in the middle of the ocean! As we saw in the story of gasoline getting oil to the gas station is an involved process but getting the oil up from deep within the earth is quite the process too. The U.S. imports a large part of our oil from foreign sources (almost 50% in 2010) but we have a large amount of oil in the Gulf of Mexico. This is where offshore drilling platforms are found. In 2006, there were over 4,000 platforms in the gulf according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association. An image helps that number hit home.

The 4,000 platforms in the Gulf of Mexico in 2006.

So how do these offshore oil rigs get to the oil? Well, the one video I found that describes the process very clearly is actually for a research vessel trying to drill through Earth's crust which is pretty cool! The process to drill for oil is the same but the drilling stops when the reservoir (big pocket of oil and gas) is reached.



Basically, a vessel or platform positions itself about the location by GPS and then lowers a drill head on a long cable down to the ocean floor. The hole is lined with casing (metal piping) to reinforce it. Once the reservoir is reached then the oil is pumped up and to a holding tank or through a pipeline to shore.

The guys who are out there on the rigs work 2 weeks straight often with 12 hour shifts (they are paid pretty well though). Fortunately the platforms aren't just for business. They usually have a movie theater and gym. This article describes the rig life in more detail. Sleeping in tiny bunks and braving windy weather are just some of the downsides of the job.

The process to reach oil thousands of feet below the ocean isn't easy. It's amazing to me the technology involved to get the precious resource out. As with my brief story of gasoline, there is a lot I'm leaving out so this will fit into a blog post. Read this longer story of the complete oil drilling process over at HowStuffWorks for more information. If you think you can brave the waves, tiny room, and 12 hour days then kudos to you because I definitely couldn't do it!

Obama came to town

The President of the United States visited Golden on Thursday. Our little town was excited to have him. (Personally, I was a little frustrated because all the traffic meant I didn’t have enough time to sneak a mountain biking ride on North Table.) Colorado, as a swing state, has seen a lot of President Obama lately but he is only the second President to personally campaign in Golden. The other was Ulysses Grant!

President Obama speaking in Golden, CO. Check out the "M" behind him!

Now I wasn't there but I did think about what I would want to hear and I was surprised when I read about his speech. I'm not going to get into politics in this post but I do what to talk  about what Obama didn’t say.

He didn't say anything about energy or science or R&D research & development funding! Now, I know, Obama was addressing the general public but, come on, he was just blocks away from a purely science and engineering school, Colorado School of Mines, and a couple miles from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory in a state that has a large amount of natural gas!

But the lack of talk about energy, science, and R&D research & development funding isn’t something new in this campaign for both parties. The blog Science-Insider highlighted last Wednesday a report comparing the technology innovation policies supported by Obama and Romney released from The Information Technology & Innovation Foundation. The nonpartisan think-tank concludes that neither party has it completely right. I was happy to see the sentence below appear in the conclusion:

"The candidates’ proposals on science and technology, innovation, broadband and telecommunications, energy, etc. documented in this report represent an important first step, but it’s time for these issues to receive far greater attention in the presidential contest and beyond.”

The bottom line is that whoever becomes the next President of the United States will affect the direction of research and money in science and more specifically geophysics. Scientists (this includes me) would like to think that politics don’t affect research but that just isn’t true. The direction of energy and science matters and we need to talk about it more!

President Obama, the next time you come to Golden, could we please talk some energy and science? Please! It's something I treasure!

What do you guys think? What science topic do you think is important in this election? Do the candidates need to define their energy plans better?