Abiotic Oil? Da!

[Heinrich]

James(and any other chem engineers here) please comment.

https://twitter.com/thingobserver/status/1603050147453505536?t=pElNhihvNgRjEUIslN1kbg&s=19

[clau clau]

There is an interesting map as part of the twitter thread above.

That oilfield and the war in Ukraine seem a pretty close match.

The scientists would share their discovery of oil and gas in the Dneiper-Donets basin. The basin has no source rock which according to western conventions is necessary  for oil formation.

[james03]

I've accepted the abiotic oil theory for some time.

On a science level, you have what is called Gibbs Free energy.  Calcs from this show that oil can only be formed at mantle type pressures and temperatures (similar to diamonds).

Natural gas is extremely pure.  Biogenetic gas does occur in swamps and even garbage dumps, and can be up to 50% CO2.  In technical terms, you need an entropy sink to soak up the entropy from making a highly reduced, high energy molecule like a parrafin.  CO2 is not present in most natural gas fields, so it can't be biotic.

In these gas fields which can't be biotic, we also get higher order paraffins besides methane like ethane, propane, butane, and pentane.  In fact the propane you use in your grill comes from this gas.  Keep going up in carbon number and you have crude oil.  Pentane and butane can be used as gasoline.

Complex hydrocarbons beyond methane exist on other planets.

Methane is abundant in the universe.

If you leave it to bio-sourced carbon you expect to only find lignite coal and natural gas containing only methane and a large amount of CO2.

Note that this does not mean we have a never ending supply of crude oil.  There will be a limit of "seep rate" up from the mantle to the crust zone.  And the methane in the mantle eventually runs out.  But we have plenty of oil.  There are enormous elephant fields in Venezuela, Colombia, and Argentina that aren't even tapped.  The "stans" have a lot of oil, but I'm unfamiliar with the region.  We've just started production from the elephant field off of Guyana, and the same oil extends offshore Suriname, which is scheduled to be developed.  Russia hasn't even started producing their shale oil, and only just started on their arctic oil.  Oil won't even be a problem for my kids.  Maybe when my grandkids reach old age.  Oil shortages are due to politics.

[james03]

I read through the tweet thread.  His technical info is correct.  The stab at "big oil" not wanting you to know was gay.  There's hundreds of oil companies and also State oil companies.  Why would they care if the public "discovered" that oil is abiotic?  The price is the price.  It's not like there is easy to get oil all over the place.  It takes a lot of money to produce oil.

The reason big oil loves the fossil fuel theory is because the down hole guys are geologists and are illiterate on thermodynamics, unlike their engineering betters.

[Heinrich]

So this phenomenon is not really a game changer. What are your experiences with Equitorial Guinea, the only Spanish speaking country in Africa. Big oil apparently owns the place.

[james03]

My buddy helped build one of the production platforms offshore.  Nasty place.  He had to check in at a shore based man camp and take a boat out.  He was glad they bunked the men offshore.  He only had to be in-country for arrival and departure.

All the production assets built for that country were paid for by "Big Oil", so they better own it.  The locals probably haven't even invented the wheel yet and spend their time dodging cobras and black mambas.  EG gets a fat cut of the proceeds however.