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This is an EXACT reproduction of a book published before 1923. This IS NOT an OCR'd book with strange characters, introduced typographical errors, and jumbled words.This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book. ... Read more

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The science of energy is at the root of many of the biggest challenges facing the future of our planet.This book uses everyday examples and the latest figures to show how we use energy from fossil fuels.Find out about fossil fuels and why they are used to generate energy.Learn where the oil we use comes from.Discover how burning fossil fuels affects the environment. ... Read more

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Fossil fuels, foundational to all aspects of modern society, are being depleted. Demand will permanently exceed supply in less than five years, commencing an inflationary spiral and worldwide depression. Simultaneously, the environmental effects of use will worsen. These conditions will be the cause of wars and may result in the destruction of civilization. The cause is overpopulation in the context of economically exploding consumer societies. There are no full solutions, fossil fuels can never be replaced. There are partial mitigations requiring massive alternative energy development, strict worldwide conservation and pervasive social changes. These must begin before the advent of serious negative effects, as they require intact economic conditions and the use of large quantities of fossil fuels. This book looks at the issues and solutions and offers pathways towards personal security. It's intense, concise and readable, leading towards greater awareness of important factors certain to impact our quickly arriving future. ... Read more

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Survival Guide
I loved this book!For me it was an interesting and fun book to read.The author is on the mark and most often hits the nail on the head.I lived and worked in Saudi Arabia and also lived in North Yemen.I receive an early buy-out of my retirement from Saudi Aramco Oil Company in 1998.I got even more interested in "Peak Oil" with Mr. Bush's invasion of Iraq in 2003.I have been researching the oil industry since 2001 and have spent over 8,000 hours trying to understand what's going on.The reason for this is I want to take care of my family, even after I am gone.Matthew Henley is a smart man and his views and facts and ideas have helped me greatly.What's so democratic about the internet is that even the most ignorant and uninformed people can voice an opinion.I've read for hours on Peak Oil Websites some smart people, but most are very limited in their knowledge, have never worked in the oil business, and have never been to Saudi Arabia, Russia or any further than Disneyland.Many of these websites are a place to play the blame game.Blame Democrats, Blame Republicans, Blame Bush, Blame Clinton, Blame oil Companies, Blame rich people, Blame OPEC, and the blame game goes on and on.The only thing these people seem to worship is the personal automobile.You don't have to believe everything Mr. Henley has written.Some of it seems to be off-the-wall, but this book and others have helped me put together a detailed hard copy peak oil plan for my family.We will move, we will be able to produce our own water, our own electricity, our own heat, and our lives will not rotate around a gasoline burning car.I have other plans ready for action.Regardless what happens, WW3, the collapse of the dollar, $12 per gallon gasoline, my family and I will live well.Gloom and Doom?Call it what you like, but most of these people who dismiss hard facts as gloom and doomers have the foresight of a snail.I know this for a fact, too many people and too many cars and it's growing like a global cancer.I am sure that 95% of the American public without cheap fossil fuel and government entitlements would starve.I am greatful to Mr. Henley for his work.Regards, Keith Renick, Peachtree City, Ga. ... Read more

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This econometric study covers the world outlook for fossil fuel-powered electric power generation across more than 200 countries. For each year reported, estimates are given for the latent demand, or potential industry earnings (P.I.E.), for the country in question (in millions of U.S. dollars), the percent share the country is of the region and of the globe. These comparative benchmarks allow the reader to quickly gauge a country vis-à-vis others. Using econometric models which project fundamental economic dynamics within each country and across countries, latent demand estimates are created. This report does not discuss the specific players in the market serving the latent demand, nor specific details at the product level. The study also does not consider short-term cyclicalities that might affect realized sales. The study, therefore, is strategic in nature, taking an aggregate and long-run view, irrespective of the players or products involved. This study does not report actual sales data (which are simply unavailable, in a comparable or consistent manner in virtually all of the 230 countries of the world). This study gives, however, my estimates for the worldwide latent demand, or the P.I.E., for fossil fuel-powered electric power generation. It also shows how the P.I.E. is divided across the world's regional and national markets. For each country, I also show my estimates of how the P.I.E. grows over time (positive or negative growth). In order to make these estimates, a multi-stage methodology was employed that is often taught in courses on international strategic planning at graduate schools of business. ... Read more

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This book is based on two symposia that were held at theAmerican Chemical Society National Meeting in San Diego, California,in April 2001, where strategies for the utilization of fossil fuels inthe 21st century were presented. The symposia titled "Greenhouse GasControl and Utilization" and "Environmental Challenges for Fossil FuelUtilization" were sponsored by the Division of Fuel Chemistry, and thelatter was also co-sponsored by the Division of EnvironmentalChemistry. International representatives from numerous countriesaround the world, including the USA, Canada, China, Australia, Japan,Italy, Belgium, Netherlands, Spain, India, France and South Korea,presented oral papers and posters that covered recent developments forthe continuous utilization of fossil fuels, especially those relatedto environmental challenges and greenhouse gas control. This bookcontains thirty peer-reviewed chapters that will provide the readerswith updated research progress in the field of environmental chemicalresearch related to fossil fuel utilization. Furthermore, itsinternational flavor will ensure that a worldwide broad cross sectionof scientific and engineering research is covered throughout the book.The book is logically divided into the following six sections: (1)Pollutant Emissions; (2) Carbon Sequestration; (3) Greenhouse GasEmission Control; (4) Utilization of CO2 for Synthesis GasProduction; (5) Utilization of CO2 for Chemical Synthesis; and(6) Combustion Byproducts. ... Read more

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With supplies of non-renewable energy sources running low and the threat of global warming and climate change, there is an urgent need to look at other types of energy resources and how well they can meet our power needs. While new technologies are being developed, each energy resource comes at a cost. This series looks at each energy resource, the technology and cost of how it is used to meet power needs and how it impacts the environment and humans. Each book explains how that power is generated and where it is used, and then, using specific Let's Discuss panels, explores the various advantages and disadvantages that concern it's use as an alternative fuel source. Case studies examine specific usage examples where that source has either worked or not worked so that the reader can weigh up the pros and cons for the use of each source against the alternatives. ... Read more

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Marshall Cavendish's book sets are top picks for elementary-level libraries
Marshall Cavendish's book sets are top picks for elementary-level libraries and these new releases are especially recommended as staples for any serious collection, promising lasting reference and relevance. Julie Richards' 'Energy Choices' provides a simple set of 32-page books surveying the basics of different energy sources. WIND ENERGY, FOSSIL FUELS, NUCLEAR ENERGY, SOLAR ENERGY, BIOFUELS and WATER ENERGY each provide large print and photos for grades 1-3. ... Read more

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Natural gas, oil, and coal are finite resources, and their use contributes to deadly smog and global warming. This book follows the world's dependence on these resources and shows how people are working to reduce their use. ... Read more

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Could there exist, deep within the earth's crust, asecond biosphere--composed of very primitive, thermophilic(heat-loving) bacteria, and containing more living matter than theentire surface of the planet? This radical idea, which initially metwith skepticism when it was first proposed by the author in the early1980s, is now supported by a growing body of evidence.

The implications are astonishing. The theory proposes answers tooften-asked questions about life on other planets and the origins ofsurface life on earth. Is the deep biosphere where life originated?Can Mars and other seemingly barren planets contain deep biospheres?Is there yet another--deeper, hotter--biosphere within the earth,based on silicon instead of carbon?

In the first book on this very controversial and intriguing theory,pioneering physicist Thomas Gold explores the likelihood of asubterranean biosphere, one that exists in a gaseous atmosphere atvery high temperature and pressure, and survives on chemicalenergy--hydrocarbons. This stunning book offers new insights intothe origins of life, the origins of natural gas and petroleum, and thedistribution of life in the universe. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (24)

Interesting and thought provoking
As a geoscientist of 30 years, and one who was involved in the use of soil hydrocarbons, helium, stable isotopes, and microbes in exploring for oil and gas, I found the book thought provoking and interesting.Gold tied together a lot of loose ends, and zeroed in on all the areas in which our understanding of the formation and occurrence of petroleum breaks down.

I used to teach classes in the petroleum system, and there are areas that you simply have to wave your arms when describing things.Topics like explusion and migration.The industry has always taken it as an article of faith that oil moves from point A, where it was generated from organic material, usually marine amorphous kerogen, not dinosaurs or fish, as some people believe, and is squeezed out and migrates underground along "fairways" to a trap which if everything is right, forms a reservoir.The trouble is we have never discovered a fairway, where you would expect to find traces of the migrated petroleum.We point to shaley source rocks as the potential source for petroleum.We say that the oil is squeezed out of the shale to be trapped elsewhere.But no one can answer the question at to how the oil moves from the very non permiable shale, the very same characteristic that makes extracting oil from plentiful oil shales so difficult.No matter, we just wave our arms and evoke the Geologic God of the Gaps and have faith that it just happened the way we think it did.Gold was right, this aspect of petroleum science has all the characteristics of religious dogma.

As a geologist who was schooled at a time when the Geosynclinal Theory of Mountain Building was being taught and Plate Tectonics was another "interesting" idea, I know what it is like to see a paradigm shift.Today we accept that Plate Tectonics is "the" correct answer, just as we once accepted another was the "right" one.We just could not explain the mechanism for the geosyncline deformation and the upthrusting of sediments or the intense volcanic activity in evidence.We just accepted there was something that caused it.Some great unseen and at the time, unfathomable force.Well eventually two and two were put together.Today Plate Tectonics is understood to be that force and Geosynclinal Theory has been encorporated into a much better understood overall conceptual understanding of which it is only one part.It took the overarching idea of shifting plates in the Earth's crust to tie together all the loose ends.

We waved our arms a lot back then, just as we do now.The fact is, so long as we can continue to find oil using today's understanding, there is no real need or impetus to search for what might be the true origin of hydrocarbons.While I was doing research for a major oil company, more than a few of my PhD colleagues who had a penchant for getting distracted in pursuit of interesting topics unrelated to their assigned duties, were reminded by their employers that we were first and foremost an petroleum company, and that their activities should be confined to doing research in areas that would make the company money. If they wanted to do "science projects" they should go back to academia or government service.Some of them did.In the end, that was it and all about it.

Only when the prevailing dogmatic ideas cease to be effective, will there be a push to expand our understanding of those gray areas.Depending on your point of view, Gold either died too soon and became a martyr of sorts, or died at the right time, never to see his ideas discredited, as without him to promote an alternative, dogmatists will just let them languish in obscurity without the need to take the effort to disprove him.Maybe one day, his ideas will be proven out, but it won't be by academia, as they do not have the funds to drill multi million dollar wells, and the petroleum companies don't either, at least not for science projects, at least not now.

Startling and revealing
This book is one of the most startling books I have ever read.Author Gold has been brave enough to try another approach to the way we view our surroundings.Coming from a well educated background he has opened new doors that have long been locked by old established ideas.

It is unfortunate that he passed away so soon as his thinking is needed in our world today.

Is oil really non-renewable?Is Peak Oil a sham?
An iconoclstic book threatens everything we knew about oil and its origins

[Disclaimer:I am not a creationist.Nor am I a supporter of its fake twin, intelligent design.]

This book could easily be titled, "Everything You Want to Know About the Formation of Oil, But Were Afraid to Ask - Is Wrong!"Is the author correct, or is he a bit too much of a flake on this issue?Gold died in 2004, but he certainly had the credentials (though I don't set a lot of store in those, necessarily).He was a member of the American Academy of Science, and a member of The Royal Society.You can't get any higher than those, unless you count the Nobel Prize.

So, what is he claiming?That oil isn't formed by swamps from the Permean Age settling their leaves, layer by layer, then getting compressed over millenia.He claims that what we learned in science class about salt domes is not where oil is found.Oh, oil was found there, but those were the easy locations.It has, he claims, been found in all kinds of other geological structures, and he is right about that.But most of us don't know that, do we?But the oil geologists do know it.The geological structures in which oil is found now are all over the map, literally and figuratively.No one existing theory can tell us why that is so, but in this book Gold tries to.

The status quo tries to explain oil showing up in other places - places it shouldn't BE - by speculating (and it IS only speculation) - that it migrates sideways, sometimes for many, many miles, from the (speculated) "right" places to the (actual) "wrong" places, where the oil geologists manage to wander upon it.

Gold's physics I cannot verify for sure, because I am not up on all of it.but what I CAN understand sounds good to me.I am a mechanical engineer, so I can have at least a semi-informed opinion, and to me it sounds at least worth looking into.

In the long view, whichever theory is correct will show out in the end, won't it?It may be 100 years, or it may be 200 years, but either the existing theory will prove out, or we will continue to find oil in places it "shouldn't" be (including our "depleted" oil fields).

I particularly like Gold's expansion of the argument to coal.Coal was laid down - so we are told - in essentially the same method as we are told oil was - swamps, layer-upon-layer, decaying, pressure, heat, time, etc.Lots of time.LOTS of time.But it all started out with swamps.Or did it?Then why - cutting diagonally across what is supposed to be tens and hundreds of thousands of years of layers of coal - are there tree trunks, spanning all those years?Heck, just the roots are projecting across a thousand years or more - what held the tree up all that time, while the layers formed around it?And why didn't it decay in all that time?

Why do I like this part?Because I have seen this myself.Am I imagining this?Am I misreading what my eyes told me?No, that was almost countless years of layers of coal, and that was one tree - intact - slicing through all those layers of "time".How did it happen? I don't know, but I do know that there is no way that that coal formed like they claim, not with that tree there.The tree would be turned to dust or mold long before 1/100th of those layers were laid down.Maybe the layers don't represent time, after all.But if not, then what DO they represent?I honestly don't know...

As to oil, Gold's theory, if correct, would have one hell of an impact on our thinking.

How so?

Well, if Gold is correct, and swamps from the Permean are not the source of oil, but it is created continually, down in the earth's mantle, THEN WE DON"T RUN THE RISK OF RUNNING OUT OF OIL - AND ALL PREDICTIONS OF PEAK OIL ARE WRONG.

Let me repeat that, for the casual reader:

There is a top scientist who is on record as saying that oil is NOT non-renewable.That actually would mean that it IS renewable.And that means our polluting can keep on going, I guess!(That was a joke...)

Gold also does us all a big favor in pointing out something that almost no one knows:

When oil fields are depleted, they sometimes re-fill with oil.

When someone first told me this, I was incredulous.But if it is true, what does that mean?...

...I don't agree with everything Gold says.Toward the end of this book, Thomas Gold overextends his ideas a little bit, getting a bit too ambitious for his theory, IMHO, but who can blame him?

I give the book a 95 out of 100.

Oil everywhere
I was very impressed Dr. Gold's crisp and persuasive arguments for the deep and non-biological origin of petroleum.Dr. Gold pictures the greater part of the Earth's biosphere infiltrating the rocks of the upper crust, where autotrophic bacteria feed on virtually limitless upwelling hydrocarbons from the planet's interior -- a hypothesis that culminated in the fascinating "Siljan" experiment in 1987, in which tens of millions of dollars were invested drilling a 5-mile well into the granite of Switzerland in search of non-biological hydrocarbons.Dr. Gold states that crude oil and other hydrocarbons were recovered from rocks where conventional geology said they could not exist.Unfortunately, this may not meet Carl Sagan's threshold of "extraordinary evidence," since his work seems to have been largely ignored by modern geologists.Nevertheless, this tightly reasoned and polished book made a believer out of me.Among other fascinating statements, Dr. Gold believes the world's oil reserves are actually slowly "recharging," and that life originated within the Earth's crust.I certainly recommend this book to anybody with an interest in oil, geology or the origin of life.

-- Auralgo

Scientific theory, or maybe just true !!
As a geologist familiar with the traditional theories about accumulations of oil and related gases in structural domes, I was skeptical of Gold's theories.But the more I read, the more I became convinced his explanations of facts that went unaccounted for using the old theories had some merit.Of course, the only problem with his theory is that we will never be able to prove it.To prove it we would have to drill at least 200 kilometers down into the earth.But his five assumptions are valid and not disproveable.Plus, I read a recent newspaper article that scientists have found evidence of a deep unidentified source of methane gas.As a scientist you can poo poo it, but hey, wait until all evidence comes in, at least give the author that much respect. Recommended for those scientists who have an open mind. ... Read more

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Shows children how can they make a difference. From fighting global warming to protecting wildlife, this book contains the information young environmentalists need to change the world. ... Read more

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America's dependence on foreign oil has become one of the hottest issues on the political agenda today. Politicians on both sides of the spectrum are calling for a way to find new forms of clean energy. As the only U.S. congressman in history with a career as a renewable energy engineer, Jerry McNerney is an expert in the field of energy independence. Now, in "Clean Energy Nation", he and journalist Martin Cheek explore what the human race must do to survive the next 100 years - we must soon make significant progress in developing energy from solar, wind, water, biofuel, geothermal, and hydrogen-based power sources to reduce our dependence on fossil fuels. Full of fascinating interviews with authorities in the field, the authors reveal why fossil fuels are destructive to the earth; which fuels and energy sources we should be using to protect our environment; and, the environmental, economical, and political benefits we will reap from that switch. Inspiring and timely, "Clean Energy Nation" offers an insightful look into what needs to be done to preserve the autonomy of our country and the well-being of our planet ... Read more

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In this report, RAND researchers assess the potential future production levels, production costs, greenhouse gases, and other environmental implications of synthetic crude oil from oil sands and fuels produced via coal liquefaction relative to conventional petroleum-based transportation fuels. The findings indicate the potential cost-competitiveness of these alternative fuels and potential economic-environmental trade-offs from their deployment. ... Read more