Running out of oil?

Not if you listen to Thomas Gold. He believes oil isn't actually a "fossil fuel" as it's been called for a long time. He believes its forming deep under the earth's surface, as explained in this Wired article:

www.wired.com...

I dont believe it, neither do people in the article.

Conventional petroleum geologists hold that hydrocarbons are created by the burial of organic material to depths where moderate levels of heat and pressure "cook" it into oil and gas, which then migrate through the crust to the sorts of sedimentary structures best suited to trap them. Geochemists argue that the bulk of the world's hydrocarbons couldn't possibly reside in the Earth's mantle, as Gold posits; at that depth, hydrocarbons would react with the mantle, oxidizing into carbon dioxide, a process which, Gold's foes believe, is evident in the belching forth of carbon dioxide from the Earth's volcanoes.

[edit on 8-7-2005 by Dulcimer]

I'm not saying it's necessarily true. It is, however, a valid theory that holds up against the trials of science. And there is some interesting evidence to support it, such as Gold digging in a place where there wasn't supposed to be oil and finding some; oil deposits that were supposed to run dry long ago that still haven't, etc.

lets just say for the sake of arrugment that it is true and oil is created by some unknown inner earth prosses .
even if this is true it doesent help our oil running low problems .
After this hypthatcial prosses must require a set amount of time to creat a set amount of oil .
so the oil world uses per DAY is aroung 30 MILLION barrels NOTE not gallons .
this works out to 12'000'000'000 GALLONS assuming Im correct in 40 gallon barrels . now This is how much oil per day is needed to run this world and as you see these numbers are UNBELIVEABLE . to think that even if oil is earth created that it could come up with even HALF this number in new oil per day is unrealistick.
The morel to this is NO matter how oil gets here it is a FINITE resorce and will become UNeconimal to extract in a high ENOUGH amount very shortly now.

I say let em run out of oil... we went from coal burning to oil burning..

I think it's time alternative energy companies take the stage..

Solar powered houses (I think would be cool) hydrogen run cars and hybrids.


when recycling first came about it wasn't a big deal and people didn't really care, but the more awareness that was brought upon them the more people started to recycle..

I think it's kind of the same thing with this issue.

It will take time, but I hope they run out of oil...