Joule Unlimited Scores Loads of Free Publicity!

A synthetic biofuels company from Massachusetts called "Joule Unlimited" has managed to score tons of free publicity in newspapers, blogs, and news services -- without doing much at all! This is public relations at its finest, and the PR people at Joule have to be congratulated.

Joule is involved in the synthetic genomics of cyanobacteria -- having obtained patents to engineer the production of hydrocarbon fuels from bacteria using CO2 and sunlight. But in the news business, most journalists are always asking a potential news focus: "What have you done for me lately?" And in the case of Joule, the answer is "Not much at all."

It all started when the Globe & Mail had a story on Joule a few days ago which erroneously claimed that Joule's miracle bacterium was E. Coli -- after several people notified the paper of their error, they finally corrected it. But not before scores of blogs and other news sources repeated the G&M mistake verbatim. But the Globe & Mail story was about something that happened -- a patent approval -- in September 2010. So why did it take off in January 2011?

A respectable fusion energy forum -- Talk Polywell -- picked the story up, and it then spread. Respected blogger and engineer M. Simon picked up the story from Talk Polywell. Then Instapundit's Glenn Reynolds picked up the story from M. Simon. And from there the story spreads across the blogosphere...

But what has Joule Unlimited actually done lately to merit this new publicity?

Well, they elected John Podesta to their board of directors.

They somehow got dufus Senator John Kerry to call Joule's technology "a game changer."

Then, way back in September 2010 Joule is awarded a patent on its technology

Al Fin analysts can be heard muttering: "Not much progress for all of that free publicity."

Microbial bioenergy is indeed a game changer. But Joule Unlimited is only one of many fine companies with very fine research and development staffs who are working hard to bring large scale microbial fuels to reality. How did Joule's PR department trigger this isolated inflationary bubble of "news?"

Al Fin Energy Institute researchers are not complaining, mind you. Microbial fuels are set to be ready to start scaling up in roughly 10 years. In 20 years, microbial fuels will score at least 10% of the liquid fuels markets in advanced western countries. In 30 years, petroleum companies will be pushed to the wall to keep their costs down low enough to compete.

But premature ejaculations of gee whiz futurism can lead to wide-scale cynicism. In the case of microbial fuels, neither gee-whiz! optimism nor cynical pessimism are warranted. Synthetic genomics is pretty spectacular -- but it takes time to get results. Give it time.

Joule Unlimited patent applications

Proviso: In a fast-changing environment such as industrial synthetic genomics and synthetic fuels, breakthroughs can occur at any time. It is not always in a company's interest to reveal the state of its R&D progress. But all breakthroughs require time to develop into industrial processes, and much more time to scale up to actual commercial and industrial supply systems. As time goes on, we will hear about a lot of breakthroughs. Most of these newsreleases deserve to be taken with a tablespoon of magnesium sulfate and two glasses of water.

Update: Now Brian Wang has picked up the story at NextBigFuture. Brian featured the correct bacterial species in his posting and features some original material from the company's website -- proving once again that Brian's is the best of the technology blogs.

Watching this story getting picked up from site to site provides a dynamic portrait of blogospheric connections. In this case the Globe & Mail writer -- Neil Reynolds, who is one of my favourite mainstream press energy writers -- reported on a company that is no doubt doing some excellent work. But Reynolds was not actually reporting on recent news, he was merely highlighting ongoing work of one particular microbial fuels company. Just one out of many fine companies working on microbial fuels.

Prospecting the Wild West for Promising Algae

Synthetic biology approaches to microbial fuels tend to attract a lot of money and investment, but mother nature still has a few tricks up her sleeve. Evolution has been working on algal species for many hundreds of millions of years.

Lee Elliott works at the US National Renewable Energy Labs, and roams the western US in search of "the perfect algae."

Elliott, a graduate student at theColorado School of Mines and a researcher at the U.S. Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Laboratory, logged 3,500 miles last year driving his car across the West in search of promising algae. _LabEquipment

Whoever first finds the key to the profitable production of microbial fuels will find plenty of customers waiting.

The US government is beginning to get serious about helping fund advanced biofuels efforts. The US Department of Agriculture is providing over $405 million in loan guarantees to three separate ventures -- all three utilising gasification of biomass as the first stage of multi-stage processing of biomass to fuels. The US Department of Energy is providing a $241 million loan guarantee to a new advanced biodiesel plant in Louisiana. The new plant will use a hydrotreating/isomerisation process to convert animal and vegetable oils to high quality bio-diesel.

Abu Dhabi's Masdar Institute along with Boeing and Honeywell, have completed an assessment of an integrated seawater agriculture system (ISAS) to produce fuels and other high value products from salt and brackish water estuaries that are not suitable for traditional agriculture.

The program under the SBRC will be a 5-year research and demonstration project designed to drive the commercial viability of halophyte-derived bioenergy, including renewable jet fuels. The program will use integrated seawater agricultural systems to support the development and commercialization of biofuel sources for aviation, and co-products.

ISAS combines aquaculture, Salicornia cultivation, and mangrove silviculture into an integrated low-impact system for biofuel production that relies on seawater irrigation and does not compete for arable land. It also offers the prospect of contributing to the development of an alternative fuel source that can alleviate a portion of global anthropogenic greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions without negative environmental impacts. _GCC

Is Putin's Russia Ready to Let Go of Political Peak Oil?

While Russia is rich in oil and gas resources, the Russian government in 2008 had to introduce a US$4.2 billion tax cut at mid-year to reverse declining production after a period of growth from 1998 through 2004. "From the oil company's perspective, the government was taking all the revenue from high oil prices, leaving them will little to invest in new production, so there was nothing to offset declining production from aging fields in Western Siberia," Neff said.

"It's amazing how quickly the industry turned things around," said Neff, noting that Russian oil production passed the 10 million b/d mark in 2010. However, "there's still a sense that Russian production could come to a cliff if they don't make changes." _Rigzone

Russia has barely begun to tap its vast energy and mineral resources. Corruption, incompetence, and bureaucratic wrangling at all levels have combined to hold Russian production far below what it could be. In the past, many international partners and investors have been burned by the arbitrary nationalisation of assets by a corrupt Russian government. But now, Russia says it wants to change all that. Are they truly serious this time?

Russia is seeking to develop its oil and natural gas resources, particularly in untapped areas like its offshore Arctic region, as well as diversify the number of oil and gas export markets available to Russia, and needs companies with deep financial pockets and a willingness to share risk. However, laws restricting exploration and production (E&P) activity by foreign companies and a sector structured to favor domestic firms must be addressed to encourage E&P activity and maintain production growth.

While the Russian government has welcomed foreign investment, it has limited companies to partnering in projects with Russian companies as operator. "It's hard for companies not to want to be in Russia because it has such vast resources, but the investment climate has not been favorable to foreign companies. The most they can hope for is an equal stake in a project with a state company, and that it ambitious," Andrew Neff, senior energy analyst at IHS.

BP's recent share swap with Rosneft, which will allow BP access to explore for oil and gas in Russia's Arctic, was made possible by BP's exceptional circumstances and its unique position in Russia via its TNK-BP venture, Neff said. However, it could set off a new frenzy of international oil companies (IOCs) looking to partner with national oil companies, if not in Russia, perhaps elsewhere.

...The Russian government is expected to push towards private companies investing in exploring for and producing oil and gas in eastern Siberia as part of a plan to diversify its supply market to include China and other Asian countries, where crude oil demand has surged. "The thinking is that if Europe can diversify its gas suppliers, the Russia should be able to find alternative markets for its supply," said Neff.

These efforts include the first pipeline linking Russia and China, the 3,018-mile Eastern Siberia Pacific Pipeline, which is now operational and will transport 300,000 b/d of oil over a 20-year period. The project's second phase will see pipeline laid that will allow for oil shipments to Japan and Korea.... _Rigzone

Prospective partners and investors must think long and hard about getting involved with the corrupt Putin dictatorship. The recent re-conviction of former Yukos head Khodorkovsky provides abundant evidence that the laws in Russia are simply whatever Putin says they are.

And yet, Siberia is stuffed full of mineral and energy wealth. Everyone wants a piece of it. Of course, if Russia does not do something about its incredible shrinking population, Siberia will belong to China before anyone expects it.

Gevo Lining Up for IPO, More Partners

GEVO
Advanced biofuels company Gevo is lining up new partners, and preparing for an IPO where it hopes to raise close to $100 million in funding.

Gevo uses synthetic biology and chemical technology to convert renewable raw materials into isobutanol and renewable hydrocarbons that can be directly integrated on a “drop in” basis into existing fuel and chemical products...

...Gevo says it is developing a pipeline of future customers for its isobutanol and its derivative chemical products across multiple global chemicals and fuels markets. In anticipation of targeted initial commercial production of isobutanol in the first half of 2012, it has entered into a number of letters of intent and is negotiating the final terms of several definitive agreements with future customers and partners in the chemicals and fuels markets, including:

Lanxess Inc., a leading chemicals company;
Total Petrochemicals USA, Inc., an affiliate of Total S.A., a major oil and gas integrated company;
Toray Industries, Inc., a leader in the development of fibers, plastics and chemicals;
United Air Lines, Inc., a major commercial airline; and
CDTECH, a leading hydrocarbon technology provider for the petrochemical and refining industry.

Gevo is also in discussions with major refiners that have indicated an interest in forming partnerships with us to manufacture renewable jet fuel using our isobutanol. It also intends to develop relationships with companies that are engineering and piloting the processes necessary to convert isobutanol to bio-based jet fuel and then license this technology to refiners and petrochemical companies that intend to use its isobutanol and other bio-based butanols for the production of biobased jet fuel. _GCC

According to energy venturist Vinod Khosla, Gevo is one of the "good guys."

Archive of Gevo news articles from Biofuels Digest

Some behind the scenes legal wrangling between Gevo and Butamax

Gevo's business approach emphasises business and industrial partnerships, building upon a specific fermentation product: isobutanol from engineered bacteria. Butanol is significantly superior to ethanol as a fuel blend, as a drop-in fuel, and as a chemical feedstock.

Gevo used synthetic biology and metabolic engineering to develop its biocatalyst to make isobutanol at high concentrations and without the typical expression co-products. Economic yield from carbohydrates and robust operations are the hallmark of all successful industrial biotechnology projects. Our current generation biocatalyst operates on fermentable sugars from grain crops, sugar cane and sugar beets. Future generation biocatalysts are in development for mixed sugars from biomass so when the conversion technology is commercially available, we will be able to produce cellulosic butanol.

Although isobutanol is a naturally occurring alcohol, high concentrations inhibit the growth of microorganisms. In order to operate our fermentation at optimum conditions for the biocatalyst, and within the process conditions found in ethanol plants, Gevo developed a unique separation technology. The solution uses a process innovation for continuous separation of the isobutanol as it is produced. Gevo provides the fully integrated solution to its ethanol production partners via flexible commercial arrangements. _Gevo

The company seems to be working on fitting all of the pieces of its business plan together before it enters the marketplace. Here is a history of Gevo press releases.

Al Fin energy analysts require more solid information to assess Gevo's chances realistically. The patent infringement lawsuit from Butamax is just one of many bumps on the road to success for Gevo. Getting high yields of isobutanol via microbial fermentation is not an easy task. We would be surprised to see Gevo sustainably scaling up its isobutanol process within 5 years.

Chromatin Demonstrates "Mini-Chromosome Gene Stacking" in Sugar Cane

Chromatin
Chromatin's mini-chromosome gene stacking technology promises to give bioenergy crop engineers the ability to optimise multiple desirable plant traits simultaneously.

Developers...want to insert genes that offer improvements in multiple traits – when an organism has more than one gene inserted in this process – for example, for disease resistance, insect resistance, herbicide resistance – this is called a gene stack. In 2007, for example, Monsanto and Dow introduced an eight-gene stack (SmartStax) that contained eight herbicide tolerance and insect-protection genes, including Dow’s Herculex I and Herculex RW; Monsanto’s YieldGard VT Rootworm/RR2 and YieldGard VT PRO, Roundup Ready and Liberty Link tolerance genes.

Gene stacking, thereby, is foundational in the drive for higher productivity from land crops.

You can stack in one of two ways. First, the traits are inserted, one each into one varietals. Then the varietals are cross-bred in the traditional manner so that they transfer the genes, eventually, into the target. That’s how Monsanto and Dow came up with SmartSTax.

The Chromatin process

The other way is to insert them all at one time into one varietal.
The company developed a proprietary gene stacking technology, which can be used to simultaneously, and precisely introduce multiple genes in any plant, bypassing the cross-breeding process.

... let’s say you wanted to introduce several genes, not just one – for example, insect resistance, herbicide resistance, disease resistance, higher sugar concentrations, and enzymes to enable better bagasse digestion. If you could do it at all in cane – and it would be a monumental, unprecedented achievement in cross-breeding, it would take, say 13 years or so to accomplish it. It has made changes at this level uneconomical.

So that’s what the Chromatin breakthrough is all about. Creating a method to bring the sort of possibilities that have materially advanced yields in, say, corn and soy, to a whole new array of energy and food crops. Opening up the door for more rapid improvement of the underlying per-acre yields.

...Cross breeding has been the platform technique for a 500 percent improvement in corn yields, over 100 years. That’s a long, long time, but it shows the kind of fundamental change possible. Without cross-breeding, the world would in all probability starved to death long ago – or rather, stalled in its industrial development as simply too many hands, and too much acreage, would have been needed on the farm.

Meanwhile, there are energy grasses, woods and aquatic species that have hardly been touched by cross-breeding or genetic improvement – and already in their wild state have had promising results in terms of productivity for biofuels. SG is just getting a leash on jatropha; companies like Sapphire Energy are just undertaking the first large-scale improvement programs for algae.

But doing so at the lowest possible cost, and the highest possible speed, is the surest road to the kinds of productivities that provide food, feed and fuel for all. This is an advance in science with game-changing characteristics across a host of energy crops. _BiofuelsDigest

Chromatin website

The technology as described sounds very exciting. Not having seen any of the research data, I cannot vouch for any of the claims. Genes require entire arrays of nuclear and cellular proteins for transcription and translation into structural proteins and enzymes. A highly intricate regulatory mechanism is involved in order to effectively utilise any gene -- artificial or natural. One cannot simply throw genes willy nilly into plant or animal cells and expect them to work as you wish.

On the other hand, if a research group were able to manipulate the mechanisms of gene expression in desired ways, so as to make best use of artificial "gene stack chromosomes," the possibilities would be enormous.

How Many "Bakkens" Will Be Found?

North Dakota's Bakken shale oil deposits were supposed to have only 4.3 billion barrels of proven reserves. But that number keeps rising -- as do the production numbers from Bakken fields.

An initial study by the US Geological Survey (notorious for its miserable record in grossly underestimating oil and gas reserves over decades) claimed that the North Dakota Bakken had 4.3 billion barrels of recoverable oil. The latest official estimate is already 11 billion barrels. Continental Resources (CLR), a leading Bakken producer, says that at current economics and with current technology the North Dakota Bakken has 24 billion barrels of recoverable oil.

The US Government claims that total US crude reserves at the end of 2009 were only 21 billion barrels.

There are almost 170 billion barrels of oil in place in North Dakota according to industry estimates, so that as new generations of technology appear and business experience accumulates, the ultimate recoverable reserves may be scores of billions of barrels.

...Drilling now is at an all time high. The State of North Dakota projects that by 2017 North Dakota’s oil production will have risen to around 600, 000 barrels per day ((bpd)) from about 325,000 bpd at present, compared with only 450,000 bpd in onshore Alaska (according to the US Government) in 2017 and about 525,000 bpd onshore Alaska at present. _SeekingAlpha

But the same technologies that made the North American shale oil and shale gas revolutions possible, are also making it possible for dozens of other countries to repeat the energy revolution inside their own borders.

Australian-Canadian Oil Royalties Ltd reports that it may have discovered a formation similar to the Bakken in the Georgina Basin (Northern territory and Queensland). The company will participate in 2 multi stage horizontal frac wells via Baraka Petroleum.

The latter company recently released estimates of shale oil in place in 2 permits in the Southern Georgina basin of 5 to11 billion barrels.

Another company in the Southern Georgina basin, Central Petroleum, announced significant shale oil in place resources in its permit areas. Like the tremendously productive Williston Basin (home of the Bakken) the Georgina is an intracratonic basin( found in continental interiors, well away from tectonic plate boundaries). Such basins occur worldwide.

The Arthur Creek shale formation in the Southern Georgina is very similar to the Bakken but with about 5 times the thickness. All 18 exploratory wells drilled so far have shown oil.

Australian geologists certainly seem to think they have found another Bakken. In another 15 to 18 months we will know if this is indeed true.

Even France?

It is not Australia, however, but France-- where the greatest industry anticipation and activity is building in the search for the next Bakken; in the well known Paris basin.

The Paris basin (current production of less than 15,000 bpd of conventional oil) covers the northern half of France and extends into neighboring countries. It is a vintage oil and gas basin. Over 2 thousand wells have been drilled and 52 fields discovered. It has extensive oil and gas shale deposits. The 3 oil shale formations are the Lower Lias , Amaltheus and Schistes Carton. The current focus of excitement is the Lower Lias with estimated oil in place resource base of a few billion to tens of billions of barrels. The estimates (guesses) for the oil in place in the other 2 formations are much higher.

Vermillion Energy is one of 10 companies positioning themselves in the Lower Lias. Vermillion reactivated a 25 year old ExxonMobil (XOM) well using drilling techniques tried and refined in the US shale industry. Vermillion is the largest conventional oil producer (8,500 bpd) in France. Vermillion plans to spend $160 million to develop shale oil reserves in the Paris Basin.

Realm Energy International (RLMXF.PK) (it has a shale oil and gas development partnership with Halliburton (HAL)) has also applied to be a significant explorer in the Paris Basin. The company has identified 17 potential oil and gas shale plays in Europe. It is already active in Poland. The company has also been awarded shale concessions in Lower Saxony, Germany.

Torreador Resources, an E&P headquartered in Paris, has perhaps the most ambitious plans for the Paris Basin in partnership with Hess (HES) which has invested $120 million (the figure could be $265 million with contingent payments) with Torreador to explore 1.7 millon gross acres in the Paris Basin. Hess has invested $1billion in the Bakken and plans to invest another $1billion there over the next 5 years. In addition to the Paris Basin, Hess thinks it has found a basin analogous to the Bakken in China.

Torreador asserts that an estimated 100 billion barrels of oil have been generated from source rocks in the Paris basin, of which 30 billion are in the Lower Lias. Its gross acreage position makes it, at present, the largest player there.

Torreador plans to drill 6 wells in the Paris Basin in 2011. Of these 2 each will be vertical, vertical / horizontal combination and horizontal. The first 4 wells have been permitted and a drilling contractor secured. The first well will be completed in February 2011 and the 6th in October 2011. By the end of this year the company expects to complete well evaluation and design phase2 of its program. _SeekingAlpha

And then there are potentially huge shale gas discoveries in Argentina, Quebec, Poland, India, the UK, off the coast of Israel, in China, British Columbia, and on and on . . .

Many of these shale gas finds will also produce large amounts of liquids along with the gas. The discovery phase for this type of field has just begun.

Supplies of natural gas could last more than 250 years if Asian and European economies follow the U.S. unconventional reserves, the IEA said. _UPI

Reserves of coal, kerogens, bitumens, methane clathrates, and other hydrocarbons are almost certainly just as underestimated as reserves of shale oil and shale gas have been. As improved technologies for both discovery and production are developed, the difficulty of obtaining "difficult hydrocarbons" will be reduced.

Remember: EROEI is not a fixed number. It is a moving target, and relatively meaningless on its own. We are barely beginning to put together the puzzle which will reveal tomorrow's energy resources and supplies.

Bill Gates Jumps Into Oil Exploration; Brazil's Reserves to Double?

Bill Gates has read the tea leaves, and thinks that there is money in advanced oil exploration technologies.

Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates is tossing his financial support behind a Houston company which hopes to utilize detailed analytics and measurement technologies to take some of the guesswork out of onshore oil and gas exploration. NEOS GeoSolutions -- whose investors include the legendary venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and investment bank Goldman Sachs -- today announced a $60 million investment from Gates and others.

The company touts itself as a "geosciences company where Silicon Valley meets the oil patch," and Gates' involvement certainly adds some big-name technology credentials to the mix.

According to the company's Web site, NEOS can can help oil, gas and mining companies more efficiently explore the Earth's subsurface.

We do this by integrating a broad range of geological and geophysical (G&G) data – including data available in the public domain, owned by our clients, or acquired using proprietary NEOS platforms – to produce a highly constrained 3D model of the subsurface. By applying the latest geostatistical techniques, we help our clients determine which portions of a basin might be the most prospective and, at the lease level, what areas are most likely to contain commercial quantities of hydrocarbons or minerals.

_TechFlash

Brazil's oil reserves may be set to double in extent:

Brazilian oil deposits below a layer of salt in the Atlantic Ocean hold at least 123 billion barrels of reserves, more than double government estimates, according to a university study by a former Petroleo Brasileiro SA geologist.

The research, which set out to show government figures were overly optimistic, found they underestimated the area’s potential, said Hernani Chaves, a professor at the Rio de Janeiro State University who worked at Petrobras for 35 years. The forecast, which the study puts at a 90 percent probability, compares with 50 billion barrels estimated by Brazil’s oil regulator, known as ANP.

“We started with a skeptical view and finished with bigger numbers,” _Bloomberg

Coal to rival oil in energy production by 2030

Green coal may come to India within 2 years

GE to assist Shenhua in providing clean coal technology to China

Renewables bubble bursting in Spain and France. German and Scandinavian power grid managers are not very happy about the renewables bubble either.

The world is floating in hydrocarbon energy resources. Humans in developed societies must choose between the lefty-Luddite dieoff.orgiast philosophy -- as promoted by Obama's merry band of energy starvationists -- or a cleaner and more abundant future of limitless resources released by the unbound human mind.

More on Small Modular Reactors

UxC SMRs TOC etc PDF
UxConsultants has recently published an extensive 500 page special report (description) on Small Modular Reactors, available for purchase at $10,000. You can get an idea of the nature of the report by reading this PDF excerpt, which includes table of contents and lists of figures, tables, and illustrations. Here is a newsrelease description of the report:

Some of the main findings of UxCs SMRA report include:

1) Up to 7 of the leading designs could see at least one plant built by 2020

2) SMRs are likely to be deployed in Russia, China, South Korea, United States, Kazakhstan, and elsewhere

3) Integral PWR designs have the highest likelihood for near-term deployment, but various HTR and LMR concepts are also experiencing positive advances

4) SMR economics can be competitive with larger LWR/HWR designs, if technical and supply chain issues are properly addressed

5) SMRs offer broad appeal for a great number of potential customers, especially due to their multiple applications from generation of both electricity and process heat

UxCs SMRA report aims to fill a clear information gap in the developing SMR marketplace and is believed to be the first ever global comparative analysis of the competing SMR designs. _EyeofDubai

Another promising advanced SMR design not listed in the report summary above, is the ARC-100 molten sodium cooled reactor from Advanced Reactor Concepts.

The new product now under development in the Virginia suburbs of Washington, D.C., is a 100 MW liquid-metal (sodium) cooled fast reactor (large image) that will require refueling once every 20 years. It is remarkable that the technology of EBR-II will live again in this small reactor design. One of the pioneers of that technology, Leon Walters, is now working on the project and is interviewed here.

He told the American Nuclear Society (PDF file) in 2004 that those who built and operated EBR-II have not given up the vision. Walters notes, the design “is proven, it is proliferation-resistant, it decreases waste disposal problems, it’s inherently safe, and perhaps most important of all, Fermi’s original idea—conserving fissionable material—is still sound.”

The ARC reactor system comprises a small uranium-zirconium-fueled nuclear core, submerged in a tank of ambient pressure liquid sodium. The liquid sodium passes through the core where it is heated to 950 degrees Fahrenheit (510 degrees Celsius), it then passes through a heat exchanger where it heats sodium in an intermediate loop, which in turn heats working fluid for energy conversion turbines.

The working fluid can be water that is heated to create steam. Alternatively, the fluid can be carbon dioxide heated to create supercritical (almost liquid) carbon dioxide. The steam, or supercritical carbon dioxide, then spins a turbine to make electricity and is recycled in a closed loop for reheating. According to the company, the supercritical carbon dioxide energy converter system, called the Brayton cycle, provides a thermal efficiency (percentage of heat energy converted to electricity) of 40% or more, significantly higher than the efficiency of conventional steam driven turbine systems. _IS

No doubt there are yet other SMR designs which are being developed around the world, which did not make it into the UxC report.

SMRs will first be built and operated in countries other than the US, because the Obama Nuclear Regulatory Commission policies discourage the licensing of new reactors. The NRC process is almost prohibitively expensive and unnecessarily hamstrung by bureaucratic makework. The NRC has in fact not licensed significantly new types of reactor designs in decades, and clearly has no intention of making it any easier to do so now -- regardless of the critical need to do so.

Big Biomass Boost for Drought-Prone Climates

Mike Mickelbart, an assistant professor of horticulture; Mike Hasegawa, a professor of horticulture; and Chal Yul Yoo, a horticulture graduate student, found that a genetic mutation in the research plant Arabidopsis thaliana reduces the number of stomata. But instead of limiting carbon dioxide intake, the gene creates a beneficial equilibrium.

"The plant can only fix so much carbon dioxide. The fewer stomata still allow for the same amount of carbon dioxide intake as a wild type while conserving water," said Mickelbart, whose results were published in the early online version of the journal The Plant Cell. "This shows there is potential to reduce transpiration without a yield penalty. _Cheminfo

Scientists at Purdue University have discovered a mutant plant gene -- GTL1 -- which shows the way for plants to produce significant biomass even in the face of drought conditions.

Mickelbart and Yoo used an infrared gas analyzer to determine the amount of carbon dioxide taken in and water lost in the Arabidopsis mutant.

Analysis showed that the plant, which has a mutant form of the gene GTL1, did not reduce carbon dioxide intake but did have a 20 percent reduction in transpiration. The plant had the same biomass as a wild type of Arabidopsis when its shoot dry weight was measured.

"The decrease in transpiration leads to increased drought tolerance in the mutant plants," Yoo said.

"They will hold more water in their leaves during drought stress."

The results have been published in the online version of the journal The Plant Cell. _NewKerala

Of the 20 genes known to control stomata, SDD1 was highly expressed in the mutant. SDD1 is a gene that is responsible for regulating the number of stomata on leaves. In the mutant, with GTL1 not functioning, SDD1 is highly expressed, which results in the development of fewer stomata.

Mickelbart said the finding is important because it opens the possibility that there is a natural way to improve crop drought tolerance without decreasing biomass or yield. He said the next step in the research is to determine the role of GTL1 in a crop plant.

The National Science Foundation and a Binational Agricultural Research and Development Award funded the research. _ScienceDaily

Change the genes, change the rules. Obviously such mutants occur spontaneously, in reaction to drought conditions. This places recent "research" claims by the high priesthood of global warming catastrophe in doubt. In fact, plants do have ways to amass greater CO2 in conditions of lowered water availability. The mechanism was provided by natural selection a long time ago.

In fact, most life forms on Earth evolved under conditions of far higher CO2 levels -- and highly variable climate conditions of cyclical drought, flood, heat, cold etc. It is time for computer modelers to stop trying to meddle in the global economy, to acquire a bit of much needed humility, and to stop stealing resources from society which would be more productively used in the private sector.

Throwing Some Light on Cold Fusion

More 18Jan11: According to this article at PureEnergySystems website, the Italian inventor Andrea Rossi is also associated with the website "Journal of Nuclear Physics.com". Pierluca Rossi of the U. of Bologna is listed on the Board of Advisors for the "nuclear experiments blog." Articles published on the website are said to be peer-reviewed, published without modification. Authors are entirely responsible for the content of their own article.

Simply put, the effect involves pressurized dihydrogen gas (2 bars is the lowest mentioned in the patent and 80 bars is what was used in the demonstration) is placed in metal tube with nano powdered nickel and a heating element (resistor). Somehow the dihydrogen gas is split into atomic hydrogen. When heat is applied the atomic hydrogen reacts with the powdered nickel to produce energy up to 400 times the input energy. Undisclosed catalysts are used to increase the efficiency of the cell.

Andrea Rossi is listed as the inventor. He is also the primary operator of the http://www.journal-of-nuclear-physics.com/ website and forum, where the information about the technology is posted. _PES

See also: Directory:Andrea A. Rossi Cold Fusion Generator in PESWIKI

Brian Wang and Brian Westenhaus are providing some interesting information and viewpoints on the latest cold fusion reports from Italy.

The work is published in the Journal of Nuclear Physics, and presents a novel mechanism for significant heat gain involving a subatomic combination (particle fusion) of nickel to copper.

When hydrogen atoms come in contact with the metal (Ni), they abandon their stationary state as they deposit their electrons in the conductivity band of the metal, and due to their greatly reduced volume, compared to that of their atom, the hydrogen nuclei (naked protons) readily diffuse into the defects of the nickel crystalline structure as well as in tetrahedral or octahedral void spaces of the crystal lattice.

It should be underlined that, in addition to the deposited hydrogen electrons, in the nickel mass included are also electrons of the chemical potential of the metal. Jointly these electrons constitute the conductivity electronic cloud, distributed in energy bands (Fermi), and quasi free to move throughout the metallic mass.

it is conceivable that, for a very short time period (e.g. 10ˆ-18 sec), a series of neutral mini atoms of hydrogen could be formed, in an unstable state, of various size and energy level, distributed within the Fermi band, which is enlarged due to the very short time (Heisenberg).

The neutral mini-atoms of high energy and very short wave length – which is in phase with the “cyclic” orbit (de Broglie) – are statistically captured be the nickel nuclei of the crystal structure with the speed of nuclear reactions (10ˆ-20 sec).

For these mini-atoms to fuse with the nickel nuclei, apart from their neutral character for surpassing the Coulomb barrier, they must have dimensions smaller than 10ˆ-14 m, where nuclear cohesion forces, of high intensity but very short range, are predominant. It is assumed that only a percentage of such atoms satisfy this condition (de Broglie).

The above considerations are based only on an intuitive approach and I trust this phenomenon could be tackled in a systematic and integrated way through the “theory of time dependent perturbations” by employing the appropriate Hamiltonian

The mechanism proposed by Focardi – Rossi, verified by mass spectroscopy data, which predicts transmutation of a nickel nucleus to an unstable copper nucleus (isotope), remains in principle valid. The difference is that inside the unstable copper nucleus, produced from the fusion of a hydrogen mini-atom with a nickel nucleus, is trapped the mini-atom electron (β-), which in my opinion undergoes in-situ annihilation, with the predicted (Focardi-Rossi) decay β+ of the new copper nucleus. _JournalNuclearPhysics_via_BrianWang

The claims will require verification, but researcher-inventors Focardi and Rossi are reportedly already working on plans for scaled up commercial versions of the device.

Watts in: 400 wh/h
Watts out: 15,000 wh/h
Yes, we can turn off the input current, but we prefer to maintain a drive and the reasons are very difficult to explain without violating my confidentiality restraints.
The reaction becomes self sustaining.

1) What is the evidence for copper production?
Answer - the evidence of copper production in past has been found using an atomic microscope in the University of Bologna. The same we will make now: we will bring the sample of the Ni we used to the lab of UNIBO and detect Cu

2) Is there any evidence for isotopic anomalies?

Answer - in the past we found them by means of the secondary ions mass spectrometer of the University of Padua. We will do the same now

3) How is the power switched on and off?
Answer - just [the same process] as [when] you turn on and off your television set

4) Is there evidence of consumption of a fuel?
Answer - yes, by an analysis. To measure the difference of mass you have to use the charge for months, because what you consume in a day is in the order of picograms

How much Ni is in the cell? Answer - In the cell there are several milligrams of Ni

How much total energy, heat and radiation, is produced per hour for a gram of Ni?

To make 10 kWh/h the consume of Ni and H is in the order of several picograms, but considering that not all the Ni in the reactor reacts, the actual consumption, to make 10 kWh/h is of about 0,1 g of Ni and 0,01 g of H

Are some other elements used to facilitate the reactions?

Yes, other elements are used, upon which we have to maintain confidentiality until the patent pending becomes a patent _from press conference as reported by Brian Wang

Videos of a recent device test can be viewed at NextBigFuture

The implications of such a device -- if the claims of an energy gain of 37 to 1 are verified -- are immense. The approach is clearly scalable. Nickel is relatively inexpensive, although other elements involved (presumably as catalysts) are likely to be more expensive.

Faux environmentalists will bemoan this news in private, given their preference for a human dieoff of up to 90% or more of the human population from "resource scarcity". Peak energy religionists would likewise rage against the fading of their great dreams of doom.

It is best to assume that the Italian solution will take many decades to develop, and to carry on with the many alternative approaches to reliable, abundant, and clean energy sources and efficient uses of energy.

Small Modular Nuclear Reactors Will Not Be Stopped

A global race is under way to develop small-reactor designs, says Paul Genoa of the Nuclear Energy Institute, an industry body in Washington, DC. He estimates that more than 20 countries have expressed serious interest in buying mini-reactors.

At least eight different approaches are being developed, mainly in America and Asia, by an army of 3,000 nuclear engineers, according to Ron Moleschi of SNC-Lavalin Nuclear, an engineering firm based in Montreal. Regulatory and licensing procedures are lengthy, so little will be built until around 2017, he says. But after that the industry is expected to take off. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) estimates that by 2030 at least 40 (and possibly more than 90) small reactors will be in operation. It reckons that more than half of the countries that will build nuclear plants in coming years will plump for these smaller, simpler designs. _Economist

Economist
Obama's Nuclear Regulatory Commission is dragging its feet on nuclear energy -- particularly on new safer, more economical reactor designs such as small modular reactors. But the world is much larger than the Obama agenda of energy starvation. In the real world, small modular nuclear reactors will find a way.

19-20 April 2011 Conference in Columbia, SC, on Small Modular Reactors:

The conference is expected to draw about 120 people from about 60 companies and agencies around the world, such as China National Nuclear Corp., the International Atomic Energy Agency and Iraq Energy Institute. Also, industry heavyweights like Westinghouse, AREVA and GE have signed up, along with the U.S. Department of Energy, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the U.S. Army and utilities across the nation.

The conference, scheduled to be held April 19-20 at the Marriott Hotel on Main Street, is sponsored by SCE&G and organized by the Carolinas’ Nuclear Cluster and Nuclear Energy Insider _thestate

SMR Conference 23-24 May 2011 Washington, DC...._ Call for abstracts


Small modular reactors can be built more quickly, safely, and cheaply in a controlled factory environment. They can then be shipped to the site for a quick and inexpensive installation -- pre-loaded with fuel and ready to hook up.

The US Navy has been powering ships safely using small nuclear reactors for many decades. One of the most likely future suppliers of SMRs to the civilian market -- Babcock and Wilcox -- just received a new $2 billion award for Naval Nuclear Reactor Components.

But then, the US military has to actually accomplish something -- unlike the civil portion of the US government which generally does no more than consume scarce resources which would be put to better use elsewhere.

2010 Crude Oil: 50 Billion Barrels Discovered, 30 Billion Barrels Used

CarpeDiem
With the price of oil hovering above $70 a barrel for over a year -- and around $90 a barrel for several weeks -- oil exploration companies can get to work discovering rich new oil fields. In 2010, more new oil was discovered than was consumed -- and we can expect that trend to continue as long as oil stays high -- above fundamentals. OPEC is sitting on considerable reserve production.

Iraq has barely begun to develop its huge fields using modern technology. Africa's rich fields are waiting for a political structure that is able to limit sabotage, theft and corruption. Mexico's leadership is finally admitting that its own graft and laziness has caused premature flagging of national oil production. Venezuela's production of its vast resources is artificially damped by an incompetent presidential boob. Russia's autocratic corruptocracy is reflected by incompetence at the oil field level -- Russian production could be much higher with competent oversight.

Bluntly put, the world is sitting on far more crude oil than it knows what to do with at this time. Human incompetence, corruption, and lack of skilled manpower and state-of-the-art equipment chokepoints contribute to the real disconnect and lag between moment-to-moment demand and instantaneous supplies.

Political peak oil: The only kind of peak oil you will ever see, except for peak demand, when oil is no longer needed.

Taken from Mark Perry's Carpe Diem blog:

Last year was a really good year for new oil discoveries, there were at least 14 major oil discoveries in Brazil alone totaling 13.5 to 26.7 billion barrels, here's a list below:

1. Well OGX-4-RUS:
100-200 million barrels
 – February

2. Well 1-OGX-3-RJS:
500-900 million barrels
 - February

3. Well 4-PM-53:
25 million barrels
 – February

4. Additions to Barracuda:
65 million barrels
 - February

5. Maastrichtian section of Well OGX-5:
30-90 million barrels
 February

6. Piranema:
15 million barrels
 - March

7. Wahoo:
300 million barrels
 - April

8. Franco:
4.5 billion barrels
 - May

9. Pipeline and Etna:-
1.4-2.6 billion barrels
 - May

10. Waimea and Fuji:
600 million-1.1 billion barrels
 - May

11. Carimbe:
105 million barrels
 - May

12. Brava:
380 million barrels
 - June

13. Libra:
3.7-15 billion barrels
 - October

14. Cernambi field at Iracema:
1.8 billion barrels
 -December

In addition, there were more than 30 billion barrels discovered in other parts of the world in 2010, including Iran, Russia, Norway(more), Mexico, Ghana, Iraq, U.S. (Texas, ND and Montana and Colorado), Falkland Islands, U.K., Angola(more) and Oman, bringing the total of new recoverable oil discoveries in 2010 to around 50 billion barrels. Brazil was the clear leader in 2010, with the oil found there representing up to half of all new global oil discoveries in 2010. With oil now selling now at close to $90 per barrel, we can expect even more discoveries in 2011.

_CarpeDiem

Nuclear Power News

Nuclear energy remains the cleanest, most reliable approach to large scale, long-term electrical power generation. Growing numbers of nuclear bloggers are contributing to the collective online knowledge of the state of the art. Here is an excerpt from the 35th Carnival of Nuclear Energy at NEINuclearNotes:

Published by the American Physical Society, Energy From Thorium highlighted a piece by Robert Hargraves and Ralph Moir where they reviewed “some of the history, potential advantages, potential drawbacks, and current research and development status of liquid-fueled reactors.”
Jack Gamble at Nuclear Fissionary took on a comment from a nuclear critic who believed that nuclear energy will leave our children with doom and gloom. In it, Jack refuted the critic who claimed that nuclear neglects the costs of its entire fuel cycle and our children will hate us for “contaminating the world.” Oy, good thing smart nuclear folks already know how to manage the fuel cycle responsibly.
At Cool Hand Nuke, Dan Yurman reported on Duke’s and Progress’ $14BN merger with a combined six Westinghouse AP1000 reactor license applications pending with the NRC. Over at his own blog, Dan reported on Areva’s monthly blogger call where CEO Jacques Besnainou said the Calvert Cliffs III reactor project is alive and well. Areva’s CEO also talked about clean energy parks and gave advice for the Blue Ribbon Commission on recycling spent nuclear fuel.

As well, at Areva’s blog you can find the latest pictures of the EPR construction of Taishan 1&2 in China (pic to the right). 
Rod Adams at Atomic Insights held a lively discussion on how even power uprates attract opposition. Two Wisconsin organizations, one claiming to be dedicated to consumer protection and one claiming to be focused on clean air and water, came together to file their opposition to NextEra Energy Resources’ proposal to increase the output at the Point Beach nuclear plant by 17%. Even though 63% of the electricity generated in Wisconsin each year comes from burning coal, these two groups claim that Wisconsin does not need any more electricity from nuclear - even if the project would not add any new facilities.
Slightly diverging from nuclear, Gail Marcus at Nuke Power Talk brought up a report from Germany saying that the explosion of solar due to “generous feed-in tariffs” is seriously stressing the country’s aging power grid. Gail’s message is that “the German experience is just the latest cautionary tale that we really need to learn to do a better job of anticipating the potential impacts of all technologies.”
_NukeCarny35@NEINN_via_NextBigFuture

Babcock and Wilcox has received a $2 billion order from the US Navy for nuclear power equipment.

Production of uranium in Wyoming is increasing. As technology moves to III and IV generation reactors, concerns about global peak uranium should fade rapidly.

Some scholars of complexity and collapse are studying nuclear reactors as a good example of highly complex systems

Brian Wang presents information discussing some of the many advantages of the liquid fuel thorium reactor (LFTR).

It will require the extinction of carbon hysteria and nuclear phobia, but eventually energy policies in the western world will return to at least semi-sanity.

Direct Conversion of Biomass to Gasoline & Diesel: GTI Hydropyrolysis

All Images via EERE (PDF)
The Gas Technoloogy Institute (GTI) is developing an advanced hydropyrolysis method for directly converting a wide range of biomass types directly to gasoline, diesel, and other high value fuels and hydrocarbons. The method is designated IH2, and utilises hydrogen scavenged from the biomass itself.  IH2 product is very low in water and oxygen, and claimed to contain 3X the heating value of standard fast pyrolysis oils.

GTI’s Integrated Hydropyrolysis and Hydroconversion (IH2) technology, which converts biomass directly into cellulosic gasoline and diesel hydrocarbon blendstocks

GTI’s IH2 technology is an advanced pyrolysis technology which utilizes low pressure hydrogen together with a proprietary catalyst to remove virtually all of the oxygen present in the starting biomass. (During the pilot IH2 project, CRI/Criterion supplied the IH2 catalyst.)

Features of the process include:

Feedstock flexible;
Fast biomass heat up maximizes liquid yield;
Hydroconversion with catalysts produces low-oxygen, low-acidity liquids;
Polynuclear aromatic components are not formed;
Self-sufficient process requires no supplemental water or hydrogen; and
High-quality renewable gasoline and diesel products are produced.

GTI says that renewable gasoline (RG) produced by the IH2 process results in more than 90% lower greenhouse gas emissions than petroleum-based fuels.

Compared to conventional pyrolysis processes this efficient, balanced approach optimizes the energy used to convert a range of non-food feedstocks into renewable transportation fuels or chemicals, according to GTI. As a result, the technology is highly flexible and is economical for both small- and large-scale applications. _GCC

The table above compares the IH2 process with two competing pyrolysis approaches for biomass to fuels.

The diagram above provides a rough scheme for hydrogen flow in the system.  The table below gives a brief step by step recipe for how the process aims to become self sufficient for hydrogen.   The project is still firmly within R&D stages.

In the race to renewable fuels-from-biomass, it appears that the thermochemical approaches of gasification and pyrolysis have roughly a 10 year head start on microbial fuels -- in terms of achieving potential to scale up to compete with petroleum infrastructure. If GTI's approach provides all the benefits promised, and is ready for scale-up in 3 years, one can almost see the price ceiling descending over the liquid fuels landscape.

Pyrolysis and gasification are much faster and simpler than most biomass to energy processes -- except direct combustion of compressed or torrefied biomass. The GTI process appears to be an important advance over standard fast pyrolysis.  GTI provides a time-to-market of roughly 3 years. That is not really such a long time to wait, given the promise.

More at EERE (PDF)

Diesel-from-Algae at $1.25 a Gallon, 10,000 Gallons an Acre?

Cost of the firm’s algal based diesel fuel is said to be $1.25/gal which permits retail pricing at or below petroleum diesel without subsidies.

Photon8 has demonstrated photobioreactor production rate equal to 1.5 gal/square meter/yr and is on its way to an expected rate of 22,000 gal per 2.5 acre/yr then to best economic units of 5 acres. It believes further development may bring it close to 10,000 gal/acre/yr as a basis for planning large production systems, according to Brad Bartilson, President & CEO, Photon, Inc, Brownsville, TX. _Ai-Online_via_BiofuelsDigest

Photon8 is a new Texas algal fuels startup, based on technology developed at UT Brownsville. The company utilises "genetically enhanced" algae, and intends to produce a "drop-in" diesel fuel which requires no blending with petro-diesel. Photon 8 claims a number of unique technologies with patents pending.

Brad Bartilson is the president and CEO of Photon8 and seems to at least talk a very good game.

Brad Bartilson, Photon8’s president and CEO, says the Traveling Wave Tube technology boosts algae growth by 500 percent, representing a major advance in the profitable conversion of algae to biofuel — "profitable" being the key word...

...He invented his own patent-pending "photo-bio reactor" in order to slash production costs. Now, Traveling Wave Tube promises to cut costs further by dispensing with limits normally imposed on algae-to-biofuel production during "degassing" and the addition of carbon to the algae. In a nutshell, algae "broth" is exposed to sunlight in order to produce oily "lipids" — the more the better. The lipids are harvested for biodiesel production.

...Photon8 has discovered how to coax more lipids out of individual algae cells through genetic manipulation...Photon8’s team has figured out a short cut, Bartilson says.

"If you’re in production what you care about is how much oil (the cells) produce a day." he says. "Now we have confirmation that these cells are producing lipids at twice the rate of a wild cell."

Despite the breakthroughs, Bartilson finds himself struggling against a perception in the algae-biofuel industry that some problems are insurmountable — including the ones Photon8 claims to have surmounted.

"It’s so frustrating for me," he says. "I feel like were fighting town hall to some extent. Those that came out first are now being looked at as the ‘forefathers.’ The mantra from these folks is nobody has solved the confounding issues — (they say) we don’t have algae that can produce at the rate we need, and second there is no growth system that can have profitability. We have those, so we have to make believers." _BrownsvilleHerald

One of the UTB professors who has been involved in the underlying academic research is Tamara Pease. Dr. Pease appears to have an eye on some critical issues involved in the production of photosynthetic organisms to fuels -- both on an immediate time scale and on a geologic time scale.

Something tells me that Dr. Pease would be reluctant to make the same claims about Photon8's "mutant algae" that Mr. Bartilson is making. It is much easier to talk about breakthroughs and "10,000 gallons an acre production" than it is to actually produce an algal based diesel-equivalent that is cost-competitive with petro-diesel.

All the same, if Photon8 can bring their fuel to market within the next 10 years, Al Fin energy analysts will be quite impressed.

More algal energy news: OriginOil is focusing more narrowly on its algae extraction process -- moving toward a continuous separation process called "Live Extraction" which preserves the viability of the algae cells after "milking", for further lipids production.
OriginOil is a a better established company than Photon8, but in a wide-open field such as algal fuels -- still in its infancy -- it is far too early to predict ultimate winners and losers.

OriginOil Extracts Oil from Algae Timelapse from OriginOil on Vimeo.

Huge Venezuelan Oil Reserves Suffer Political Peak Oil

BitToothEnergy

Jorge Pinon, an energy expert at Florida International University in Miami, said that Venezuela's state oil company has suffered from a lack of adequate technology and investment, hurting oil output in recent years.

"You can be sitting on the world's largest oil reserves but if you do not have ... capital, technology, know-how, and most important, stewardship of the enterprise," Pinon said, "they are worthless." _AP

Venezuela is sitting on over one trillion barrels of oil equivalent in heavy oils, in the Orinoco Belt. These oils can be difficult to extract, transport, and refine, but significant profits still remain to be made -- if the dull-witted dictator of Venezuela does not kill his golden-egg-laying goose.

Venezuela in the same situation as Canada, as conventional production of oil diminishes, so the rise in oil prices is making it more practical to produce the heavier oils of the Orinoco Basin, although almost all the oil from Venezuela is both heavy and sour. _BitTooth

BitToothEnergy

The largest supply of oil remaining in Venezuela is that in the Orinoco Belt, which the USGS has estimated holds a reserve of some 513 billion barrels. (Which, for reference is about twice the size of the Saudi Arabian reported reserve.) _BitTooth

BTE

These resources were known to be enormous: close to 1,200 billion barrels of oil originally in situ (between 80 and 210 billion barrels of recoverable resources, depending on the recovery factor one chooses to believe). However, they were of very poor quality, at less than 10o API (indicating low gravity/high viscosity) and a high content of sulfur and heavy metals. _PetroleumWorld

No one knows how large the Orinoco Belt resource may turn out to be. As the technology for recovering and refining heavy oils improves, the reserves are likely to grow ever larger.

Unfortunately for Venezuela, Hugo Chavez' interminable reign of error is likely to continue to alienate most foreign partners. Indigenous Venezuelan expertise under Chavez is particularly inept, so foreign assistance is virtually mandatory if the nation is ever to get a handle on the great wealth it is sitting on.

Unless Chavez is ejected, it is likely that energy technologies globally will progress to the point that most of Orinoco will never be developed.

Oil Shale Mining and Research Picking Up Steam

Estonia's largest oil shale mining company, Eesti Energia, reported the largest oil shale production figures in 18 years for 2010 - 17 million tons, up 3 million tons from the year before.

The bulk of the national power company Eesti Energia's mining subsidiary's production is used in the furnaces of the Narva power plants, which have significantly geared up electricity production due to a sharp decline in imports after the closure of Lithuania's Ignalina nuclear plant. _ERRNews

The short quote above illustrates several points. First, Estonia is using its own oil shale resources to generate electrical power -- by burning oil shale (kerogen) in furnaces to drive steam turbines -- similar to one of the ways that coal is used to generate electrical power. Second, the EU's misguided drive to shut down European nuclear plants will have the effect of increasing the use of fossil fuels use. Third, oil shale kerogens are located all over the world. Most countries are not burdened by an Obama-style energy starvation regime. They will use their fossil fuel resources if they must.

Oil shale is reported from nearly 40 countries, with the largest deposits being located in the United States, Russia and China. Middle Eastern and North African resources also are large in aggregate.

Active commercial shale oil production occurs in Estonia, Brazil and China, with total global production of shale oil about 20,000 barrels per day. Informal current and future production numbers (figure 1) indicate that shale oil is unlikely to be a significant part of global production for a decade or more.

China has set aggressive goals for production over the next two decades, and the figures for the United States could be conservative, depending on the political environment.

The United States, Jordan, Israel and Morocco are nonproducing areas likely to see future shale oil production.

The United States, with over half the estimated world resources of oil shale, remains a central focus. The current political environment encourages caution, and companies are still conducting research, development and demonstration (RD&D). _AAPG

In the US, companies can find it difficult to get permits for even the most rudimentary research into improved methods of oil shales in situ production or mining. As long as that is the case, energy producers will find it slow going to develop cleaner and more efficient methods of producing a more environmentally friendly shale oil product. In other words, should it become necessary to use this resource, we will use far more environmentally destructive processes -- thanks to the faux environmental regime of Obama - Salazar and its constraints on basic energy research.

Gigantic unconventional reserves lie virtually untapped across the planet. But the massive amounts of energy needed to get at them -- and hence, the greenhouse gases released -- is a thought that makes environmentalists bolt awake at night.

...The American Petroleum Institute right now is wracking its members' brains to figure out how to blast a substance called Kerogen from solid rock in Wyoming, Colorado and Utah. If this modern-day alchemy proves commercially viable, the United States could begin exploiting crude oil reserves three times the size of Saudi Arabia's. Just never mind that turning Kerogen into fuel requires massive energy inputs -- code for greenhouse gases -- and up to 3.2 barrels of water for each barrel of shale oil.

That hasn't stopped the parched Middle Eastern country of Jordan from signing two major project agreements in the past three years. And recent reports indicate a third is coming soon. _Tyee

Yes, Jordan is another country besides Estonia that will not hesitate to use its oil shale kerogens in whatever way will help the country survive and prosper.

...Jordan, where Royal Dutch Shell is thinking so far out it has signed a contract with the authorities that has the potential, given contract renewals and so on, to last more than 100 years, according to Mr Shaw. The contract, signed in 2009, grants Shell exclusive oil shale exploration rights to a concession area, where it already is drilling for oil shale samples, analyzing them and developing a geological model of Jordan’s deep oil shale resources. Shell says, “There is still a lot to be learnt about the geology and nature of the Jordan oil shale resources” before a decision on a commercial project can be taken.

That is true, as it is about oil shale resources globally. Nonetheless, it already seems clear why the majors have never gotten caught up in the peak oil arguments. Given all the potential source rocks out there, and the industry’s record of technologial advancements, they are a long way from pronouncing the last drop of oil has been produced. _GWPF

A Series of articles on Oil Shale from Bit Tooth Energy

A set of papers covering various symposia on Colorado Oil Shale by the Colorado Energy Research Institute

Kerogens are simply precursors to petroleum which have not been sufficiently heat and pressure treated to make the conversion to crude oil and gas. But the use of nuclear reactor heat -- to finish the job -- for in situ oil shale extraction is likely to make a big difference in global hydrocarbon resources within the next 30 years. The coming wave of small modular reactors are likely to boost oil sands production in Canada, heavy oils in Venezuela, and oil shales in the US and elsewhere -- if the energy starvationists can ever be removed from positions of power and influence.

Biomass to Butyl Esters and γ-Valerolactone (GVL)

...we have described an integrated biorefining strategy for the production of butyl esters and GVL starting from cellulose and utilizing reactive extraction of levulinic and formic acids with butene. This strategy simplifies the recovery and recycle of sulfuric acid for cellulose deconstruction and enables downstream catalytic processing in the absence of sulfur. The mixture of levulinic and formic esters, along with residual levulinic and formic acids, can be converted to an aqueous solution of GVL and 2-butanol in a single step over a dual-catalyst- bed consisting of Pd/C followed by Ru/C, in which H2 generated from FA and its ester over Pd/C is used for the reduction of LA and its ester to GVL over Ru/C.
—Gürbüz et al _GCC

GCC
Chemical engineering has barely begun to work on the problem of lignocellulosic biomass-to-energy. Up until now, the price of oil has not been consistently high enough to justify the research costs. But that is beginning to change. A team at UW-Madison is working on an approach to streamline a biomass to butene process.

The new process relies on the use of butene—produced by the decarboxylation of GVL during the process—as an extracting solvent in lieu of using alcohols, as proposed in other work. The new biorefining strategy simplifies earlier processes, is adaptable to various extraction conditions, and potentially advances the cost-effective production of alkenes from renewable lignocellulosic resources, the researchers say.

In the hunt for cost-effective, high-yield ways to convert biomass into renewable liquid hydrocarbons, one attractive approach is the controlled reduction of the oxygen content in the feedstock to produce platform chemicals that retain sufficient functionality for upgrading to a variety of useful end products (biorefining). Levulinic acid (LA) is an attractive platform molecule that can be converted to, among others, GVL.

...The new process comprises the following steps:
Production of an aqueous solution containing equimolar concentrations of LA and formic acid (FA) by hydrolysis of cellulose at 423 K (150 °C) using sulfuric acid (0.5m);

Some of the water and the FA co-product are then removed by an evaporation step to obtain a more concentrated solution of LA and sulfuric acid, containing residual amounts of water and FA.

The FA product in water is retained for downstream hydrogen production in a dual-catalyst-bed system, and the concentrated LA product is contacted with butene, generating sec-butyl levulinate (BL) and sec-butyl formate (BF) esters as major and minor products, respectively, using H2SO4 as a catalyst. The team has demonstrated that high yields, 85%, of the levulinate ester can be attained at moderate temperatures (<373 K, 100 °C) and short contact times (<120 min). Excess butene is recovered by vaporization, and the concentrated ester product is then contacted with water, during which the hydrophobic ester separates spontaneously from the aqueous phase, the latter of which retains 99% of the sulfuric acid to be recycled for use in biomass deconstruction. The BL and BF esters are subsequently processed in combination with the aqueous FA product stream (obtained from the evaporation step) using a dual-catalyst-bed in a single reactor to produce GVL in nearly quantitative yields with 2-butanol and CO2 as coproducts. The liquid effluent from this reactor, consisting of an aqueous solution of GVL and 2-butanol, can undergo decarboxylation and dehydration (of GVL and butanol, respectively) over a catalyst to obtain butene and CO2. _GCC

As more engineers, microbiologists, nanotechnologists, plant scientists, and thermodynamics experts become involved in the problem of creating renewable liquid fuels, expect to see significant progress.

The economics will take longer to catch up with the science and engineering.

In a rational energy climate, there would be more than enough coal, gas, and unconventional hydrocarbons, and nuclear energy to ride out the current storm of "political peak oil." Lacking a rational energy climate, we must hope that the energy starvation regime of Obama and company gets tangled in its own intrigues.