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KevO
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 Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2008 1:41 pm Post subject: CRUDE OIL FOUND ON SATURN'S MOON TITAN |
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You couldn't make this up.
An announcement the very same day that they confirm water on Mars - so the oil space race is on. what a pipeline this'll be. Go China!
| Quote: | Researchers have spotted a liquid lake on Saturn's moon Titan, making that moon the first celestial body shown to have fluid on its surface. But this isn't a lake you'd want to swim in -- it's made up of ethane, one of the components of crude oil.
Scientists identified the ethane lake, which is about the size of Lake Ontario on Earth, using instruments onboard the Cassini spacecraft, NASA announced Wednesday. The orbiter has been studying Saturn and its moons since 2004.
"This is the first observation that really pins down that Titan has a surface lake filled with liquid," lead researcher Robert Brown, a professor of planetary science at The University of Arizona, said in a statement.
Scientists had long theorized that hydrocarbons like ethane might rain down on Titan's surface, creating bodies of water. Cassini spotted the lake in December, NASA said, and scientists confirmed that it was liquid ethane by studying the way it absorbed and reflected infrared light. |
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joeltrout
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| Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2008 1:45 pm Post subject: Re: CRUDE OIL FOUND ON SATURN'S MOON TITAN |
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What is the good of deep space exploration?
Wouldn't those billions of dollars be better spent inside US soil rather than Saturn and Mars?
I understand local space travel is essential for everday things like cell phones and tv but I can't figure out deep space travel.
How do they justify the cost?
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Ferretlover
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| Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2008 1:46 pm Post subject: Re: CRUDE OIL FOUND ON SATURN'S MOON TITAN |
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Just keeping that hope alive, folks. "Don't worry about running out of resources here on Earth. If we ever do run out, we'll just get whatever we need from another planet. No Sweat!" 
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KevO
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| Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2008 1:52 pm Post subject: Re: CRUDE OIL FOUND ON SATURN'S MOON TITAN |
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| Ferretlover wrote: | | Just keeping that hope alive, folks. "Don't worry about running out of resources here on Earth. If we ever do run out, we'll just get whatever we need from another planet. No Sweat!" |
Go Richard Branson! known as Dick to his friends
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Concerned
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Joined: Sep 23, 2004
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| Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2008 1:55 pm Post subject: Re: CRUDE OIL FOUND ON SATURN'S MOON TITAN |
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It would be like running a garden hose from the exhaust of your car into the interior.
But Im sure we can DO IT!! Heck imagine all the profits and growth.
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Tyler_JC
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| Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2008 2:32 pm Post subject: Re: CRUDE OIL FOUND ON SATURN'S MOON TITAN |
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If we found flawless diamonds the size of bowling balls on the moon, they wouldn't be worth harvesting based on the expenses involved.
But we are somehow going to profitably extract oil that sells for less than a dollar a pound from Titan?
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DefiledEngine
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| Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2008 2:34 pm Post subject: Re: CRUDE OIL FOUND ON SATURN'S MOON TITAN |
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What happened to the funny signature here on peakoil.com "Earth first! We'll strip mine the other planets later"?
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cualcrees
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| Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2008 2:47 pm Post subject: Re: CRUDE OIL FOUND ON SATURN'S MOON TITAN |
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| I don't understand; wasn't oil supposed to have organic origins; like from algae? What created this oil in Saturn's moon? |
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Homesteader
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| Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2008 2:54 pm Post subject: Re: CRUDE OIL FOUND ON SATURN'S MOON TITAN |
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| cualcrees wrote: | | I don't understand; wasn't oil supposed to have organic origins; like from algae? What created this oil in Saturn's moon? |
Well, what they found was ethane, not oil.
Ethane: "Atmospheric ethane results from the Sun's photochemical action on methane gas, also present in these atmospheres: ultraviolet photons of shorter wavelengths than 160 nm can photo-dissociate the methane molecule into a methyl radical and a hydrogen atom. When two methyl radicals recombine, the result is ethane:
CH4 → CH3• + •H
CH3• + •CH3 → C2H6
In the case of Titan, it was once widely hypothesized that ethane produced in this fashion rained back onto the moon's surface, and over time had accumulated into hydrocarbon seas or oceans covering much of the moon's surface. Infrared telescopic observations cast significant doubt on this hypothesis, and the Huygens probe, which landed on Titan in 2005, failed to observe any surface liquids, although it did photograph features that could be presently dry drainage channels. In December 2007 the Cassini probe found at least one lake at Titan's south pole, now called Ontario Lacus because of the lake's similar area to Lake Ontario on Earth (approximately 20,000 km²). Further analysis of infrared spectroscopic data presented in July 2008[2] provided stronger evidence for the presence of liquid ethane in Ontario Lacus.
In 1996, ethane was detected in Comet Hyakutake, and it has since been detected in some other comets. The existence of ethane in these distant solar system bodies may implicate ethane as a primordial component of the solar nebula from which the sun and planets are believed to have formed."
Ethane
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Starvid
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| Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2008 3:01 pm Post subject: Re: CRUDE OIL FOUND ON SATURN'S MOON TITAN |
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That lake must contain many, many times as much as all oil fields on earth, which if pooled would fill lake Geneva.
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emersonbiggins
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| Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2008 3:04 pm Post subject: Re: CRUDE OIL FOUND ON SATURN'S MOON TITAN |
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Is it space elevator time yet? 
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cualcrees
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Joined: May 28, 2008
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Location: Leon, Gto. Mexico
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| Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2008 3:06 pm Post subject: Re: CRUDE OIL FOUND ON SATURN'S MOON TITAN |
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| Homesteader wrote: | | cualcrees wrote: | | I don't understand; wasn't oil supposed to have organic origins; like from algae? What created this oil in Saturn's moon? |
Well, what they found was ethane, not oil.
Ethane: "Atmospheric ethane results from the Sun's photochemical action on methane gas, also present in these atmospheres: ultraviolet photons of shorter wavelengths than 160 nm can photo-dissociate the methane molecule into a methyl radical and a hydrogen atom. When two methyl radicals recombine, the result is ethane:
CH4 → CH3• + •H
CH3• + •CH3 → C2H6
In the case of Titan, it was once widely hypothesized that ethane produced in this fashion rained back onto the moon's surface, and over time had accumulated into hydrocarbon seas or oceans covering much of the moon's surface. Infrared telescopic observations cast significant doubt on this hypothesis, and the Huygens probe, which landed on Titan in 2005, failed to observe any surface liquids, although it did photograph features that could be presently dry drainage channels. In December 2007 the Cassini probe found at least one lake at Titan's south pole, now called Ontario Lacus because of the lake's similar area to Lake Ontario on Earth (approximately 20,000 km²). Further analysis of infrared spectroscopic data presented in July 2008[2] provided stronger evidence for the presence of liquid ethane in Ontario Lacus.
In 1996, ethane was detected in Comet Hyakutake, and it has since been detected in some other comets. The existence of ethane in these distant solar system bodies may implicate ethane as a primordial component of the solar nebula from which the sun and planets are believed to have formed." Ethane |
Thank you!! |
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Homesteader
Light Sweet Crude
Joined: Apr 12, 2007
Posts: 1185
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| Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2008 3:40 pm Post subject: Re: CRUDE OIL FOUND ON SATURN'S MOON TITAN |
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| Starvid wrote: | | That lake must contain many, many times as much as all oil fields on earth, which if pooled would fill lake Geneva |
Except they are saying it is ethane. Would all the ethane fields in the world fill Lake Geneva? Probably not since it would be in gaseous form.
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"The era of procrastination, of half-measures, of soothing and baffling expedients, of delays, is coming to a close. In its place we are entering a period of consequences…"
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Twilight
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Joined: Mar 02, 2007
Posts: 3076
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| Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2008 3:41 pm Post subject: Re: CRUDE OIL FOUND ON SATURN'S MOON TITAN |
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| DefiledEngine wrote: | | What happened to the funny signature here on peakoil.com "Earth first! We'll strip mine the other planets later"? |
You can buy merchandise.
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cipi604
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Joined: Aug 14, 2007
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Location: Montreal Canada
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| Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2008 4:03 pm Post subject: Re: CRUDE OIL FOUND ON SATURN'S MOON TITAN |
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| OK we have it! Ethane from Titan, but.... but oxygen from where? |
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