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POPSThe 'Idle' Oil Field Fallacy or that there is not enough to justify the tremendous investment required to bring it to the surface – the company cuts its losses by moving on to more promising leases. Yet it continues to pay rent on the lease, atop a leasing bonus fee. Our companies have made tremendous strides in developing cutting-edge exploration technology. But they are not magicians. They cannot produce oil or natural gas where it does not exist. In reality, a lease is simply a block on a map, with no guarantee that it contains any resources. If all of them did, one could simply pay for the lease, haul in equipment and start pumping oil. But that only happens in fiction. Today's short-term need was yesterday's long-term opportunity. If Congress had acted on that opportunity years ago, America would not be in the energy bind it finds itself in today. Working with industry, Congress now has the opportunity to help secure America's energy future. It should not miss the chance again.
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POPSNatural 'Invisible' Gold Found In Nanoparticles “On investigation of these crystals, there appeared to be a dark band across them. However, high magnification imaging showed the band was in fact, a mass of gold nanoparticles and nanoplates. These are identical to those being manufactured in laboratories around the world for their unique properties.”
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POPSMass extinctions? Blame it on the ocean In the course of hundreds of millions of years the world's oceans have expanded and contracted in response to the shifting of the Earth's tectonic plates and to changes in climate. There were periods of the planet's history when vast areas of the continents were flooded by shallow seas such as the shark and mosasaur infested seaway that neatly split North America during the age of the dinosaurs. As those epicontinental seas drained, animals like mosasaurs and giant sharks went extinct, and conditions on the marine shelves where life exhibited its greatest diversity in the form of things like clams and snails changed as well.
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POPSSea's Ebb And Flow Drive World's Big Extinction Events Arnold I. Miller, a paleobiologist and professor of geology at the University of Cincinnati, says the new study is striking because it establishes a clear relationship between the tempo of mass extinction events and changes in sea level and sediment: "Over the years, researchers have become fairly dismissive of the idea that marine mass extinctions like the great extinction of the Late Permian might be linked to sea-level declines, even though these declines are known to have occurred many times throughout the history of life. The clear relationship this study documents will motivate many to rethink their previous views."
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POPSSand, Up Close and Personal All images are copyright 2008, Dr. Gary Greenberg. He's published a book of these. Captions for the 2nd and 3rd pics are at the bottom, sorry.
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POPSLarge methane release could cause abrupt climate change “This is a major concern because it’s possible that only a little warming can unleash this trapped methane. Unzippering the methane reservoir could potentially warm the Earth tens of degrees, and the mechanism could be geologically very rapid. Such a violent, zipper-like opening of the clathrates could have triggered a catastrophic climate and biogeochemical reorganization of the ocean and atmosphere around 635 million years ago.”
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POPSTectonic paleo-history of the earth [images] Created by Ron Blakey ; maps of the tectonic evolution of the earth's surface. Dr. Ron Blakey Professor of Geology http://www2.nau.edu/rcb7/ Rectangular Global Maps (750 x 375): http://www2.nau.edu/rcb7/rect_globe.html "These help to visualize broad historical processes in a way that is visually clear, conceptually unforgettable, and imaginatively provocative, to say the least."
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POPSRussian Stone Idols of Komi The seven "stone idols" in the upper part of the river Pechora stand alone on a wide plateau. An interesting formation considering the surrounding landscape: The writer for englishrussia.com believes they were man-made. http://englishrussia.com/?p=1911 I think they appear to be formed by nature, but the location is odd. amgumen if you see this, any ideas?
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POPSThe Jurassic Coast The nearest coast to where I lived as a boy. It sparked my interest in geology and paleontology. I was there again yesterday. Bliss!
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