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Oil from stones
A CONTROVERSIAL study now claims that oil comes from old rocks and not from dead plants and animals as widely known. Though it has always been believed that oil could also be produced from inorganic sources like rocks, this study summarily disregards the organic origin of oil from dead plants and animals. According to American researchers who run oil exploration firms, petroleum forms from rocks under high pressure which is prevalent only at great depths not less than 100 km.
The textbook view of oil formation is that organic matter gets trapped in sediments. Microbes convert this organic matter to hydrocarbons at about 75-200 degrees centigrade. This process takes many million years and is typically restricted to depths not deeper than 6 km.
Researchers have now produced hydrocarbons in their laboratory by heating a mixture of iron oxide, marble and water at 900 degrees centigrade with high pressure. However controversial the claims are, they nevertheless open up new vistas in oil exploration.
A rosy picture of forest loss
THERE IS piece of good news for all environmentalists — the high rate of deforestation happening around the world may be a little exaggerated. Rainforests are not disappearing at the rate suggested by UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation. The new finding comes based on high-resolution satellite images, focusing on just the deforested hotspots during the 1990s. The study was undertaken by the European Commission's Global vegetation Monitoring Unit in Italy along with experts from India, Latin America, Africa and South East Asia. This team selected 100 sites considered as deforestation hotspots spread over three continents and found nearly 23 per cent less deforestation compared to FAO's data. A word of caution though: this work is based on a small sample area and the results obtained in this study may not be right when done on a global scale. The NASA's Landsat Pathfinder project may put an end to the confusion.
Compiled From New Scientist
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