[ennui2]

So you go with the AGW doom then.

When have I NOT gone with AGW doom? You never seem to be able to get a handle on my position no matter how often I restate it. If I don't predict insta-doom I'm a corny, right? You are too much of a binary thinker.

It's your opinion that warming seas will initiate the calthrate phase-change before we have a chance to mine it.

I don't know when or if it will happen, nor do I think the clathrate gun needs to fire off for our geese to be cooked anyway. So answering that question doesn't really change my views that we're screwed due to AGW. It's just a matter of how fast it happens.

You also feel compelled to suggest that the same pressurized calthrate will be brought to the surface for a merry party.

I don't see your problem with this the way you do. You don't think the FF industry won't attempt to do this? You think the public will successfully rally against it? An attempt will be made, a much more vigorous attempt than we've seen. They may fail. I'm not saying they will succeed. Just that they will attempt it. I hardly see how that is a controversial prediction.

[ennui2]

No, the FF industry will not even attempt calthrate mining. It is idiotic thing. This is too much fun. Next. Your turn ennui.

Ah, another prediction.

This is not going to be settled today. Just going to bank your predictions for later.

[ennui2]

Wrong. It is settled. It. will. never. happen. Because thermodynamics matters. Calthrates are solid at very low temperatures and high pressures at depths greater than 500 meters. But change to gas as they come to the surface.

Then break the news to the Japanese who are still working on the problem. BTW, I don't see how capturing a gas is such a non-starter when it already happens in landfills.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landfill_ ... ll_gas_use

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biogas

There is actually a tremendous amount of gas that is currently wasted.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gas_flare

"As of the end of 2011, 150 × 109 cubic meters (5.3 × 1012 cubic feet) of associated gas are flared annually. That is equivalent to about 25 per cent of the annual natural gas consumption in the United States or about 30 per cent of the annual gas consumption in the European Union.[12] If it were to reach market, this quantity of gas (at a nominal value of $5.62 per 1000 cubic feet) would be worth $29.8 billion USD.[13]"

http://www.nbcnews.com/business/energy/ ... as-n186946

Many oil drillers are unable to direct the flow of natural gas coming off wells into existing pipelines, which already are at full capacity. They have no choice but to add a flare at each site with a well. The result is nearly a third of the natural gas produced in the region is being burned to secure crude oil, and subsequently creating thousands of flares.

In a resource-strapped future, lots of gas currently just wasted like this will be captured. But the fact it is being thrown away tells you how far we really are from that dystopia.

[ennui2]

Neither landfills nor fracting flares are under 500 meters of cold arctic ocean.

Just because something's hard doesn't mean it's impossible. That appears to be a fundamental philosophical difference between the two of us. No, I do not believe that innovation can overcome the laws of thermodynamics. But I don't think the thermodynamics of the problem is intractable yet. But don't ask me to engineer a solution myself because that's not my area of expertise.

For instance, look at what is going on with reusable rocketry right now. It wasn't thought possible to launch a payload into orbit and return the main stage back in a soft vertical landing, but the Falcon 9 can do this. The physics that allows this is very narrow. Everything has to be done just right. The physical science behind it has to be just right. It's threading a needle.

Now, when you just bang on the keyboard to say this or that simply can't be done, you're taking the easy road out by throwing your hands up. But that's not how industry works.

The reason horizontal drilling happened, or tar sands, or CTL, is because someone found out a way. And there is enough of an incentive to keep trying to find more or better ways that the underlying thermodynamics are NOT a constant. That is why I said there are unknown variables. To think otherwise is to be willfully ignorant.

Again, you will fall back to mockery, the internet equivalent of sticking out your tongue. Sorry, that's not a very compelling argument.

[ennui2]

No it is not philosophy that makes us different. It is facts. I have them. You don't.

The only thing you have over me is the arrogance that your opinions (and they are only opinions) are correct.

[ennui2]

Horizontal drilling of tight-shale is hardly a better way. It was a desperate ploy to keep BAU going.

A successful one, to date. Nobody's claiming any of this is sustainable, just that it will likely be done.