CompuServe Messages

Mike: <<spent a lot of money to drill a well in a place where one would expect oil according to the latter theory (don't think he found anything though). (This is from a vaguely remembered PBS show.)>> This same group drilled a similar well in the summer of '94, here in Alberta, Canada (the well–at least one, possibly two–you refer to was drilled in Sweden), into granitic basement rocks underlying or adjacent to the Athabaska Tar Sands, one of the world's biggest petroleum accumulations. Compared to the media hype built up prior to the drilling of this well, the follow-ups have been notable in their absence. The grapevine has it that hydrocarbons were, if not completely absent, spectacularly negligible. So far, the "inorganic origins" theory seems to have little empirical evidence to support it, while the very extensive laboratory work such as that mentioned by Bob Easterly continues to point to an organic origin. As in all controversies, "proof" is in the eye of the beholder: last I heard, the Flat Earth Society was still going strong. Howard