China To Tap Combustible Ice As New Energy Source 185
lilbridge writes "Huge reserves of "combustible ice" — frozen methane and water — have been discovered in the tundra of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau in China. Estimates show that there is enough combustible ice to provide 90 years worth of energy for China. Burning the combustible ice may be a far better alternative than letting it just melt, releasing tons of methane into the air."
Re:well yeah, (Score:5, Interesting)
I'd tap that.
Actually, this is both interesting and apparently fits into the "suddenOutbreakOfCommonSense" category. If you ask me, it seems perfectly logical to not only stop it floating up into the air as it would do otherwise, but to also get power out of it.
Seems too good to be true. I wonder what the downside is.
Re:the downside... (Score:4, Interesting)
I like to admire the Asian tundra on Google Earth, and think about what a paradise it must be for mosquito predators, birds and such. I guess now we will be trying to discover how much environmental degradation is required to crash that eco-system. Too bad.
Re:well yeah, (Score:2, Interesting)
I wonder what the downside is.
One downside is that they will be stealing it from occupied Tibet.
So Is This Why China Insists That Tibet is Theirs? (Score:3, Interesting)
90 Years worth of energy for the nation with the largest population in the world seems like sufficient cause for China to claim that Tibet is part of China and always has been etc, despite the fact that it has been independant for much of its history (although its also been occupied by one power or another for much of the rest of that history of course).
If Tibet had its independence this would be a terrific resource for the country to take advantage of in modernizing itself. As it stands I am sure it will be used for Chinese benefit and not Tibetan.
What about liberation time? (Score:2, Interesting)
Another world (Score:3, Interesting)
It occupies an area of around 1,000 by 2,500 kilometers, and has an average elevation of over 4,500 meters.
The plateau is a high-altitude arid steppe interspersed with mountain ranges and large brackish lakes. Annual precipitation ranges from 100 mm to 300 mm and falls mainly as hailstorms. The southern and eastern edges of the steppe have grasslands which can sustainably support populations of nomadic herdsmen, although frost occurs for six months of the year. Permafrost occurs over extensive parts of the plateau. Proceeding to the north and northwest, the plateau becomes progressively higher, colder and drier, until reaching the remote Changthang region in the northwestern part of the plateau. Here the average altitude exceeds 5,000 meters (16,500 feet) and year-round temperatures average -4C, dipping to -40C in winter. As a result of this extremely inhospitable environment, the Changthang region (together with the adjoining Kekexili region) is the least populated region in Asia, and the third least populated area in the world after Antarctica and northern Greenland.
Wow, a Class L planet.
Comment removed (Score:3, Interesting)
Oh and one other thing about the methane (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:So Is This Why China Insists That Tibet is Thei (Score:5, Interesting)
The combustible ice is merely a practical concern. As such, it's basically unimportant compared to the extremely vital matter of Never Losing Face Ever, which is probably the single most important core value in far-eastern culture. Not losing face is more important than life itself and *far* more important than minor things like a few petawatt-hours of energy.
You have to understand, if Tibet hadn't always been part of China, that would imply that the "liberation" of Tibet in the mid-twentieth century was an aggressive action, not a peaceful one, and that the PROC government acted in bad faith (especially as regards the Seventeen Point thing). Admitting such a thing would be an unfathomable loss of face and an unconscionable disgrace to every Chinese person. It would be better for the entire nation to commit ritual suicide than to allow such a thing to be said.
Re:So when was our environment methane? (Score:3, Interesting)
There may be other ways it could have happened.
Just for example, if an insulative ice cap formed overtop a mass of biomatter (say, a bog) that was otherwise still warm enough to decompose, possibly with some water in between, you could end up with a mixture of methane and water ice forming below the ice cap as the whole thing cooled. A few thousand years later, melt off the top layer of ice, and you've got combustible ice exposed to the surface.
There may be other possible formation scenarios as well.
I thought China's population is to decline? (Score:3, Interesting)
"and will have a population of about 1.5 billion"
I thought I remember reading projections somewhere, which indicate that China's population is soon supposed to begin a pretty rapid decline, due to several decades of 'birth control' measures imposed by the government? Contributing even further to that, I had heard that there is a large imbalance in the population ratio between males and females, because, since parents were limited to one child, many of them chose to abort girls and 'try again' until they had a boy? Because of the predominance of males, there are fewer females to become pregnant and birth the next generation, further contributing to long-term population decline?
Shouldn't those things be starting to have an effect 20 years from now?
Re:I thought China's population is to decline? (Score:2, Interesting)
And even funnier such strict controls on birth are not applied on other ethnic groups - for example, Tibetans.
Now, someone please tell me how do we (yes I'm ethnic Han) colonize some inhospitable place while the Han population is rapidly aging and declining?
And who wants to move to somewhere that is cold, inhospitable, underdeveloped and filled with relatively unfriendly people?
Re:Infinite energy! (Score:3, Interesting)
You inadvertantly described the flaw with fuel cell cars.
You have water, and you crack it to make hydrogen, which makes the cars roll down the road. Sounds great doesn't it? But where does the energy come to crack the water? ----- Often the response is "just use solar" and that's fine, but if we have solar why not simply use the electricity directly in the car or house or other device? There's no need to add the additional water/hydrogen step.
Alternatively we could just use the same liquid fuel as we have now. Use solar electricity for everything else, but keep cars as they are now. We've got 10,000 years worth of coal laying around that could be liquefied into diesel fuel, and pumped into one of those new Volkswagen commuter cars at 250 MPG. These cars are so clean the pollutant can't be measured.
Re:Solving the wrong prbolem (Score:3, Interesting)
How many kids did your great-grandparents have? Do you think they wanted the 'extras' because they were going to need extra workers in a decade or two, or maybe so that the kids would support them in their old age? Oh, that's right, we're talking about BROWN people, they don't love having children around the house as much as we do.
Think for 30 seconds. Even better, get to know someone who grew up in the Third World.
Re:I thought China's population is to decline? (Score:3, Interesting)
To answer the parent post: Yes, China's population WILL decline but it is still coasting upwards (all the people who were born before the "1 child" policy have yet to die). It is going to peak at about 1.5 billion around 2020 (and India's population will go soaring by it. Poor India). I did a little population research using (our friend) Mr. Google, if you doubt me it's your turn.
Next, you are right, China will *then* rapidly age unless they remove/have removed the "1 child" policy. Of course the technocrats who run China seem very competent for these kind of social planning issues (I think Time called them "the Harvard Alumni Association with an Army"), will have done so or figured out a way of keeping the population from a catastrophic decline (how about cloning? how about cloning women to make up for the gender imbalance?). Of course, even if the ethnic Chinese population did "crash", it would probably be a long long time before they become a "minority within their own country" like whites will be become in the U.S. (2050?).
Finally, please Google "chinese Tibet incentives" and you will see many articles (of unknown quality) describing the various incentives offered to ethnic Chinese who migrate to Tibet. From the gist of them it appears as if many millions (tens of millions?) have taken the government up on the offer(s). Also there are the "development" projects that, while presumably raising the Tibetan standard of (material) living, have made it much easier for ethnic Chinese to move into and about Tibet (airports/highways/railroads). I'm thinking of taking the China-Tibet railway myself!
Anyway, if you want to hear just one person's view on what has happened, just read the comment below by Apparition-X (617975).
To recap: 1) China's population will increase and peak about 1.5B around 2020 before declining. (So by your argument there is near-term large population GROWTH in addition to the already high population density). 2) In addition, the Chinese government has been actively promoting the large scale emigration of ethnic Chinese into Tibet. 3) It has been quite "successful" 4) Some people think it has been very devastating to the Tibetan people and culture.
Re:ANWR (Score:3, Interesting)
It looks like this article is referring to the Tibetan Plateau, more steppe than tundra, and even more sensitive to environmental damage. This stuff does not recover quickly from disturbance. And every bug IS sacred if you think your grandchildren might want to watch birds that migrate. The oceans are quite vast, yet it is distinctly possible we may have already permanently altered the entire system by polluting breeding areas and depleting or extirpating key species.
I've not yet been to Alaska, but I got out of the car once in Minnesota to get a better look at a moose. I then managed to fight my way back to the car through the solid masses of mosquitoes before being fatally exsanguinated. I pity anyone who takes a job at this nightmare.