[Cheiron]

For all sorta engineering interested people, this might be a bit fascinating.

"Ormen Lange" is a gas field in the North Sea. The gas pocket itself is at 3000 meters below sealevel. What separates it from other oil/gas fields is that the rig is constructed at the seabed about 1000 meters (~3280 feet) below sealevel, using robots to build it (divers are not an option here), the rig parts were towed out (120 km) and installed at location after making drillholes, and is totally unmanned of course, controlled from the shore plant remotely. Long pipelines burried in the seabed take the gas to the shore plant where they used robot caterpilars to pave their way through rough and uneven seabed (like building a train track through mountains, but of course... underwater !).

here is one link with more info, if interested:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ormen_Lange_%28gas_field%29

They constructed the worlds longest offshore pipeline too from Norway to Britain in that connection
(Langeled pipeline http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langeled_pipeline ).

It is estimated that when it all goes fully operational, Norway will become the second largest gas producer in the world after Russia.

This seems to be the future for the dwindling fossile ressources. Instead of "offshore" platforms they develop "subsea" oil/gas platforms to get to the last reserves that is profitable to get at. Of course the reason it is possible now is not only that technology has advanced, but that prices on oil and gas have skyrocketed, but it is still impressive that they can do it, making an oil/gas rig 1000 meters below sealevel... well .. kinda like building in space, but space has zero pressure, plenty more pressure down there, and very challenging too.

In that connection... huge investigations are now underway from Danish and Russian side to develop "subsea" oil/gas rigs on east side of Greenland and all the way to North Pole where they think very very large layers of oil and gas seems to be waiting, if it is possible to get at it.

On a note, "Troll A" is biggest gas rig in north sea, an "offshore" platform mounted on huuuge concrete pillars, impressive in itself, and the largest movable building ever made (pillars equal 15 Eiffel Towers or so in iron for reinforcing the concrete and weighs 656.000 tons, totally it all weighs 1.2 million tons... and yes... they towed that out 80 km to the location.)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troll_A_platform

Oh well... it fascinates me, bare with me
_________________
Cheiron
______________________________
"Any scientist with respect for himself should start
the day by rejecting his own pet hypotheses".
(Konrad Lorenz)

"Wir müssen wissen
Wir werden wissen"
(David Hilbert)

[Cheiron]

In above post I mentioned the arctic sea research that is going on to find oil, gas and minerals. Here's a follow up.

Some scientists estimates that a quarter of the worlds oil ressources may be lurking in the arctic sea, so the nations that border it, USA, Canada, Denmark (Greenland), Norway and Russia are all interested in claiming the North Pole as their territory. Nobody knows yet if there is oil though.

In 1994 UN formed an international searights-convention, to establish territorial demands for coastal countries. Nations have until 2014 to provide data to UN to extend their claims of ownership beyond the 200 seamile border.

The criterias for a nation are rather complex, but it involves providing sufficient data about the extent the continental socket goes beyond 200 seamiles and how thick and old the light seabottom sediment is.

Recently Denmark made first of three scheduled expeditions to the north of Greenland to claim the North Pole. The expedition made measurements from north of Svalbard, up towards Northpole, and into the Lincoln Sea.

Using the swedish ice-breaker "Oden" the expedition performed gravity, sonar and seismic measurments of the seabottom under very difficult conditions, due to the hydrophone cable that needs to extend far behind the ship, costs a bunch of money and can break easily if it gets caught in the ice. It was actually first surface expedition that far north. Eventually they came into up to 4 meter thick ice, and got help to pave the way from the worlds largest ice-breaker, the russian nuclear powered "NS 50 Let Pobedy".

Pobedy video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VVtDX46cTJQ

Oden video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7w5LrFx-wdY&feature=related

Pessimistic climate researchers estimate that oilrigs might be possible in around 2030 due to the global warming. There has been found "asphalt" like lumps of oil on surface level of Greenland, so it indicates there are sediment enough to have formed oil layers. Also, technically it will eventually be possible to use multibeam sonars to find the oilpockets even from a plane.

It will be interesting to see what comes out of it all... so far the research indicates that Denmark can claim the North Pole as ours, but it craves more investigation and the final acceptance from UN based on the data provided.

So ... humm maybe us danes will own the North Pole... oil is fine I guess, if it is there at all... otherwise, I dunno what we can do with it...maybe put up a Santa franchise of some sort, rent out some polar bears, sell icecubes, charge a fee for using a magnetic compass or whatever lol,... but I will certainly not go there for a vacation

PS: I'm pondering some sort of scheme for an alternative for male emperor penguins from Antarctica btw... when they have to go and protect the eggs.. can fly them there, provide lots of restaurants for them serving fresh fish, day-care for the eggs, some female penguin go-go dancers etc....
_________________
Cheiron
______________________________
"Any scientist with respect for himself should start
the day by rejecting his own pet hypotheses".
(Konrad Lorenz)

"Wir müssen wissen
Wir werden wissen"
(David Hilbert)