The technology used in the PlayStation 3 is being used to help explore and find oil much faster than before. Woohoo!
Using IBM technology, specifically the IBM PowerXCell 8i, which was originally developed for the Sony Playstation, a Spanish Oil company reports that specialized "Cell" microprocessors are speeding the search for oil and natural gas reserves located 30,000 feet below the Gulf of Mexico up to 6 times faster than current technology. Repsol and the Barcelona Supercomputing Center are using a process known as Reverse Time Migration (RTM), a sophisticated subsurface imaging tool accepted by the oil industry.
It has proven essential for imaging areas of complex subsurface geological structure, such as the rich hydrocarbon provinces of the deep waters of the Gulf of Mexico, offshore Brazil and West Africa. These basins are the new frontiers in oil exploration, where significant oil reserves are present below thick masses
of salt that have made seismic imaging difficult. But the new technology
will accelerate and streamline oil and gas exploration in these promising regions by several orders of magnitude compared to current industry
methods.
Great! Now we just need to network up the millions of PS3s around the world to assist in oil exploration and we'll have this high oil price problem licked in no time!
Of course, just because we find it doesn't mean we can 'drill' for it. Darned extreme environmentalists! Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf of Mexico and last I checked not a drop of oil was spilled by any of the oil platforms in the Gulf. And don't get me started on ANWR and offshore oil drilling.
Anyway, the project is sponsored by oil and gas company Repsol and the Barcelona Supercomputing Center. The U.S. Department of the Interior's Minerals Management Service estimates that these ultra deep Gulf waters holds approximately 56 billion barrels of oil equivalent (oil and natural gas), which, at $130/barrel, would be worth over $7 trillion and would meet the entire U.S. demand for oil and gas for about five years.
Sounds too good to be true, especially with the Democratic party blocking any attempts to drill for oil in U.S. territories. Then again, it's a Spanish company doing the oil drilling and not the U.S., which apparently is beholden to extreme enviro-wacko views even though the vast majority of Americans want us to drill. Heck, even the Chinese will be drilling in the Gulf of Mexico. ABTUSACD (Anybody But The USA Can Drill) apparently. Well, if you believe oil is bad and causing global warming, I have news for you --- China and other countries are doing to drill off the coast of the U.S. anyway.
Check out the funny The No Zone chart displayed on the U.S. Senator floor to show Congressional stonewalling.
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