This sounds interesting with potential.

Link from Free Republic.

From Forbes

Three years ago, Luca Technologies, a start-up in Golden, Colo., discovered that microorganisms in U.S. coal fields are converting–in real time–large hydrocarbon molecules into methane, a natural gas. The obvious entrepreneurial reaction? Harness those “bugs” and put them to work producing natural gas in underutilized oil and coal fields, decided Luca Technologies Chief Executive Robert Pfeiffer.

snip….Pfeiffer and his Preston Reynolds colleagues had the Powder River Basin coal tested and discovered that indeed, this wasn’t ancient, trapped natural gas, but newly produced methane. Anaerobic microbes–bacteria that live without oxygen–were generating the methane. Luca dubbed these microbes “geobioreactors.â€?

Luca hasn’t yet determined how many bugs it takes to produce gas. Although it’s likely to take quite a large herd, Pfeiffer believes that harnessing these geobioreactors properly could offer a long-term solution to U.S. energy needs. “So many renewable [energy solutions] require a complete change of infrastructure. Here the same well bores could be usedâ€? to mine for natural gas instead of coal or oil, he says.

Since that initial discovery in Wyoming, Pfeiffer says they’ve found these microorganisms in other fields around the U.S., namely in old oil fields, other coal fields and organic rich shale fields. His scientists are working on a process to grow more microorganisms as well as alter their metabolism to produce even more methane.

There is so much that is unknown regarding oil, coal and gas. With this in consideration could oil not be a “fossil fuel”? This is what I read in the book “Black Gold Stranglehold”.

Technorati Tags: energy alternatives, geobioreactors, renewable enegy, Luca Technology