Fall 2005: Jackson School People & Science Featured in the Media

Fisher sees changes but surely no peak in 2005 outlook

Geotimes, December 2005
Political events and natural disasters might interrupt world oil supplies, but lack of resources and production capability should not, reports Bill Fisher, dean of the Jackson School, in his end-of-year energy outlook. Fisher recaps prospects for methane, coal, nuclear and other resources. "Fossil fuels will continue to be the dominant global energy sources well into this century, but the mix will change with coal and oil steadily having less of a role and natural gas more, as the methane economy comes into full play," writes Fisher. Despite this historic shift, he dismisses concerns of imminent "Peak Oil," citing the strong reserves outlooks calculated by IHS Energy and increased production capacity foreseen by Cambridge Energy Research Associates.
Read Fisher's energy outlook at Geotimes.

Austin appears in America's Tsunami: Are We Next?

Discovery Channel, Dec. 18
The deadly wave that shook the world Dec. 26, 2004, caused the deaths of more than 280,000 people. "America's Tsunami: Are We Next?" followed an international team of scientists, including the Institute for Geophysics' Jamie Austin, for 17 days as they used remotely operated vehicles to explore the raw power of the earthquake through what it left behind on the ocean floor.
Learn more about the show. or watch video excerpts online.

Hovorka explains benefits of carbon sequestration

NPR Marketplace, Dec. 9, 2005
Carbon sequestration is gaining new attention as a technology that might combat global warming. "CO2 is a powerful solvent," said Bureau of Economic Geology scientist Susan Hovorka, who explained how compressed CO2 can also be used to extract oil. Gary Rochelle of UT's Department of Chemical Engineering also weighed in on the costs and economic hurdles to transporting CO2.
Listen to the Marketplace Report.

Texas to try for futuristic power plant

Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Dec. 8, 2005
Texas will compete for a $1 billion experimental fossil-fuel plant called FutureGen, a program formally announced Tuesday by U.S. Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman. In its last regular session, the Texas Legislature appropriated $2 million to nominate a Texas site for the plant. Scott Tinker, chairman of the Bureau of Economic Geology at the University of Texas at Austin, is heading a selection committee.
Access story at the Star-Telegram archives (fee required).

Oil Industry needs engineers, courts retirees, students

Bloomberg, Dec. 7
U.S. producers and contractors are working harder to keep their oldest employees and recruit college graduates because there aren't enough new engineers to go around. The present personnel crunch was influenced by the 1980s oil bust, explained William Fisher, dean of the Jackson School. "It's hard for a kid in Houston not to know somebody who's been laid off," Fisher said.
Read the Bloomberg story.

Blankenship and Holt complete map of WAIS underside

BBC News, Dec. 6, 2005
British and US scientists have produced a remarkable map of the underside of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS). "These data are critically important," said Don Blankenship from the University of Texas (UT), Austin. "Without them we wouldn't be able to asses the contribution of the WAIS to global sea level rise." Aircraft had to fly up and down some 50,000miles of grid lines in the two months from December 2004. "It was a remarkable job to complete it all in the one season," said co-principal investigator Jack Holt, also from UT.
Read the BBC story.

Already No. 1: Football isn't only top UT unit

Austin American-Statesman, Nov. 25
Confirming that sports teams are not the only top-ranked programs at UT Austin, the American-Statesman interviewed faculty leaders from petroleum engineering, Latin American studies, accounting and geosciences. Clark Wilson, chairman of the Department of Geological Sciences, explained the school's strategies for maintaining the country's No. 1-ranked program in sedimentology and stratigraphy.
Read the American-Statesman story (free registration required).

Report on demise of New Orleans is off the water mark

New Orleans Times Picayune, Nov. 22
Geologist Tim Kusky of St. Louis University aroused the ire of many Louisianans when he appeared on "60 Minutes" predicting that in 90 years New Orleans will be 15 to 18 feet below sea level with enormous levees protecting it from the Gulf of Mexico. A group of experts, including the Jackson School's Chip Groat, told the New Orleans Times Picayune that Kusky's analysis was exaggerated and that it misconstrued some of the crucial factors facing citizens and policy makers who want to rebuild the region.
Read the Times-Picayune story (free registration required).

Image problems lead to worker shortage in oil industry

C-Net News.com, Nov. 22
Oil and gas companies are in the midst of a personnel crisis, according to several speakers and attendees at the International Petroleum Technology Conference last week in Doha, Qatar. Underscoring the serious nature of the problem, Scott Tinker, director of the Bureau of Economic Geology, cited figures showing a two-decade decline in enrollment in U.S. geosciences degree programs.
Read the C-New News story.

Bureau aerial surveys track Hurricane-influenced receding along Texas coast

The Beaumont Enterprise, Nov. 21
In addition to its human toll, Hurricane Rita leveled sand dunes and ate away at Southeast Texas and Southwest Louisiana beaches, thinning their defense against the Gulf of Mexico. A major concern "is with how much the shoreline has been retreating," said Jim Gibeaut of the Bureau of Economic Geology. Gibeaut and colleagues conducted aerial surveys of sections of the Texas and Louisiana coasts just 12 days after Rita. They are now analyzing the data in comparison to pre-Rita surveys—results will be available in January.
Read the Beaumont Enterprise story.

For more information, contact J.B. Bird, Jackson School of Geosciences, jbird@jsg.utexas.edu, 512-232-9623.