Jim Scherrer
Scherrer Resources, Inc., Exton, Pa

Fossil fuel (the term that is) is obsolete; paleosolar does a much better job at defining the modern energy in today’s world.

The term “Fossil Fuel” is a fossil itself; a relic of the past. Adoption and use of the term “fossil fuel” was a prior attempt to define in a few words an entire class of energy sources.

The term “fossil fuel” has been around so long that everyone has forgotten where it comes from and thus within the light of the newest energy concepts, this term has now become obsolete.

A Utica Shale core sample from Fossil Creek, Ohio where several successful horizontal wells have been drilled.

The modern preferred term is “paleosolar” as the energy source is in fact solar energy, not the fossils themselves.

Paleosolar energy includes a broad range of hydrocarbons whose earliest activation energy was the sun’s broad spectrum of radiation which created and sustained single and multiple-cell life forms.

Fossil fuel is a long overused, general term for buried combustible geologic deposits of organic materials, formed from decayed plants and animals that have been converted to crude oil, coal, natural gas, or heavy oils by exposure to heat and pressure in the earth’s crust over hundreds of millions of years.

The term fossil fuel has now become a fossil and is ripe for an upgrade.

Here’s why:

• Fossils are not the same as energy
• It’s more than a fuel; it’s a broad range of products
• Current industry thinking has moved beyond this archaic terminology

Paleosolar energy as a fuel is generated when organic matter from the total organic carbon (TOC) component in sedimentary rocks – such as shales – is sufficiently high. These geologic environments permit cost effective extraction from which fuel and products ultimately result.

Furthermore, the term “paleosolar” energy is the only term that captures the essence of the fuel given the characteristics of the creation process of the fuel supply and it’s future.

Here’s why this is the best newest term:

• Clear and straightforward term
• Easy to remember
• Simple, unambiguous concept

Our energy sources are all solar in nature making the sun our most important life-sustaining source. The oil used mainly for transport, natural gas used mainly for heating, and coal used mainly for electricity are all solar energy at inception.

The reason why this is now coming to the fore is because the world is on a path to ever more educated ways of discovering, harvesting and using energy sources; and the understanding that the source is the sun offers a better and more honest description of the energy itself. In this connected world with UBER, Google and cloud computing; this over-arching connection to the sun is a more accurate portrayal. And, now with the more rapid exploration and harvest of the abundance of energy within organic rich black shales, the time is ripe for updating the terminology.

Combining paleo (ancient geologic) and solar (sun) into one term, paleosolar, is the clearest definition for our modern energy world.

Editor’s Note: Natural gas is a concentrated form of solar energy, a point that needs to be understood better by the general public. More education on that score is needed. A much more detailed explanation may be found here.