Dr. Willie Soon’s interview by Tucker Carlson (December 2023)

In December 2023, CERES-Science co-founder, Dr. Willie Soon, was invited to talk to Tucker Carlson about energy policy, climate change and approaches to science.

The full interview covered a lot of topics and lasted 48 minutes.

The interview was posted online on January 9th, 2024 and is available to view on Tucker Carlson’s website at the following link: https://tuckercarlson.com/the-tucker-carlson-encounter-fossil-fuels/

Or it can be viewed on Twitter/X.com at:

https://twitter.com/TuckerCarlson/status/1744777758507504061

[Update January 10th, 2024:] It can also be viewed on YouTube below:

00:01:49 Fossil Fuels in Space

00:14:27 Global Warming Throughout History

00:25:31 Outside Forces are Ruining Science

00:40:41 Evidence of God

Further reading on the topics discussed

Dr. Soon’s comments on the discussion of the origin of fossil fuels. In the first part of the interview, Tucker Carlson asked Dr. Soon some questions about the possibility that hydrocarbons (gas, oil and coal) could be produced “abiogenically” as opposed to requiring a biological source.

• For example, in a 2009 paper in Nature Geoscience, Kolesnikov and colleagues showed that under very high pressures and temperatures, methane gas can be converted into short-chained hydrocarbons (https://doi.org/10.1038/ngeo591).

• Another example they discussed was the fact that liquid methane and small-chained hydrocarbons are found in Saturn’s moon, Titan – see Mastrogiuseppe and colleagues (2019), Nature Astronomy; https://doi.org/10.1038/s41550-019-0714-2; Hayes (2016). Annual Review of Earth and Planetary Sciences. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-earth-060115-012247.

• Meanwhile, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons have also been found in Titan’s atmosphere – see Zhao and colleagues (2018), Nature Astronomy, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41550-018-0585-y.

• They also mentioned that multiple chlorinated hydrocarbons have been identified on Mars by the Curiosity rover – see Freissinet and colleagues (2015), Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets, https://doi.org/10.1002/2014JE004737.

• Finally, several studies have suggested that PAHs (Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons) can also be formed in interstellar space (i.e., deep space in between stars). E.g., Dorian S. N. Parker and colleagues (2011), Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1113827108.

But what does all of this mean?

From Dr. Soon’s perspective, it means we should be careful not to assume all of the hydrocarbons on Earth are “fossil fuels”. We do not yet know what percentage of the Earth’s hydrocarbons were formed from biological fossils and what percentage were formed from non-biological (“abiogenic”) processes.

However, it should be stressed that this does not necessarily mean that our accessible hydrocarbon reserves are limitless. As Dr. Soon pointed out the conditions Kolesnikov and colleagues (2009) showed could produce hydrocarbons abiogenically occur very deep underground – at least 50-100 miles. In contrast, the deepest oil or gas drill so far have only been 6 to 8 miles deep.

Dr. Soon also pointed out that current drills are not able to extract 100% of the oil and gas in the reserves – as the oil or gas is extracted, the pressure required to extract more becomes greater until it eventually becomes impractical to remove (with current technology, including fracking).

So, in terms of practical gas, oil and coal exploration, arguably it does not make much difference how the hydrocarbons in the known reserves were produced.

Moreover, most coal, oil and gas companies spend considerable financial resources in the exploration of new reserves. This shows that from an economic perspective, the companies that are most heavily invested in the existing reserves are actively seeking new potential sites to drill.

On the other hand, as Dr. Soon later discussed, the widespread debates over “limited resources” and “renewable energies” are often non-scientific and unrealistic.

For more details on some of the topics discussed, below is a background presentation in pdf format: