[syllablehq]

Very cool research. On the topic of hydrogen deep underground: I'm not an expert, just a fascinated amateur, but I've been fascinated by the recent discovery that there is enormous amounts of hydrogen below the earth. In fact, this article mentions hydrogen forming by serpentinization, and says that the researchers were shocked to find so much hydrogen. Recent research indicates that hydrogen may exist deep in the earth from processes other than serpentinization as well. There are now a handful of companies working to extract this natural hydrogen to use as a source of green energy. Exciting stuff.

This is an excellent research overview on the topic of "natural" geologic hydrogen https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S00128...

I've also compiled some of my own notes on that paper here which provide some summaries on the multiple fascinating sub-topics. (E.G. hydrogen may be a driver of earthquakes! And we may be able to use hydrogen samples to predict earthquakes! Some predict that there may be even more biomass under the earth driven by sources like hydrogen and methane than there is above ground!) https://docs.google.com/document/d/1pnW4HRq6E2up0DhIoxjCyGS6...

[pixl97]

If the Earth didn't have a huge internal geological reserve of hydrogen (and other gaseous chemicals) we'd effectively be a dead planet. It's easy to lose hydrogen to space, which is one reason we don't see much of it in the atmosphere. When we start talking about geologic timescales it would lead to the disassociation and lose of almost all atmospheric gasses. Luckily we have the tectonic plate cycle that puts new gasses in the atmosphere and kicks our eventual extinction down the road a bit farther. This also leads to earth shrinking over these very long time periods.

[jl6]

Let’s hope we don’t find and extract so much subterranean hydrogen that we burn it into water and cause sea level rise.

[random_ind_dude]

It will probably increase the concentration of water vapor in the atmosphere, which will lead to further warming as water vapor absorbs the heat radiated by Earth.

[coder543]

Don’t forget that oxygen is useful for breathing too. Semi-important, I hear.

ChatGPT estimates that if we converted all of earth’s atmospheric oxygen into water (via burning with hydrogen), ocean levels would rise about 3.7 meters: https://chat.openai.com/share/c9c8ce51-6070-49b6-a092-86e4a4...

I don’t have time to check this math, so take it with a substantial grain of salt.