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Thermal cracking of kerogens and bitumens is widely accepted as the major source of natural gas (thermal gas). Decomposition is believed to occur at high temperatures, between 100 and 200°C in the subsurface and generally above 300°C in the laboratory. Although there are examples of gas deposits possibly generated at lower temperatures, and reports of gas generation over long periods of time at 100°C, robust gas generation below 100°C under ordinary laboratory conditions is unprecedented. Here we report gas generation under anoxic helium flow at temperatures 300° below thermal cracking temperatures. Gas is generated discontinuously, in distinct aperiodic episodes of near equal intensity. In one three-hour episode at 50°C, six percent of the hydrocarbons (kerogen & bitumen) in a Mississippian marine shale decomposed to gas (C1–C5). The same shale generated 72% less gas with helium flow containing 10 ppm O2 and the two gases were compositionally distinct. In sequential isothermal heating cycles (~1 hour), nearly five times more gas was generated at 50°C (57.4 μg C1–C5/g rock) than at 350°C by thermal cracking (12 μg C1–C5/g rock). The position that natural gas forms only at high temperatures over geologic time is based largely on pyrolysis experiments under oxic conditions and temperatures where low-temperature gas generation could be suppressed. Our results indicate two paths to gas, a high-temperature thermal path, and a low-temperature catalytic path proceeding 300° below the thermal path. It redefines the time-temperature dimensions of gas habitats and opens the possibility of gas generation at subsurface temperatures previously thought impossible.
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Marine and Petroleum Geology
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