Comment by tomatocracy
7 hours ago
Both the US and the Soviet Union actually experimented with "nuclear fracking" in oil/gas fields. The Soviet Union also used atomic bombs to put out fires in gas fields as late as 1981.
7 hours ago
Both the US and the Soviet Union actually experimented with "nuclear fracking" in oil/gas fields. The Soviet Union also used atomic bombs to put out fires in gas fields as late as 1981.
My grandfather worked as the lead geologist on Project Rulison. That was the fracking shot in western CO.
Apparently the shot was quite successful as a natural gas fracking technique, but quite a bit of radon also was released.
They what?! Can we please get a link to this to read more?!
And yes, I have the same Google as you, but I'd love a link to your preferred telling of the tale of how the Soviets nuked a gas well fire just a couple years before I was born.
I recall we were seriously talking about using one during the early days of the Deepwater Horizon disaster. For a variety of reasons it wouldn’t have worked in that instance.
[1] https://www.cbsnews.com/news/report-soviets-nuked-gas-well-f...
Soviets also blew up a 140kt bomb to make a lake.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shagan_(lake,_Abai_Region)