PS3's Cell processor helps locate oil

by Alan Tsang { Jul 1st 2008 at 12:00PM }

Besides the Roadrunner and our beloved PS3, the Cell processor can now add another task it can do into its repertoire. Repsol, one of the world's ten largest oil companies, is employing the use the of the Cell processor, more specifically the PowerXCell 8i variant on a BladeCenter QS22 computer, to "analyze undersea rock formations in the search for untapped reserves." An analyst commented that 75% of the reserves are in deep water, which are 30,000 feet below and are estimated to hold 56 billion barrels of oil. This amount would meet the entire U.S. demand for oil and gas for about five years. The use of a technique called reverse time migration will allow Repsol to survey regions as much as six times faster and reach areas that were inaccessible before.

What do you guys think about this? Will this lower gas prices somewhere far, far away from $5 a gallon? Are you going to mod your PS3 to start drilling for oil in your backyard? Ah, the possibilities...

Tags: cell-processor, sony, supercomputer

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Mo @ Jul 1st 2008 12:10PM

screw folding!!! Find daddy some gas!!

Nate @ Jul 1st 2008 12:13PM

The question is, how much does it cost to find, get to, and bring back a barrel of oil from 30,000 feet under the sea?

Is it just me, or is it really poignant that this HUGE undersea reserve would only last us FIVE YEARS. Then what?

The government needs to pour money and manpower into alternative fuels NOW. That includes nuclear as well as clean power like solar and wind.

Popfrogs @ Jul 1st 2008 12:30PM

Yeah, the US is in dire need of energy reform. We need a buttload of new nuclear plants for clean(ish) power, electric cars, and a universal ban on SUVs and other vehicles that get less than 20mpg.

Also I'd like to see more funding going into public systems like trains. There's no excuse for us not to have a high speed rail between all major cities.

Jerses @ Jul 1st 2008 1:05PM

or... retry "mission irak" but this time take the precious oil :D don let them burn it. Or try to steel it from us mexicans like france did ages ago but this time make an excuse like...war or something.

Ishimaru @ Jul 1st 2008 1:11PM

It's pronounced nucular.

Averna @ Jul 2nd 2008 8:07AM

"This amount would meet the entire U.S. demand for oil and gas for about five years."

Errr then what? The entire world needs to put more effort into alternate energy sources rather than all of this short sightedness BS thats going on.

MexicanTerrorist @ Jul 1st 2008 12:14PM

Oil sucks.

The Aggie CEO @ Jul 1st 2008 12:18PM

yea I'd love the have the Cell processor they are using put into my PS3.......

maxpontiac @ Jul 1st 2008 12:24PM

Tell me how to get my PS3 to do that..

Peter Graham @ Jul 1st 2008 12:26PM

They should develop a program like folding, more an more distributed computing projects on the Playstation 3 would be good. Just so the community has a choice. Also regardless if we start developing new greener technologies, we will still need gas and oil for hundreds of years yet, all the cars wont instantly be converted to a greener source and more oil and prospect of finding more pretty much benefits everyone. Also the technology needed could also then be used for applications like geo thermal energy.

ben @ Jul 1st 2008 12:36PM

its the car driving, oil finding, cancer curing, server hosting shiny black box

TheBaByBLuEdeViL @ Jul 1st 2008 12:45PM

I sure wish gas was $5 a gallon in the UK. Here it's $10 (£5) but that's somehow better than the US :S. People here would kill for £2.50 a gallon and still America complains.

Phileoca @ Jul 1st 2008 12:56PM

Put that cell processor in my Mustang! :-)

Jasper @ Jul 1st 2008 1:23PM

That is the thing. We actually do kill people to keep our gas cheap.

Popfrogs @ Jul 1st 2008 2:11PM

For the thousandth time, you Euros can't whine about gas because the EU taxes the hell out of it. If you want it cheaper, get the EU to lower the tax. Same goes for the English.

Barndo111 @ Jul 1st 2008 1:12PM

Yeah, America just stop driving everywhere. Walk your fat a**es to more places. Complain to your government that planned your cities so everyone is required to HAVE a car. Thanks jerks. I wish more people would use the bus in my city..

The Gamestop I go to is just a simple bus ride away.

As an aside, I've always wondered what happens to the cavities in the earth that once contained the oil. Do they just cave in? I apparently need to read up on this..

Mo @ Jul 1st 2008 1:38PM

I walk to gamestop, its about 1/2 a mile.

*throws Nose up*

is that bus running on clean fuel?

Mo @ Jul 1st 2008 1:38PM

oh, and im american as apple pie

rob @ Jul 1st 2008 3:02PM

I think it's a misconception that we are lacking oil. The oil crisis can't happen this suddenly if the problem is a lack of oil. The problem is that Wall Street works like ebay. It's basically an auctionhouse. Oil is a product that's auctioned off every second. Companies such as Shell participate in the auctioning of oil. So that, when Shell raises the price of the oil by bidding at a higher price, the overall gas price goes up because then every gas company has to raise the price or else Shell would own a monopoly on oil. To clarify: Say there's 1 barrel of oil available for auction today. Normally, that barrel is worth $1. So the base price of the auction is $1. Then Shell bids $2. Now that barrel will go to the highest bidder, which is now at $2. Same situation, but with 10 barrels at $1 each. Now Shell bids $2 for each barrel. Other companies are forced to also bid $2 or else the oil drilling company would sell all of their oil to Shell for $2. Then Shell would have monopoly on the oil. It is this tumbling of higher bidding that's causing the rise in gas prices. It has little to do with the quantity supplied because the gas companies would still raise the bids to try and own all of the oil.

One of the solution to prevent this would be a heavy international tax agreed by every country to place on their gas companies if they were to raise the bid any more. So that for every $ that's above the hypothetical normal $1, the gov can charge a 99% tax to discourage the raising of bids. And if gas companies still raise prices, the gov can use that tax and give the money back to the people. Another solution would be to place an international price ceiling on how much gas can actualy go up, thus forcing the price to go down.

Popfrogs @ Jul 1st 2008 2:31PM

The real solution is to kick the jackass spectulators and hedge fund managers out of the commodity market for fuel/energy. They're the ones using the Chicken Little tactics to get prices higher every day. Not only that but the deflated dollar makes it attractive to overseas buyers. Bring the dollar back up to parity, kick the paper traders out, oil will fall back to ~$60 per barrel, which is what it's actually worth.

Ben @ Jul 1st 2008 2:45PM

This is incorrect. Oil is priced based on supply and demand. Speculators can't change the supply unless they stockpile the oil in huge tanks somewhere, and that's expensive.

If the price is getting bid up, it's because people want to pay that much for it so they can use it. And it's also because no one is able to supply more of it for a lower price.

Adding (lower-cost) supply to the market will cut the price. Taking demand out of the market will cut the price. Nothing else is relevant to the price.

Oil is a business, not a conspiracy.

Popfrogs @ Jul 1st 2008 5:43PM

Ben must know something that the Senate Special Subcommittee didn't know in 2006 when they published their report findings, showing clear evidence of speculators manipulating the market.

If you look at a graph of prices per barrel from 2001 to present, you'll see a nice upward graph. 2001 was the year Enron successfully lobbied to get access to oil and other energy futures via commodities exchanges. Previous to this the CFTC limited who had access and how much they could trade. Once this access was blown wide open, the speculators and hedge fund managers and investment banks got a piece of the action. Recently legislation has closed "the Enron loophole (google it)" but Congress and the CFTC have more work ahead of them to get this under control.

Supply and demand is only true when companies taking actual delivery are buying more today because the NYMEX, ICE and Brent exchanges continue to trend upward. If prices are going to be higher next week, without a doubt, you buy more today to hedge against inflated prices.

Trust me dude, you do not want to step to me on this issue. I've done way too much research, just take it as gospel.

JaseH @ Jul 1st 2008 2:05PM

Petrol has now reached $1.75 a litre here in Aust.

Damn fuel. Sucks when you wanna go out & stuff.

:[

__________________________
JaseH.

Mike918 @ Jul 1st 2008 2:09PM

I drink your cell processor!

OAKside @ Jul 1st 2008 2:31PM

Bastard from a basket!

usagi704 @ Jul 1st 2008 3:21PM

Tapping into other oil reserves will not bring down the price of gas. It is well past the time we should have established an alternative fuel source as the one to use. I'd say go with hydrogen since its byproduct is water and doesn't pollute at all. There is absolutely no reason for us to still be on oil. The only reason we are is because of greed.

Ben @ Jul 1st 2008 3:32PM

Nothing you have said changes the price of gas. Telling people to go buy $10 fuels instead of $4 gas is a "let them eat cake" answer. It solves no problems.

Supplying more oil causes there to be more oil to use. Greater low-cost supplies bring the price down (or keep it from going up as fast).

If alternative fuels weren't A LOT more expensive than oil, you might have a point. But they are. So you don't.

usagi704 @ Jul 1st 2008 4:17PM

When the fuck did I say anything about alternative fuels being cheaper?! If we'd actually start investing in them, then yes, eventually they would be cheaper. BTW, I'm sure you don't have any point either since you pulled that $10 out of your ass. Besides, if we go your route then we'll eventually use up all of the oil and pollute the planet to hell and then what, smarty pants?!

Ben @ Jul 1st 2008 4:53PM

When we "use up all of the oil" oil will cost $11 and the $10 alternatives will be used instead.

Popfrogs @ Jul 1st 2008 5:47PM

@Ben: Saudi Arabia just added 300,000 more barrels per day followed by 700,000 more per day to their quota. You'd think a million more barrels per day would tamper prices, but prices actually went UP. Iran actually has supertankers sitting in the ocean off their coasts loaded with heavy sweet crude looking for buyers. If demand is so high, why can't they find a buyer?

You know maybe 5% of this story friend. Might want to do some more reading.

TheBaByBLuEdeViL @ Jul 1st 2008 5:38PM

Usagi - Work out a way to cheaply and safely store Hydrogen. If you crack it I promise you'll be a multi-billionaire.

Popfrogs @ Jul 1st 2008 5:57PM

Mazda actually experimented with a pretty effective means of storing hydrogen when they were researching the HR-X, a hydrogen-powered rotary prototype, back in 1991. They ended up using hydrogen-infused pellets that were heated in a sealed tank in the vehicle to release the hydrogen. It has evolved into a street-ready production vehicle which has become a special version of the RX8, replacing pellets with liquid hydrogen and a high pressure tank. http://www.greencar.com/features/features6/

Regardless, I don't see how transporting pressurized hydrogen is any more dangerous than gasoline. It's amazing that something as flammable as gasoline is dumped into millions of vehicles every day without things exploding or catching on fire more often.