Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Oil shale extraction/archive1

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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was not promoted by User:SandyGeorgia 21:55, 25 August 2008 [1].

Oil shale extraction[edit]

Nominator(s): Beagel (talk)


I'm nominating this article for featured article because I think this worth to be assessed as FA. The article is quite technical and there could be some problems with its prose. At the same time, the current prose is probably a good example of joint work which involved both well established oil shale experts (namely Alan Burnham) and experienced wikieditors (special thanks work the copyediting to user:Novickas and user:Gprince007 and for reviewing to user:JMiall and user:4u1e). However, if you have any idea how to further improve this article, please make your suggestion to make it really worth to be FA. Beagel (talk) 19:52, 12 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment: All the images check out fine, most as US government works. Per MoS, however, make sure to keep all blocks of references in numerical order. I noticed quite a few out of order. Calor (talk) 20:01, 12 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    fixed.Beagel (talk) 20:15, 12 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • The first line of the article, a hatnote, breaches WP:LAYOUT, and the citations breach WP:CITE, mixing citation and cite xxx templates. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:16, 12 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Could you please give a more specific advice? Thank you.Beagel (talk) 20:25, 12 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    See WP:LAYOUT, the {{main}} template is not used at the top of an article, those should be article links. See Wikipedia:Citing sources#Technical details (this text keeps getting moved and relabeled, so it's hard to find); the {{citation}} template provides a different style than then the cite xxx family of templates (cite book, cite news, cite web and so on), so they can't be mixed. Pick one or the other for a consistent style, per WP:WIAFA 2c. Also see WP:MSH on section headings, there are some very long headings. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:31, 12 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    The more specific info is at Template:Main; MoS is such a wreck that finding this info is a challenge <grrr ...> SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:38, 12 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Removed {{main}} template and changed all references to use style cite x. Concerning headings, I am not sure how to shorten them as they refer mainly to the names by technology classification. Probably something could be done with the longest one, which consists of three different (at the same time in principle similar) technologies. Any idea how to summarize this heading? Beagel (talk) 20:48, 12 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Shorter headings are introduced.Beagel (talk) 08:51, 17 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

Issues resolved, Ealdgyth - Talk 12:41, 17 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Link checker tool shows two dead links.
    Dead link removed as the information is verified by other sources referred in the text. However, I would like to ask what is the official policy concerning use of web archives like Wayback Machine?
      • I've seen them used, and don't usually have an issue with the mainstream ones. Ealdgyth - Talk 13:10, 15 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Current ref 11 (Soone, Juri) is lacking a publisher.
    This is a paper presented to the International Oil Shale Conference held in Jordan on 7-9 November 2006 and organized by Jordanian Natural Resources Authority and Al-Balqa Applied University. The author Jüri Soone is a director of the Oil Shale Research Institute, Tallinn University of Technology. Conference materials are published at the website of the Sustainable Development Networking Programme in Jordan. In this case, who should be marked as publisher? Beagel (talk) 16:05, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • http://www.freepatentsonline.com/ what makes this a reliable source:?
  • Likewise http://www.patentgenius.com/?
    Right now there are two references to patents. Concerning the ATP retort, the information provided in the patent is verified by third party sources. This technology was also used in practice at the Stuart Oil Shale Project. Concerning Multi-Mineral Corporation, this method is quite notable as referred by several sources and classifications. At the same time, there is not so much information about the technology itself. Therefore, the patent information could be useful. I also add one additional reference to verify the sentences referring to the patent information.Beagel (talk) 18:26, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • And http://www.aboutremediation.com/default.asp?
    Verified by additional source
      • If its not a reliable source, why is it needed? Ealdgyth - Talk 13:10, 15 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Can't say that this source is not reliable (at least the information seems reliable and the description of technology seems quite good). However, as there are also other sources, this references is removed.Beagel (talk) 08:55, 17 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • And what makes http://www.hubbertpeak.com/ a reliable source?
    Although website itself probably can't to be considered as reliable source, the author of this article, Jean Laherrere, is a reputable petrochemist and oil shale specialist and his works are cited in other reliable sources, e.g. report by the European Academies Science Advisory Council. His reliability could be verified by Google Scholar search.Beagel (talk) 16:05, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Likewise http://i-r-squared.blogspot.com/2006/06/oil-shale-development-imminent.html? It's a blog.
    I agree about blogs in general. At the same time, Robert Rapier—the author of the referred essay in this energy blog—is a well known writer on energy issues. He has a master's degree in chemical engineering, and has 15 years of experience in the petrochemicals industry. He holds several U.S. and international patents, and is currently employed by a major oil company. Therefore he could be considered authoritative and also trustworthy in relation to the subject. However, as this reference is not necessary, I removed it.
  • And http://www.mineweb.com/mineweb/view/mineweb/en/page1?
    Mineweb.com is an international mining online publication. It is published by Moneyweb Holdings, listed on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange [JSE:MNY]. Therefore it is reliable as any other information agency. However, I changed publisher to Moneyweb Holdings.Beagel (talk) 18:45, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Otherwise sources look good, links checked out with the link checker tool. Note that I'm traveling, so responses may be delayed a bit. Ealdgyth - Talk 13:09, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

  • I changed two cite web references to cite patent.
  • ex situ and in situ should be defined in the lead section. In general, the lead could be targeted to a broader audience.
    Defined.Beagel (talk) 17:37, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • The images are too small for my taste.
  • My personal preference is for no line breaks within the references.

Otherwise looks good on a quick read. --Kkmurray (talk) 13:44, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose—1a —This is part of a comment by Tony1 (of 05:54, 15 August 2008 (UTC)), which was interrupted by the following: [reply]

  • Let's have a look at the opening.
    • "(shale gas can also refer to gas occurring naturally in shales). The process also produces ..."—We haven't yet heard of "shale gas", so why is it an "also"? THis solves the problem of two "alsos". "that occurs" would shift the possible meaning away from the process-oriented formation ("occurring").
      What problem is exactly with shale gas? Term "shale gas" has two different meanings. The first one is the gas produced in the process of oil shale pyrolysis. Another meaning is gas occurring naturally in shales (See shale gas). The sentence says: "Kerogen is pyrolysed into a petroleum-like condensable shale oil and combustible shale gas (shale gas can also refer to gas occurring naturally in shales)." So, the sentence clearly talks about the shale gas as product of pyrolysis and to avoid confusion it gives in brackets the another meaning of shale gas. So, in this case both meanings of shale gas are given and "also" in the brackets is needed to avoid mixing these two different meanings. In the next sentence, I replaced "also" with "in addition" if you like this more. "Occuring is replaced with "that occurs".
    • The decomposition, surely.
      fixed.Beagel (talk) 08:54, 15 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • Probably remove "relatively".
      It is possible to say that "300 °C is a relatively low temperature", but saying that "300 °C is a low temperature"? I don't think so.Beagel (talk) 08:54, 15 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • "There is a lot of oil shale pyrolysis and retorting technologies." Dear dear dear. And while we're here, a semicolon after "technologies" to flag that the next clause is an immediate expansion.
      reworded.Beagel (talk) 08:54, 15 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • This is messy: "However, only a few dozen have been tested in a pilot plant (with capacity 1 to 10 tonnes of oil shale per hour) and less than ten technologies have been tested at a demonstration scale (40 to 400 tonnes per hour)"—Unsure, but do you mean this? "However, only a few dozen have been tested, in a pilot plant with a capacity of 1–10 tonnes of oil shale an hour, and fewer than ten technologies have been tested at a demonstration scale (40–400 tonnes an hour).
      There are different test levels. I have a feeling that your proposal makes it more confusing. Maybe we could use a serial comma before "and"?
  • "may be ... may be"—Remove the second one (ellipsis). Remove "used".
    • This is exactly the case that in both cases it "may be" used, but it depends of technology and not always used. Removed "used" after "electricity".Beagel (talk) 08:54, 15 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Stub, and it's poor style, I'm afraid, to start a clause with "also" (audit the use of this word throughout—get rid of most): "Also heat of the spent shale may be reused for the pyrolysis."

That's just over two pars. The standard of prose is significantly wanting. Please bring on board work-nerd collaborators (search edit summaries in edit-history pages of similar articles; teamwork is of the essence at WP). Tony (talk) 05:54, 15 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment - Is that table under Classifications absolutely necessary? I find myself coming to a dead stop there every time I try to read the article. It is very technical and hard for someone like me to understand. Do you think hydrocarbons should be mentioned in the lead somewhere? Also, if petroleum and oil are the same thing, I think you should stick to using one word or the other. —Mattisse (Talk) 17:23, 15 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    My personal feeling is that the table helps to get a better overview of different technologies. Otherwise you may just lost in descriptions of different technologies. But if there is a support to remove this, I will accept this. Kerogen (as also shale oil and shale gas) is a hydrocarbon, and therefore hydrocarbons are probably worth of mentioning in the lead. Do you have any specific suggestion? I replaced crude oil with petroleum, except in cases of synthetic crude and heavy crude oil.Beagel (talk) 21:13, 15 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
It really helps to connect the dots for people like me. I was figuring things out by reading all the wikilinks, but I never did get beyond the table. I will skip the table and try again! —Mattisse (Talk) 21:33, 16 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
P.S. As far as a suggestion, I would say that at the earliest possible opportunity you could stress that what you are talking about is hydrocarbon extraction (if that is the case). We all know that hydrocarbons are important, but the other terms you use are unfamiliar. Another question: you frequently mention retorts and retorting, which is actually distillation? —Mattisse (Talk) 21:40, 16 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Added hydrocarbons in the first sentence (don't knew if this the right place for this). In chemistry retorting and distillation are same thing. However, the industry uses terminology "retorting" (and the industrial retort and laboratory retort are quite different although the principle is same).Beagel (talk) 08:43, 17 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment. I can see there is talented hand behind this article. It has a lot going for it, however, I doubt anyone will call it light reading. I don't see mistakes in the writing, but it is dense with industry-specific concepts and science. Questions: —This is part of a comment by Maclean25 (of 01:44, 19 August 2008 (UTC)), which was interrupted by the following: [reply]
    • In Economics, "Some observers have compared shale-oil production unfavorably with other unconventional oil technologies..." - sounds like a Wikipedia:Avoid weasel words. According to the reference there is no doubt that coal is more economical than oil shale. Are there observers that argue that oil shale is production is more favorable?
      As a rule, coal-to-liquid produce more oil than extraction of oil shale. At the same time, different oil shales vary significantly by their composition and carbon content, and depending technology, in some cases you could achieve an oil yield comparable with CTL production. So, the above statement is correct in general, but not in absolute scale. However, I removed possible weasel words, so hopefully it is acceptable right now.Beagel (talk) 07:06, 19 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • Same with "Some commentators have expressed concerns over...", just switch to "There are concerns..." to avoid that passive voice.
      reworded.Beagel (talk) 07:06, 19 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • The Environmental considerations section is somewhat lacking. While key words are hit upon, with the exception of water which is explained in the article, the key 'considerations' are not elaborated upon. What is missing is how does extraction create sulfur gas emissions (or other air pollution) and to what extent? ie. there's no flaring? Same with 'biological and recreational value of land', how and to what extent does extraction damage biological/recreational/agricultural value? -maclean 01:44, 19 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
      As this is a summary section, more information is provided in the Environmental impact of oil shale industry. I added also more information about land use and atmospheric emissions. However, it is impossible to say "to what extent" as different oil shales have different composition and properties (some of them have very low sulfur content, some of them have very high sulfur; same applies to carbon). It is depends also of used technology. For example, it is believed that in situ extraction doesn't have any other atmospheric emissions than only emissions created by burning fuels to generate a heat. At the same time these technologies have greater impact to the groundwater. Beagel (talk) 07:06, 19 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • It may be helpful to consult the list at WP:PRV to bring on board someone to help comb through the lingo and jargon. I've been wondering why more reviewers haven't engaged here, but looking at the article even as someone with a background in the oil industry, I'm seeing why reviewers are having a hard time with the prose. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:40, 25 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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