Dr Kaydy Pinetown and I just gave a workshop on methane – from its formation, to measurement, to in-ground assessment to fugitive emissions and the legislation governing that. We were at the 42nd Annual Meeting of The Society for Organic Petrology (TSOP) in Beijing, China. TSOP is the premier international organisation that looks at all […]
Our group has just published a paper, with the research headed by Alex Wheeler, in Evolving Earth (https://doi.org/10.1016/j.eve.2026.100156) on the palaeoecology of an area in Laurasia. This is the fourth paper on our efforts to unravel the paleoclimate, paleovegetation and paleoecology of the Early Cretaceous in the Central Asian region*. We still haven’t found any […]
The control of fire is arguably mankind’s most important learned skill. Yet … …Yet, we humans are still at the mercy of fire (natural or otherwise), which, when uncontrolled can obliterate not just forests, but whatever gets in the way, such as houses, infrastructure and even whole towns and communities. So, we take notice. And […]
One of the nice things about not being a tourist in places like Mongolia (as an example) is that you get to see a much fuller cross section of the place you are visiting. There are those who take the ‘high-road’ by only taking the ‘low-road’ travel options (though unless they’ve walked there from home, […]
It is no secret that the mere mention of the word coal is divisive. Yet, people on either side of the debate have a far from adequate understanding of what coal actually is. Practically no one who is talking about coal these days has the faintest idea of the conditions under which it is formed, […]
After three and half years we made the journey back to China and back to the Early Cretaceous of Inner Mongolia. We know that it was hot in the Early Cretaceous, even at high latitudes such as that of Inner Mongolia but our first stop in Beijing had us sweating and swearing in very real […]
Wildfires are in the news lately, but if you were in the Hailar Basin, Inner Mongolia during the Early Cretaceous (~100 million years ago) you’d find yourself in a lot of smoke! Even though it was tough times for vegetation, the palaeomires were able to accumulate incredible thicknesses of peat – enough to make 70 […]
On the 7th of June, 9pm Brisbane, Australia time I’ll be giving an invited lecture on some of the palaeoclimate, palaeovegetation and palaeotectonic studies we’ve been doing in the Hailar Basin, Inner Mongolia, China. This is for The Society for Organic Petrology. Read the abstract for the talk below. It’s ONLINE and Open to All! […]
Excellent paper* just out by Alex Wheeler reconstructing palaeoclimate and palaeoecology in the Early Cretaceous of Inner Mongolia. Amazing what studying organics can tell you!!! I was lucky enough to work on this paper with him and co-authors Prof Jian Shen, Dr Marvin Moroeng,and Dr Jingjing Liu. We did the sampling of this back in […]
Of all the particles in a sedimentary basin, organics are arguably the most insightful. Think about it: they tell you how hot things got, millions and millions of years ago, and that is both within the basin at depth but also at the surface when they were deposited; they tell you what plants were evolving; […]