A Search For Radio Carbon in Coal

The discovery of any measurable quantity of radiocarbon in fossil carbon deposits, such as coal, would have profound significance for geo-chronometry since, according to the conventional geological time scale, radiocarbon In such depOSits should have become extinct long ago. Reports of measurable radiocarbon levels in such deposits have appeared within the creationist technical literature from time to time. However, in every case the work being reported on was done by non-creationist scientists who felt their results implied the presence of contamination by modern radiocarbon, not residual indigenous radiocarbon. Clearly, a specially designed creationist research program is required to settle this question. Such a program was instituted at ICR several years ago. A large-volume liquid scintillation detector has been constructed to search for radiocarbon in fossil carbon. In this paper I describe this apparatus and discuss the results of measurements to the present time