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What is the efficiency of refining petroleum?

Do we need animal materials to extract or refine petroleum?

  • The reliance of industrial agriculture on petroleum products is fairly well-documented. Is the reverse also true? Would we be able to produce oil without industrial farming? More broadly my curiosity is about the relationship between industrial agriculture and petroleum extraction/refining. I know that oil is generally thought of as being the product of long-dead animals (hence, "fossil fuel," actually not dinosaurs but plankton), but I'm looking for other connections. Do we use animal products in the production of plastics, for example?

  • Answer:

    You may be interested in Carbon Democracy by Timothy Mitchell which explores the relationship between resource extraction and our structural society.

Edna Million at Ask.Metafilter.Com Visit the source

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Oil appears in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petroleum_seep on the Earth's surface, so as far as extraction goes, a vanishingly small amount relative to the current global consumption level doesn't require any industry at all of either kind.

XMLicious

http://www.technologyreview.com/news/408334/making-gasoline-from-bacteria/ discusses research into bioengineered bacteria that make custom hydrocarbons. The article discusses their use for fuels, but what these non-animal organisms would produce could just as well serve as https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/feedstock in plastics, fertilizer or pesticide/herbicide production pipelines that ultimately make products used in agriculture.

Blazecock Pileon

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