10 ms·

RIP Dinosaurs. Welcome fuel!

eloff 5y ago
Buried hydrocarbons are not really dinosaurs. They're prehistoric plant and microscopic life for the most part. Algae, plankton, etc. I believe a lot of coal harkens back to the great forests of the carboniferous (sp?) Period, which is special because it took millions of years for life to learn how to digest the cellulose in trees. So you can imagine millions of years of buried forests that could burn, but not decompose. Forest fires in those days must have been truly terrifying. That was a one off event in Earth's history, and has not been repeated. I believe it's partially responsible for why modern CO2 levels are much lower than historical levels. It was a massive natural carbon sequestration program. At least until us humans in our short sightedness dig it up and burn it.
- btilly 5y ago
  The Carboniferous was roughly 60 million years long. And oxygen levels were much higher than today. This showed up in large insects. For example they had dragonflies over 2 feet wide - that's over 6x as large as the largest today.
  - klyrs 5y ago
    Maybe I'm reading too far into this, but are you suggesting that higher oxygen concentration is responsible for larger insects? If true, I'd love to understand why
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    - morpheos137 5y ago
      More oxygen works better with less efficient breathing systems.
    - tejtm 5y ago
      Their lung analogs are more like holes/tubes where air can go and maybe slosh around a bit. So there is a surface area to volume trade off point that depends on O2 concentration.
    - btilly 5y ago
      Oxygen is one of two factors allowing for large insects. Ecology is the other. As https://news.ucsc.edu/2012/06/giant-insects.html https://news.ucsc.edu/2012/06/giant-insects.html says, before birds you see a clear correlation between insect size and oxygen level. After birds, the correlation disappears.
    - jjk166 5y ago
      Getting sufficient oxygen is a key limiting factor in metabolism. The more oxygen an animal can get, the bigger an animal can afford to get. And it's not just insects. For example, the ancestors of dinosaurs evolved a highly efficient respiratory system towards the end of the permian period when oxygen concentrations were low, which likely helped them survive the deadliest mass extinction ever. Afterwards, oxygen levels skyrocketed up, and the dinosaurs, who still had their efficient lungs, could take advantage of it and became the giants we know and love. This same system is also key to the ability of modern birds to fly. Insects and other arthropods breathe through their skin, so the amount of oxygen they can get is limited by their surface area, whereas the amount of oxygen they need is determined by volume. Thus for any given oxygen concentration, there is some maximum surface area to volume ratio for insects, and in turn a size limit for any given body plan. This is why, for example, the largest species of tarantulas across multiple continents, despite evolving separately, are all the same size - being big has a lot of perks, but if they got any bigger they'd suffocate.
      - eloff 5y ago
        That's a fascinating angle on dinosaurs and birds I've never heard of before, thanks for sharing!
      - willmadden 5y ago
        Oil is mostly a renewable resource. New oil is made from magma heating the basement rocks of the Earth’s crust. As the rocks heat methane gas is distilled. This combines with carbonates and carbon 14 to form oil. This is why oil wells in Saudi Arabia, Russia, and elsewhere mysteriously refill after being depleted.
        btilly 5y ago
        Citation needed. Given how much your claim flies in the face of established and widely accepted scientific claims, preferably citations to peer reviewed research. Doubly so for the howler about C14. Oil is notable for its conspicuous LACK of C14, not an abundance of it.
- morpheos137 5y ago
  Lignin not cellulose. It was a wood crisis.
  - tejtm 5y ago
    When photo-vores covered all the land the only place left to go was up. But Lignin was what emerged as the scaffold and it was amazingly successful and completely indigestible. It would be as if animals figured out how to make their bones out of Teflon or silicon dioxide, after a few tens of millions of years the planet would be hundreds of feet deep in old non decomposed skeletons.
    - dzdt 5y ago
      My favorite analogy is it is like trees were made of plastic. You know how today people say the plastic bottles will sit unchanged in landfills for thousands of years? Back then it was the same for trees. They grew, they fell, they sat there unchanged unless they burned. So if they fell in water, they stayed. Today trees rot because microbes evolved to decompose lignin. A million years from now maybe plastic will rot too. It helps to make clear how the giant carboniferous coal deposits were formed: plastic tree landfills.
      - morpheos137 5y ago
        It would be cool if somebody could model what the landscape then would look like. I don't think there would be massive piles of wood anywhere but wet places because as you indicated fire is another way dead wood can be cleared.
      - eloff 5y ago
        That's a good analogy. There already appear to be bacteria evolving to eat some kinds of plastic. I don't think it will take millions of years. But it will also reduce demand for plastic, because like wood and paper, it will be able to rot. At least nature may bail us out of that mistake we made with plastic. Could you imagine if we used it for millions of years without it being able to decompose? Your analogy would become reality.
- chrisco255 5y ago
  Wasn't the carboniferous period one of the most abundant periods for life on planet earth? The forests must have been incredible.

Buried hydrocarbons are not really dinosaurs. They're prehistoric plant and microscopic life for the most part. Algae, plankton, etc. I believe a lot of coal harkens back to the great forests of the carboniferous (sp?) Period, which is special because it took millions of years for life to learn how to digest the cellulose in trees. So you can imagine millions of years of buried forests that could burn, but not decompose. Forest fires in those days must have been truly terrifying. That was a one off event in Earth's history, and has not been repeated. I believe it's partially responsible for why modern CO2 levels are much lower than historical levels. It was a massive natural carbon sequestration program. At least until us humans in our short sightedness dig it up and burn it.

btilly 5y ago
The Carboniferous was roughly 60 million years long. And oxygen levels were much higher than today. This showed up in large insects. For example they had dragonflies over 2 feet wide - that's over 6x as large as the largest today.
- klyrs 5y ago
  Maybe I'm reading too far into this, but are you suggesting that higher oxygen concentration is responsible for larger insects? If true, I'd love to understand why
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - morpheos137 5y ago
    More oxygen works better with less efficient breathing systems.
  - tejtm 5y ago
    Their lung analogs are more like holes/tubes where air can go and maybe slosh around a bit. So there is a surface area to volume trade off point that depends on O2 concentration.
  - btilly 5y ago
    Oxygen is one of two factors allowing for large insects. Ecology is the other. As https://news.ucsc.edu/2012/06/giant-insects.html https://news.ucsc.edu/2012/06/giant-insects.html says, before birds you see a clear correlation between insect size and oxygen level. After birds, the correlation disappears.
  - jjk166 5y ago
    Getting sufficient oxygen is a key limiting factor in metabolism. The more oxygen an animal can get, the bigger an animal can afford to get. And it's not just insects. For example, the ancestors of dinosaurs evolved a highly efficient respiratory system towards the end of the permian period when oxygen concentrations were low, which likely helped them survive the deadliest mass extinction ever. Afterwards, oxygen levels skyrocketed up, and the dinosaurs, who still had their efficient lungs, could take advantage of it and became the giants we know and love. This same system is also key to the ability of modern birds to fly. Insects and other arthropods breathe through their skin, so the amount of oxygen they can get is limited by their surface area, whereas the amount of oxygen they need is determined by volume. Thus for any given oxygen concentration, there is some maximum surface area to volume ratio for insects, and in turn a size limit for any given body plan. This is why, for example, the largest species of tarantulas across multiple continents, despite evolving separately, are all the same size - being big has a lot of perks, but if they got any bigger they'd suffocate.
    - eloff 5y ago
      That's a fascinating angle on dinosaurs and birds I've never heard of before, thanks for sharing!
    - willmadden 5y ago
      Oil is mostly a renewable resource. New oil is made from magma heating the basement rocks of the Earth’s crust. As the rocks heat methane gas is distilled. This combines with carbonates and carbon 14 to form oil. This is why oil wells in Saudi Arabia, Russia, and elsewhere mysteriously refill after being depleted.
      - btilly 5y ago
        Citation needed. Given how much your claim flies in the face of established and widely accepted scientific claims, preferably citations to peer reviewed research. Doubly so for the howler about C14. Oil is notable for its conspicuous LACK of C14, not an abundance of it.
morpheos137 5y ago
Lignin not cellulose. It was a wood crisis.
- tejtm 5y ago
  When photo-vores covered all the land the only place left to go was up. But Lignin was what emerged as the scaffold and it was amazingly successful and completely indigestible. It would be as if animals figured out how to make their bones out of Teflon or silicon dioxide, after a few tens of millions of years the planet would be hundreds of feet deep in old non decomposed skeletons.
  - dzdt 5y ago
    My favorite analogy is it is like trees were made of plastic. You know how today people say the plastic bottles will sit unchanged in landfills for thousands of years? Back then it was the same for trees. They grew, they fell, they sat there unchanged unless they burned. So if they fell in water, they stayed. Today trees rot because microbes evolved to decompose lignin. A million years from now maybe plastic will rot too. It helps to make clear how the giant carboniferous coal deposits were formed: plastic tree landfills.
    - morpheos137 5y ago
      It would be cool if somebody could model what the landscape then would look like. I don't think there would be massive piles of wood anywhere but wet places because as you indicated fire is another way dead wood can be cleared.
    - eloff 5y ago
      That's a good analogy. There already appear to be bacteria evolving to eat some kinds of plastic. I don't think it will take millions of years. But it will also reduce demand for plastic, because like wood and paper, it will be able to rot. At least nature may bail us out of that mistake we made with plastic. Could you imagine if we used it for millions of years without it being able to decompose? Your analogy would become reality.
chrisco255 5y ago
Wasn't the carboniferous period one of the most abundant periods for life on planet earth? The forests must have been incredible.