5 ms·

The petrochemical industry is huge we've yet to find alternatives for it. Half the stuff around you was made with something derived from oil, and you can't repl

by buran77 7mo ago

The petrochemical industry is huge we've yet to find alternatives for it. Half the stuff around you was made with something derived from oil, and you can't replace that with wind or sunlight in the foreseeable future.

all2 7mo ago
We should also note that wind turbines require huge amounts of petroleum derivatives to operate.
- nullpoint420 7mo ago
  Yeah but at least the byproducts produce a solid that can last for years vs treating it as a consumable. I'm fulling expecting someone will reply to me and say that making plastic wastes 75% of the oil or something during production, and that it's just as wasteful amortized across the lifespan of a wind turbine. I'm tired, man.
  - leonidasrup 7mo ago
    You can compare material intensity of different electricity generation technologies. https://davidturver.substack.com/p/material-intensity-electricity-generation https://davidturver.substack.com/p/material-intensity-electr... According to International Energy Agency mineral demand for clean energy technologies would rise by at least four times by 2040 to meet climate goals, with particularly high growth for EV-related minerals. https://www.iea.org/reports/the-role-of-critical-minerals-in-clean-energy-transitions https://www.iea.org/reports/the-role-of-critical-minerals-in...
    - triceratops 7mo ago
      You can recycle the minerals so it will also fall back down to almost 0 on a longer timescale. If you keep burning gas you will never stop mining.
      - leonidasrup 7mo ago
        We have heard many claims from politician about https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circular_economy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circular_economy You can recycle the minerals and you should recycle minerals, but almost no recycling technology can recycle 100% of minerals and recycling has always costs attached to it (this can be for example capital costs, building recycling facilities, operating costs in form labor costs for separation, energy costs for melting material and purification processes). For example aluminum is recycled, not because we have have a shortage of aluminium ore (Earth's mantle is 2.38% aluminium by mass), but because recycling is less energy intensive then production of fresh aluminum. https://international-aluminium.org/work-areas/recycling/ https://international-aluminium.org/work-areas/recycling/ Recycling of EV batteries will lose between 1-10% of the valuable metals https://blog.ucs.org/jessica-dunn/how-are-ev-batteries-actually-recycled/ https://blog.ucs.org/jessica-dunn/how-are-ev-batteries-actua... The worst kind of recycling is decreasing the costs of recycling by outsourcing to third world countries, by exploiting lax environmental regulations or corrupted environmental protection officials. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2025/11/18/world/africa/lead-poisoning-car-battery.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2025/11/18/world/africa/... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chittagong_Ship_Breaking_Yard https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chittagong_Ship_Breaking_Yard https://www.npr.org/sections/goats-and-soda/2024/10/05/g-s1-6411/electronics-public-health-waste-ghana-phones-computers https://www.npr.org/sections/goats-and-soda/2024/10/05/g-s1-...
        triceratops 7mo ago
        > aluminum is recycled... but because recycling is less energy intensive then production of fresh aluminum So what? > Recycling of EV batteries will lose between 1-10% of the valuable metals How much gasoline, coal, and natural gas can you recycle? > The worst kind of recycling is decreasing the costs of recycling by outsourcing to third world countries That's going to happen as long as those countries are poor. They need to develop their economies quickly to demand better laws. Climate change will be a danger for many of them in the coming years. Better, less-polluting recycling tech will help them far more than continuing to burn fossil fuels.
- triceratops 7mo ago
  As opposed to gas or coal turbines which are naturally lubed somehow?
andriy_koval 7mo ago
there are pathways to produce synthetic oil from coal or using carbon capture if you have cheap energy. I hope they will catch up if fossil oil prices skyrocket.
- kmeisthax 7mo ago
  This is the secret flipside of solar power's duck curve: it makes a lot of stupidly energy intensive paths towards non-fossil oil production a lot less stupid if you just have the energy to burn. Think about how in the 2000s we had a weird obsession with ethanol and other biofuels, only to learn that they were merely 40-50% efficient. If your energy mix is predominantly fossil fuels, you're better off just not burning the oil. But if you have solar, suddenly it becomes a good option for energy storage, especially in industries that need the weight properties of chemical fuels (i.e. aircraft, where you HAVE to be able to burn and exhaust your fuel or the plane will be too heavy to land).
- ahartmetz 7mo ago
  Pretty much all chemical changes can be made with reasonable amounts of energy. That includes making "bioplastics" as well as the typical plastics we use today like polyethylene, polystyrol and so on, from biomaterials. What doesn't work in a way that's remotely economical is transmuting elements. It is, for example, possible to make gold today, the old dream of alchemists. But it's several orders of magnitude too expensive. Common plastics are made from highly abundant elements, so running out of oil as a chemical feedstock is a quite surmountable problem given cheap enough energy.
leonidasrup 7mo ago
Very little oil is used to make plastic. In Europe between 4–6% of oil and gas is used for producing plastics and globally around 6% of global oil is used. By contrast, 87% is used for transport, electricity and heating. https://www.bpf.co.uk/press/Oil_Consumption.aspx https://www.bpf.co.uk/press/Oil_Consumption.aspx
- XorNot 7mo ago
  6% is hardly a small fraction at scale.
  - UncleMeat 7mo ago
    If we could reduce our oil usage by 94% I'd weep with joy. Yes that's still a lot of oil. But it would be a complete sea change from what is currently happening.
oblio 7mo ago
A lot of what the petrochemical industry does took over from other stuff or isn't vital, there just hasn't been enough push back against it. Stuff like medicine, sure, crucial and very hard to find replacements for. But single use plastics can probably be replaced 95% (the environment would appreciate it if we banned them), dyes are mostly not vital, synthetic fibers can be replaced 95% with minor critical impact, just using natural fibers, etc. The petrochemical industry is just the cheapest option in many cases in a world driven by conspicuous consumption of non vital items.

by buran77 7mo ago

all2 7mo ago

We should also note that wind turbines require huge amounts of petroleum derivatives to operate.

nullpoint420 7mo ago
Yeah but at least the byproducts produce a solid that can last for years vs treating it as a consumable. I'm fulling expecting someone will reply to me and say that making plastic wastes 75% of the oil or something during production, and that it's just as wasteful amortized across the lifespan of a wind turbine. I'm tired, man.
- leonidasrup 7mo ago
  You can compare material intensity of different electricity generation technologies. https://davidturver.substack.com/p/material-intensity-electricity-generation https://davidturver.substack.com/p/material-intensity-electr... According to International Energy Agency mineral demand for clean energy technologies would rise by at least four times by 2040 to meet climate goals, with particularly high growth for EV-related minerals. https://www.iea.org/reports/the-role-of-critical-minerals-in-clean-energy-transitions https://www.iea.org/reports/the-role-of-critical-minerals-in...
  - triceratops 7mo ago
    You can recycle the minerals so it will also fall back down to almost 0 on a longer timescale. If you keep burning gas you will never stop mining.
    - leonidasrup 7mo ago
      We have heard many claims from politician about https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circular_economy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circular_economy You can recycle the minerals and you should recycle minerals, but almost no recycling technology can recycle 100% of minerals and recycling has always costs attached to it (this can be for example capital costs, building recycling facilities, operating costs in form labor costs for separation, energy costs for melting material and purification processes). For example aluminum is recycled, not because we have have a shortage of aluminium ore (Earth's mantle is 2.38% aluminium by mass), but because recycling is less energy intensive then production of fresh aluminum. https://international-aluminium.org/work-areas/recycling/ https://international-aluminium.org/work-areas/recycling/ Recycling of EV batteries will lose between 1-10% of the valuable metals https://blog.ucs.org/jessica-dunn/how-are-ev-batteries-actually-recycled/ https://blog.ucs.org/jessica-dunn/how-are-ev-batteries-actua... The worst kind of recycling is decreasing the costs of recycling by outsourcing to third world countries, by exploiting lax environmental regulations or corrupted environmental protection officials. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2025/11/18/world/africa/lead-poisoning-car-battery.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2025/11/18/world/africa/... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chittagong_Ship_Breaking_Yard https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chittagong_Ship_Breaking_Yard https://www.npr.org/sections/goats-and-soda/2024/10/05/g-s1-6411/electronics-public-health-waste-ghana-phones-computers https://www.npr.org/sections/goats-and-soda/2024/10/05/g-s1-...
      - triceratops 7mo ago
        > aluminum is recycled... but because recycling is less energy intensive then production of fresh aluminum So what? > Recycling of EV batteries will lose between 1-10% of the valuable metals How much gasoline, coal, and natural gas can you recycle? > The worst kind of recycling is decreasing the costs of recycling by outsourcing to third world countries That's going to happen as long as those countries are poor. They need to develop their economies quickly to demand better laws. Climate change will be a danger for many of them in the coming years. Better, less-polluting recycling tech will help them far more than continuing to burn fossil fuels.
triceratops 7mo ago
As opposed to gas or coal turbines which are naturally lubed somehow?

andriy_koval 7mo ago

there are pathways to produce synthetic oil from coal or using carbon capture if you have cheap energy. I hope they will catch up if fossil oil prices skyrocket.

kmeisthax 7mo ago
This is the secret flipside of solar power's duck curve: it makes a lot of stupidly energy intensive paths towards non-fossil oil production a lot less stupid if you just have the energy to burn. Think about how in the 2000s we had a weird obsession with ethanol and other biofuels, only to learn that they were merely 40-50% efficient. If your energy mix is predominantly fossil fuels, you're better off just not burning the oil. But if you have solar, suddenly it becomes a good option for energy storage, especially in industries that need the weight properties of chemical fuels (i.e. aircraft, where you HAVE to be able to burn and exhaust your fuel or the plane will be too heavy to land).
ahartmetz 7mo ago
Pretty much all chemical changes can be made with reasonable amounts of energy. That includes making "bioplastics" as well as the typical plastics we use today like polyethylene, polystyrol and so on, from biomaterials. What doesn't work in a way that's remotely economical is transmuting elements. It is, for example, possible to make gold today, the old dream of alchemists. But it's several orders of magnitude too expensive. Common plastics are made from highly abundant elements, so running out of oil as a chemical feedstock is a quite surmountable problem given cheap enough energy.

leonidasrup 7mo ago

Very little oil is used to make plastic. In Europe between 4–6% of oil and gas is used for producing plastics and globally around 6% of global oil is used. By contrast, 87% is used for transport, electricity and heating. https://www.bpf.co.uk/press/Oil_Consumption.aspx https://www.bpf.co.uk/press/Oil_Consumption.aspx

XorNot 7mo ago
6% is hardly a small fraction at scale.
- UncleMeat 7mo ago
  If we could reduce our oil usage by 94% I'd weep with joy. Yes that's still a lot of oil. But it would be a complete sea change from what is currently happening.

oblio 7mo ago

A lot of what the petrochemical industry does took over from other stuff or isn't vital, there just hasn't been enough push back against it. Stuff like medicine, sure, crucial and very hard to find replacements for. But single use plastics can probably be replaced 95% (the environment would appreciate it if we banned them), dyes are mostly not vital, synthetic fibers can be replaced 95% with minor critical impact, just using natural fibers, etc. The petrochemical industry is just the cheapest option in many cases in a world driven by conspicuous consumption of non vital items.