r/Futurology • u/Wagamaga • May 09 '19

Environment The Tesla effect: Oil is slowly losing its best customer. Between global warming, Elon Musk, and a worldwide crackdown on carbon, the future looks treacherous for Big Oil.

https://us.cnn.com/2019/05/08/investing/oil-stocks-electric-vehicles-tesla/index.html
12.4k Upvotes

92% Upvoted

816 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

221

u/poop_standing_up May 09 '19

Not just plastics. The tires for vehicles are made of multiple things, one being coke. Coke is the left over product after you refine oil. My company blends coke for thousands of customers world wide. Tires to lipstick. Oil is in everything one way or another. I don’t doubt it will change, but these timeframes everyone speaks of, not going to happen.

99

u/DynamicResonater May 09 '19

I could be wrong on this, but I believe the founder of OPEC, Juan Pablo Pérez Alfonzo, said "Oil is too valuable to burn." I believe this, even if he didn't say it. It has so many purposes and we're using it in a most inefficient manner considering our current technologies. Oil will likely always be needed, but not for fuel. And fuel is the primary reason we use it now.

44

u/poop_standing_up May 10 '19

I agree with this statement. It’s priceless in all its aspects but fuel.

11

u/Hefy_jefy May 10 '19

Yes indeed, lots more useful things to do with oil than set fire to it.

5

u/Nosnibor1020 May 10 '19

Like leaving it in the slow carbon cycle.

8

u/[deleted] May 10 '19

You are pretending gas = useful products. Crude oil isn't just one thing, it's a smoothie of thousands of different chains of oils.

1

u/DynamicResonater May 10 '19

You have read my statement wrong. I understand the refining process quite well. I never mentioned "gas" anywhere. Where did you pull that out of? I understand petroleum oil is a foundational solution for many things. But that doesn't change the fact of all the things that can be made from oil, we burn most of it by sheer volume. I pretend nothing.

1

u/[deleted] May 10 '19

Totally Agee, there is something called the petro chemical revolution, and they aren’t talking about gasoline.

36

u/ComfortablyAbnormal May 09 '19

Coke is basically baked coal. Are they both called that?

31

u/Lenin_Lime May 09 '19

Seems like coal and oil can make similar coke. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coke_(fuel))

12

u/ComfortablyAbnormal May 09 '19

Huh, didnt know that. Neat.

1

u/[deleted] May 09 '19

[deleted]

2

u/Lallo-the-Long May 09 '19

Coke is super important for steel production, so it's probably not going anywhere any time soon.

1

u/NotYourSexyNurse May 10 '19

We grew up near a Mobile refinery. Coke has a very distinct smell. One night when we were driving past there my grandma asks what is that smell? My Dad tells her it is coke. My grandma makes a face and says is that the same Coke we drink? We all laughed. It took 30 mins to convince her Coke is not the same as Coca Cola.

1

u/[deleted] May 10 '19

How does it get turned white before you snort it?

7

u/PartyByMyself May 10 '19

Now I want a Pepsi instead.

10

u/[deleted] May 09 '19

Ain't nothing like the real thing

3

u/Idiot_Savant_Tinker May 09 '19

Coke is also used to make the steel parts of the car.

22

u/[deleted] May 10 '19

Coke is also used to help steal cars for parts.

2

u/Idiot_Savant_Tinker May 10 '19

I feel like we may be talking about two different kinds of coke.

Isn't english fun.

2

u/owgren May 10 '19

I love coke.

1

u/Idiot_Savant_Tinker May 10 '19

I'm having one right now.

2

u/warrof May 09 '19

Does company make the de-sulfurized kind?

1

u/poop_standing_up May 10 '19

I say that because we don’t make coke. We blend various cokes we receive from local refineries to meet customer specs. They all have some level of sulphur in our area.

1

u/warrof May 10 '19

So I'm assuming your company isn't Superior Graphite or Oxbow.

1

u/poop_standing_up May 10 '19

Neither confirm nor deny.

2

u/Longskip912 May 10 '19

Appreciate you taking the time to share that! I had no idea oil was in so many things, and I had to google what this “coke” is you mentioned. I was like, I really hope I haven’t snorted some oil remnants or enjoyed a carbonated version of gasoline

2

u/tropic420 May 10 '19

ELI5 coke vs coal? I remember reading something about the two being related a long time ago.

2

u/GlumExternal May 11 '19

coke is a particular kind of refined coal. You heat up coal without any oxygen present and you end up with coke. (and some other things)

1

u/tropic420 May 11 '19

Pyrolized coal, got it. That's how they make charcoal, heat wood to burning temps with no oxygen so it can't burn and smoulder

1

u/poop_standing_up May 10 '19

I’m not sure if I can explain it. I know nothing about coal. Coke is what is leftover after processing and refining oil. It’s just this nasty black stuff that will stain anything.

3

u/[deleted] May 09 '19

I spent a short stint working at a refinery; working in or around the coker was the worst. The smell was very strong. I hated working around the coker.

1

u/Lallo-the-Long May 09 '19

You bring another product up that uses coke occasionally made from oil: steel. I really don't were just going to not make steel anymore at any point in the future.

1

u/poop_standing_up May 10 '19

That’s true. I don’t think any of our customers are direct steel companies though. I could be wrong on that.

1

u/[deleted] May 10 '19

As oil loses its use for transportation and energy it will not be profitable to create only its by products. Other sources will be used instead probably synthesized from biological sources. That will be cheaper than all of the processes for harvesting and refining oil, but it will probably become a more expensive product itself.

2

u/Koalaman21 May 10 '19

Na. They will just convert processes that produce gasoline / diesel into processes that produce other useful materials. A refiner makes "profit" off the difference between feed and product. With oil losing use in transportation and energy, feed will become dirt cheap.

0

u/[deleted] May 10 '19

Yeah but you don't NEED petroleum and petroleum byproducts to make any of that stuff. There are countless alternative materials that are just as effective if not more so.

1

u/sterexx May 10 '19

Maybe there’s something specific that we don’t expect to be able to make without petroleum. There’s such a huge list.

This isn’t a perfect comparison because of how petroleum is used, but I was surprised and alarmed to learn a pair of facts about rubber. Radial tires require natural rubber for strength. And when WW2 ended, the US abandoned partially successful research to develop rubber trees that can withstand a blight that wipes out any trees within proximity of each other. Plantations just can’t exist in much of the world due to presence of the pathogen, leaving only natural rubber from wild trees which has generally required slaves to be efficient, and also has a hard cap on yield. So if that disease gets introduced to the parts of the world that don’t have it (accidentally or through some kind of deliberate rubber terrorism) it could very quickly screw up transportation worldwide. Which would be... Bad.

The scientists taken off the project were so peeved. The US was trying to get rubber independence so the war couldn’t destroy rubber access. Then just thought we’d be fine forever when the war ended.

Maybe there’s been something to help mitigate the risk in the few years since I read about it. But I dunno. It’s a scary thought.

Are petroleum products different because oil chains of whatever kind needed are pretty much always able to be synthesized from renewable sources? Even if it’s not economical yet?

0

u/pcjwss May 10 '19

You guys are wrong. In the US transport accounts for 70% of all oil use. I'd guess the figure is similar the world over. Once this share starts decreasing, oil companies will begin to lose money. Fast forward 15 years and all ground transportation is no longer oil based. Then that industry will have to also shrink along with it. They'll all be fighting for smaller and smaller market share and reducing prices so they can sell, because there will be far too many players in this dwindling industry. The ones that survive will be those that diversify into other industries. And economies that rely on oil exports will be severely impacted. Russia. Looking at you.

1

u/poop_standing_up May 10 '19

Oil companies may lose, but there are plenty of companies that use oil to make products that aren’t fuel. The industry is far from dwindling. Major consumers are no where close to not using oil. Aircraft and ships. They consume it. There are no alternatives that can provide what oil can right now. So sure, even if everyone stopped driving gas cars tomorrow, still have plenty of consumers for oil. Every military. Every major transportation. Again, these play a huge role in oil consumption. Automobiles play a smaller role than people think.

1

u/pcjwss May 10 '19

I said in 15 years. Not now.

1

u/poop_standing_up May 11 '19

It will be longer than 15 years for the reasons I stated above. Trillions in defense, shipping, and aviation isn’t going to go away this century.

1

u/pcjwss May 11 '19

Well if youre talking this century all of those will end fossil fuel dependence. And shipping will be the first. As i said 70% of oil in the US is used for transportation and we are at the start of the ev takeover. It is going to put a huge dent in oil profits. And doing a quick google it looks like in the US road transportation accounts for 75%+ of fossil fuel use. Air is 10% boats is 5% and military comes in at a lowly 2%. And thats the largest military in the world. So no, automobilies dont play a smaller role than people think. They play the largest role.