The Real Origin of Oil
The usual story of oil's origin is that it's fossilised plant or animal material that turned into oil when compressed, hence the term fossil fuel. Really? In the (excellent) novel The Emperor's Tomb by Steve Berry, one of the plot points is that oil doesn't really come from organic material (biotic) - but is naturally formed (abiotic) deep within the earth. In the author's note at the back separating the fact from the fiction, Berry has to say the following about the facts that inspired that element of the novel: The debate between biotic and abiotic oil is real, and continues to this day. Does oil come from decaying organism or is it naturally produced by the earth? One source is finite, the other infinite. the Russians, at Stalin's prodding, pioneered the abiotic theory in the 1950s and continue to find oil, utilizing the concept, in places where fossil fuels could never exist (chapters 15 and 17). Likewise, as Stephanie Nelle points out in...