Have you ever heard the myth that oil comes from dinosaurs? The idea that we are pumping refined velociraptor directly into our cars at the gas station is quite perplexing. Despite its popularity, it is completely false. In reality, oil is not made from the decomposed bodies of ancient dinosaurs.
“For some strange reason, the idea that oil comes from dinosaurs has stuck with many people,” geologist Reidar Müller from the University of Oslo explained to Science Norway. “But oil comes from trillions of tiny algae and plankton.”
As algae and plankton died tens to hundreds of millions of years ago, they sank to the bottom of the sea, where they accumulated and were buried by layers and layers of sediment. Despite the misconception, the truth is that after millions of years in a high-pressure and low-oxygen environment, the algae and plankton got “cooked” and turned into that sticky black oil we humans seem to be so reliant on despite the pressing issue of a climate emergency. From there, it seeps upwards until it encounters impermeable rock, necessitating human intervention or some other natural disaster to set it free.
While marine dinosaurs – or a T. Rex that discovered swimming was not its forte – may find themselves at the bottom of the ocean after death, it’s highly unlikely they would get converted into oil themselves.
This is because an oxygen-deprived environment is needed to convert organic matter into oil. Upon death, they would have been consumed by smaller aquatic creatures, gradually decomposing long before they could undergo the process of fossilization and burial.
But why aren’t dinosaur bones found everywhere, you might wonder? Well, we’re about to explain that.
