Crude oil currently makes the world go round. It is the most important raw material for the global economy and is synonymous with prosperity and progress. It powers cars, planes and ships, and is the feedstock for the production of base chemicals, plastics, paints and many other products in our everyday lives.
The secret to crude oil’s success is its high carbon content. Carbon, a chemical element with the symbol C, can be used to create almost all chemical compounds, making it the most important building block for the chemical industry. No other chemical compound can be used to produce such an extensive variety of molecular architectures, including infinitely long chains, rings and 3D networks.
Carbon is therefore crucial to industrial production. And with 85-90% carbon content, crude oil has a lot to offer. “However, carbon is also present in natural raw materials,” explains Prof. Thomas Hirth, Head of the Fraunhofer Institute for Interfacial Engineering and Biotechnology (IGB) in Stuttgart.
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