An overview of carbon in nature

CARBON- THE ULTIMATE SUSTAINABLE PRODUCT

Carbon is life. It is also the most undervalued product on Earth. The biology of this planet generally doesn’t work at all without it. The carbon cycle is one of the best known biological and environmental processes. We currently have a technology where priceless oil and coal are oxidized for energy. This is the equivalent of selling the kids every time you want to go for a drive or use the electricity.

There are literally millions of different uses for carbon which are much more valuable to consumers and industries. It is also eminently “sustainable”. That’s not a cuss word, industry. It means big money. It’s also not a joke, consumers. It means better prices, a better life, and much better products and technology.

Try a bit of basic chemistry. The fundamentals of most organic products include carbon. It is now possible to synthesize materials which didn’t exist when the “traditional” role of carbon as a fuel was established. Synthetic stem cells, when they happen, will need carbon. So will a list of commercial products many times the size of Encyclopedia Britannica. Auxetic polymers, a sort of inverted carbon polymer which gets stronger at the pressure point, will revolutionize everything from mattresses to construction to space travel.

And that paragraph’s what you can safely say in 80 words about carbon without working up a sweat. I’m not guessing about any of this.

In short, anything which doesn’t involve setting fire to carbon is far more valuable than what we’re doing now. Polymers alone, long chain organized structures, have more uses than a dictionary is likely to find terminology. (Actually carbon is one of the main reasons that so many professional reference texts have to be rewritten so often. They keep coming up with new products.) Compounds using good quality carbon are good chemistry and good product.

Byproducts are another point. Even the wastes from oil production have uses. Sulphur has almost endless uses. In medicine, to use only one example, there are more sulphur based products than a phone book would dare print.

The problem with the current “argument” about oil and coal is that it simply doesn’t address the possibilities of the products. The oil companies can distribute any alternative fuel through existing networks, and have their current carbon production turned into something far more valuable. Coal can be adapted to creating complex polymers. It’s been done, extremely