Coal, oil, peat are some of the most common fuels and they are all based on debating material. What makes material like this such a great fuel when it’s aged over huge period of time.
In: Geology
Coal, oil and peat are actually ancient plant/plankton. In the Long ago, when they were alive, they spent all their time collecting CO2 from the air and sunlight to produce food (photosynthesis). The C in CO2 is carbon, which is a basic building block for all life on earth. The plants/plankton use the carbon to literally grow (build more of them selves). The carbon contains a lot of energy in it’s chemical bonds, and when burned releases that energy as heat. Same reason wood is/was used as fuel.
There were times in Earth history, that particular plants exploded in population. For example, the carboniferous Era. Millions of trees grow in a warm and humid ancient Earth for millions of years, but due to a changing climate, most of the forests died and all the wood of these forests, over time, was crushed and heated to form coal. Similar thing happened with the plankton and oil.
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