The standoff in the strait of Hormuz has shown just how dependent the world’s economy is on fossil fuels. From petrochemicals to plastics and fertiliser, they all begin life as oil or gas – but are there alternatives? Can we loosen the grip that fossil fuels have on our lives?

While solutions to wean the transport system off imported oil are well understood – albeit not fully implemented – substituting the plethora of petrochemicals that underpin everyday life is a much more challenging task.

Chemicals produced from oil and gas make up 90% of all raw materials, according to the International Energy Agency, which says they are “intimately engrained in our daily routines: toothbrushes, carrier bags, food packaging, mobile phones, computers, carpets, clothes, furniture … and these are just the items we see every day.”

Petrochemicals account for 14% of oil demand and 8% of fossil gas, the IEA says, but remain a “blind spot” in the global energy debate.

Assoc Prof Stuart Walsh, a resources engineer at Monash University, says crude oil and petrochemicals can be found in “just about everything we interact with every day”. “It’s almost hard to enumerate them because they’re so ubiquitous.”