Your first refining: weathering olivine

Facts checked 1 Nov 2026

Raw Olivine won't make steel on its own. Your first refining job prepares it: weathering, which binds Carbon Dioxide into the Olivine and turns it into Weathered Olivine, ready for the acid that comes later.

How refining works

• A Process: Every refinery job follows a process: a recipe that takes set amounts of inputs and turns them into outputs. You choose how much to run, and the inputs and outputs scale with it.
• Engineers Do the Work: Refining is Engineers' work, so your tutor crew's Engineer sets the speed. A crew with no Engineer would refine at half speed.
• Set-up Time, Then Running Time: Each job starts with a fixed set-up time, however much you run, then takes longer the more you process. One big job is usually quicker than several small ones in a row.
• Lease by the Job: The Academy's refineries are leased by the job, just like its extractors. Start every job with Lease & Begin, never through the refinery's own lease window.

The weathering recipe

The process is called Olivine Enhanced Weathering. For every 4,526 kg of Olivine and 1,936 kg of Carbon Dioxide, it makes 5,140 kg of Weathered Olivine, plus some Silica.

For the warehouse goal you'll weather about 8,900 tonnes of Olivine with 3,800 tonnes of Carbon Dioxide, making about 10,000 tonnes of Weathered Olivine and around 1,600 tonnes of Silica, which you can sell.

How long it takes

Weathering is the slowest job in the Training Ground: about 14 hours of set-up before it even starts, then about 10 more hours for the full amount. Two ways to make it quicker:

• Start It First: Begin weathering as soon as you have the Olivine and Carbon Dioxide, and do everything else while it runs.
• Split It Across Refineries: Run half on one refinery and half on another at the same time. Each still has its 14 hours of set-up, but they run side by side, so the whole lot finishes several hours sooner.

Start weathering

1. Select one of the Academy's leased refineries and click Refine Materials.
2. Under Process, choose Olivine Enhanced Weathering.
3. For the Input Inventory and Output Inventory, choose your crew's warehouse.
4. Set the amount. Check that your warehouse holds enough Olivine and Carbon Dioxide for it.
5. Leave Weathered Olivine as the primary output: it's what you're making. The next lesson explains why that choice matters.
6. Check the Processing Time, click Lease & Begin, and approve in your wallet.

When the job is done, click Finish and approve, and the Weathered Olivine and Silica arrive in your warehouse.