By Ross Pomeroy
June 29, 2015 (realclearscience.com)
The world runs on oil. According to the United States Energy Information Administration, in 2011, the 6.965 billion people on Earth collectively used about 3,669,353,105 gallons of the stuff, combusting it in cars as gasoline, laying it down in asphalt, and processing it into lubricants.
Our reliance on this energy-dense liquid prompts questions. For starters, what the heck is it? Oil consists of hydrocarbons — compounds containing carbon and hydrogen — and other carbon-containing (organic) compounds. When combusted, oil’s hydrogen-carbon bonds split apart, releasing a large amount of energy, energy that can be harnessed.
Oil is cheered by some and maligned by others. Everyone seems to have an opinion on it. Out of the incessant discussion, myths have arisen. Here are five of them.
Myth #1: Oil is mostly dinosaur bones. Oil is a “fossil fuel,” formed from the remains of organisms that died millions of years ago. Dinosaurs certainly fit this description, and we dig up their fossilized bones all the time! But though dinosaurs reigned for 135 million years, not many of them died in a position where they could be buried and crushed over the eons into coal, natural gas, or oil.
“If you took all of the dinosaurs that ever lived and… squished them up in order to get the oil out of them, we’d probably go through that oil in… a couple of days,” paleontologist Jack Horner told Vsauce.
In actuality, the oil used to make the gasoline in your car almost certainly formed from oceanic microorganisms like plankton and algae that lived millions, if not billions, of years ago. When they died, they sank to the bottom of the ocean and began to decompose. Over time, they became buried. As more and more sediment formed on top of them, heat and pressure crushed them into fossil fuels.
Myth #2: Americans use the most oil. This is only partly true. By far and away, the U.S. consumes the most oil of any other country. But on a per capita basis, Americans aren’t the world-leading gas-guzzlers. We rank 22nd, behind countries like Singapore, Kuwait, Luxembourg, Bermuda, and our neighbor to the north: Canada.
Myth #3: All crude oil is black. When you think of oil, you probably picture a black sludge. Most oil is black, but it can be yellow, red, or even green in hue. Crude oil’s color is a clear indicator of quality — the more contaminants that are present, the darker it will be. The highest quality oil will actually resemble the vegetable or olive oil in your kitchen: amber or golden in color.
Myth #4. The first commercial oil well was in the U.S. Though Edwin Drake’s relatives might claim otherwise, their ancestor’s commercial oil well in Titusville, Pennsylvania was not the first of its kind. Wells in Russia, Poland, and Romania were already in operation. Drake’s well did, however, attract the first great wave of investment into oil drilling and refining.
Myth #5. The world will run out of oil very soon. Oil’s demise has been greatly exaggerated for decades. There’s no question that fossil fuels are finite, but predicting when they will run dry is no easy task. Proven reserves continue to increase the more we explore and as technology advances. It may be more likely that humanity will phase out the use of fossil fuels before we even run out. But with demand still increasing, nobody precisely knows when that will be, either.
(Images: AP, Niagara)
