How oil is formed

Oil is considered worldwide as one of the fossil fuels more used in our day to day. Despite their negative effects on the environment (both during their extraction and final deposition processes), oil uses For world societies they are multiple, but summarizing them we can indicate that they are:

• Fuel in gasoline of vehicles, machinery and energy and thermal industries.
• Production of plastics in materials and tissues to give rise to objects of all kinds.

Now that we know What oil is used forlet’s see what the nature of this compound is, that is, its chemical composition. Oil is fundamentally constituted by carbon and hydrogen (Hydrocarbons), which are stored at high depth, with a characteristic oily liquid consistency. To better learn about their uses and fuels of this type, we advise you to read this other post near what fossil fuels are and how they formed.

In the next sections we will see more characteristics of oil, as well as its formation and extraction processes to know the details of this fossil fuel.

He Origin of oil It is one of the most surprised natural phenomena discovered by human beings. As a summary, the oil formation process is the following:

1. For millions of years, the decomposition of organic remains of living beings (both of animals and plants) that were deposited in the marine bed and lake areas and lake areas has been given.
2. These organic remains were buried under many meters of land and rocks.
3. The pressure that these layers exert, was causing the result of the Decomposition in a medium without oxygen (anaerobic) It was an oily, viscous liquid compound, of greater density than water and dark color: oil. In addition, during this type of process, natural gas also appears.

Know How oil formedhas allowed to discover more and more oil sources around the world. In the next section we will see exactly what places it is most likely to find this hydrocarbon of fossil origin.

Did you know that in the time of Roman and Egyptian civilizations it was made of oil? However, at that time they did not have the necessary machinery and technology to access localized oil reserves, while sometimes located up to 5,000 meters deep.

As we have seen in the previous sections, given the chemical composition and oil formation, it is essential to have large sources of organic matter and water resources which are in depth and subject to high pressures. In this way, the ideal places for oil formation are, in the first place, in the Oceanic depthsfollowed by coastal areasas well as in River, lake and lagoons mouths.

Some examples of countries and regions of the planet in which large oil sources have been discovered are:

• Venezuela.
• Saudi Arabia.
• Canada.
• Iran.
• Russia.
• Nigeria.
• USA.
• Brazil.

The Petroleum extraction methods They depend, fundamentally, on the location of the oil source, that is, either in land or marine areas. Due to the pressure exerted by sediments and rocks on oil sourcesthis tends to be expelled to the earth’s surface by channels and cracks once these rocks that make a warehouse in which oil accumulated for millions of years are perforated.

Thus, to know the issue well, it is also necessary to take into account these processes on the oil extraction process:

• Start by having the appropriate machinery and technology that allows, on the one hand, to perform Topographic and drilling studies of the land and, on the other hand, Extract and store oil in pipes and special storage systems.
• Said first oil is also called raw. This cannot be used directly, but needs to go through one or more Refining processes (through fractional distillation), according to the final type of oil that is desired to obtain, for example, the liquefied petroleum gas resulting from butane and propane during the refinement of oil.
• Others Oil types They follow a classification according to their density (light-medium-pesado-extra heavy) or according to their composition (paraffinic, naphthenic or mixed base).

In addition, by applying different temperatures during the oil refining process, various Petroleum derivativessuch as:

• Methane
• The butane.
• Gasoline
• The kerosene.
• Fuelolio.
• Paraffins.
• The targets.

All these oil derivatives also have various industrial uses. If you are interested in learning more about this fossil fuel, you can enter the links to our articles about black tides and the environmental impact of oil and natural gas.

If you want to read more articles similar to How oil is formedwe recommend that you enter our category of non -renewable energy.