Is oil a renewable resource?

We start clarifying that Oil is not a renewable resource. But then, Why is oil a non -renewable resource?

On the one hand, renewable resources or potentially renewable resources are those that can be regenerated through natural processes at a speed higher than that of human needs. On the other hand, non -renewable resources are those in which there is no replacement or it is extremely slow, so that it is not able to compensate for consumption by the human being. Therefore, the latter are present in nature in limited amounts.

In the case of oil, to continue with the current consumption and without finding new oil deposits, it is estimated that their reserves can be exhausted around 2070. Thus, oil is clearly a non -renewable resource and, therefore, also a non -renewable source of energy that takes millions of years as we will see below.

As a summary, this is the oil formation process:

1. Oil originated from the massive death of Marine plankton and algaedue to sudden changes of salinity or water temperature.
2. Then, that organic matter was deposited next to one hundred and sand in anxical conditions and were subsequently buried under heavy layers of sediments for millions of years.
3. Before forming oil as such, the Sayic Barroswhich are simply dark sludge formed by the aforementioned components (organic matter, one hundred and sand).
4. What happens next, is that Organic matter becomes hydrocarbons For a fermentation process, while sand and hundreds are transformed into sedimentary rocks (sandstones and marls) that constitute the mother rock, which is impregnated by such hydrocarbons.
5. As oil density is rather low, this tends to emerge towards the surface and dissipates in the atmosphere leaving a bituminous solid residue (this occurs, for example, on the bituminous blackboards of Puertollano). However, if while oil begins to ascend, it runs into an impermeable mass, the underlying porous rocks will accumulate and impregnate what is called warehouse rocks or storage rocks. These are, consequently, the reservoir or deposit from which oil is extracted.

Here we tell you much more about how oil forms.

Once the deposit is located and proven its viability, the oil extraction. To do this, drilling techniques are used to make extraction wells.

Oil is extracted in crude oilformed by a mixture of Gaseous, liquid and solid hydrocarubwhich cannot be consumed directly. Thus, for its use it must go through a series of refining processes. The first is known as fractionated distillation and consists of raising the temperature progressively in order to separate the different fractions or parts that compose it, from lower to higher boiling point: first of all, the gaseous products (butane, ethane, methane, etc.) separate in a upper chamber, then the liquids (kerosene, fuel, gasoline, etc.) and final deposited in the lower areas.

Hydrocarbons thus obtained are not yet suitable for consumption, so some treatments that consist of improving their octane, that is, the anti -domaining capacity of the fuel will suffer later. Finally, it is transported through acquaintances Pipelinesalthough the most common form of transport is through large oil tankers.

The main environmental impact caused by the Use of oil It is associated with the combustion of its derived products. On the one hand, combustion causes pollution to increase particles, nitrous oxides, sulfur oxides, etc. On the other hand, they detach themselves Large amounts of CO2 to the atmosphere, whose accumulation in the atmosphere is generating climate change.

As if this were not enough, the use of large oil container ships have a high risk of accidents, having oil spills consequences that can certainly be unfortunate. Being the lightest oil than water, in case of escape it can be extended by marine surfaces, which, in the first instance, slows the oxygen entry and eliminates all existing life (they are the so -called Black tides). Some examples of black tides are the shipwrecks of the tankers Exxon Valdez or the prestige and the events occurred during the Gulf War.

Despite these problems, we cannot yet abandon its use, since much of society would be paralyzed. The solution involves replacing it little by little with other alternative energies that have a lower environmental impact on the environment.

We tell you much more in this other post on the environmental impact of oil.

Finally, we say goodbye to some Examples of non -renewable resources. As we had commented, oil It is a type of fossil fuel and a non -renewable resource. However, there are two more types of fossil fuels and are also non -renewable resources: Coal and natural gas. These, together with Nuclear energythey constitute the different Types of non -renewable energy sources that exist.

Other non -renewable resources are those found in finite quantities such as Minerals and also some types of rocks used in construction. Likewise, it can be considered as non -renewable resource to Underground aquifers.

In addition, to learn more about natural resources, both non -renewable and those of them, we recommend these articles about what are non -renewable resources and examples and what are renewable resources and examples.

If you want to read more articles similar to Is oil a renewable resource?we recommend that you enter our category of non -renewable energy.