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How do “Conventional” oil fields/petroleum pools/ aka
“Oil Traps” form?1) Need Source Rock (different
types)(sedimentary layers originally containing
organic C)
2) Need burial / Heat and Pressureapplied to source rocks to promote Kerogen conversions
3) Concentrate petroleum into a pool--> HC compounds can Migratefrom source rocks into rocks that can become saturated with petroleum.
4) Need Reservoir Rock: permeable rock whose pore space is saturated with oil/gas
and one last thing……..>>>>
How do oil fields/petroleum pools form?
5) To accumulate a pool, the
HC must be trapped in the Reservoir Rock:
Need Cap Rock:impermeable layer that
halts migration of fluids
(e.g. shale, salt deposit)
Common “Oil Traps”include anticlines,
faults, salt domes &
stratigraphic
Why use Oil?
• It burns
• Yields lots of energy
• It’s relatively cheap
• It flows
• Easy to extract or pump it out
• Easy to transport
• Not much land disruption
• It’s abundant
At end of 2011, world proven crude oil reserves stood at over >1.4 trillion Barrels (~1,482 billion barrels)
1,481,526
• can be converted to useful materials
Refining Crude Oil
Heating / distilling separates crude oil into
components with different boiling points
Lightest components rise: petroleum gases,
gasoline. Then kerosene (used as jet fuel),
heating oil, and diesel fuel for trucks, buses,
trains, and ships. Heaviest fractions stay at
the bottom of the column: lubricating oils,
waxes and asphalt.
Petrochemicals are products of oil distillation, over 4,000. Common
“end-products” are pesticides, plastics, fibers, paints, synthetic rubbers and medicines
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*Includes both home heating oil and diesel fuel
**Heavy oils used as fuels in industry, marine transportation, and for electric power
generation (Source: American Petroleum Institute)
A bi-product of oil & coal used as fuel, and
in smelting iron ore
Mostly methane, ethane, propane, butane
42 Gallons/Barrel
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6eCt0VDg-KcHow is Plastic Made 2:54
Sweet crude oil is a type of petroleum with
less than 0.42% sulfur. Petroleum containing
higher levels of sulfur is called sour crude oil.
Sweet crude oil contains small amounts of
hydrogen sulfide and carbon dioxide. Source: Wiki
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ed7XJeXl3b4How Plastic Bottles are Made 3:11
Why use Natural Gas?
• Burns hotter than oil
• It’s cleaner than oil
• Easy to extract
• Easy to transport
• Yields lots of energy
• Global reserves up 140% since 1973
• Not much land disruption
Disadvantages of using Oil & Natural Gas?
• Often degrades fresh air, soil and water
• Emits greenhouse gases (CO2, CH4) and other
damaging gases (CO, NOx, SOx, H2S)
• Gases contributes to global climate change
Causes acid deposition
• Can be explosive
• Not much time left at current rate of use
• Damaging leaks, spills and runoff are common in the world’s oceans….
San Francisco Bay Wednesday November 7th, 2007
~58,000 gallons of “oil” spilled from the 926-foot ship Cosco
Busan after tanker hits Bay Bridge; Coast Guard determines
cause was human error.
“Bunker Fuel” is a general name given to any type of fuel oil
used aboard ships.
Investigators found that pilot John Cota of the Costco Busan
abandoned his radar because he was high on pharmaceuticals.
On March 6, 2009, A plea agreement was negotiated with
prosecutors to charges of federal water pollution and
migratory bird killings.
He was sentenced in July 2009 to 10 months imprisonment
and fined between $3,000 and $30,000. He’s currently
trying to pilot again.
Pilots now earn $451,000 /yr & Cota’s pension is ~$228,864/yr
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Is petroleum formation likely to happen again soon?• No.• No petroleum found in rocks younger than 1-2 million years so it’s
extremely likely it takes at least this long for petroleum to form.
• It’s estimated that <0.1% of all marine organic matter buried on the sea floor is eventually trapped as usable petroleum.
• Some settings lack adequate heat to convert kerogen to petroleum
• Some settings lack sufficient depth or the necessary cap rock to burry and trap fluids from escape.
• Conditions required to produce, concentrate, trap and retain hydrocarbons are rarely observed together--> most marine sedimentary rocks lack petroleum.
• Geologic processes can destroy oil traps. Uplift, erosion and faulting can remove cap rocks or rupture traps allowing oil or gas to escape at the surface. Majority of current oil reserves are in rocks < 160 my old. 90 &150my common
• >90% of all petroleum formed escapes @ Earth’s surface.
Abiotic Oil?Some challenge the accepted view of petroleum formation being
exclusively from biological material.
Extraterrestrial occurrences used to support hydrocarbons may
be inorganic:
� Outer planets and moons contain methane.
� Some stony meteorites (chondrites) contain hydrocarbons.
Carbonaceous chondrites (5% of all chondrites) are a type of stony meteorites that contain Silicates, Oxides, Sulfides and traces of various hydocarbons, including amino acids. Most chondrites (86% of all meteorites) are rich in silicate minerals olivine and pyroxenes. (Iron meteorites account for <6% of all meteorites but make up ~90% of the mass of all known meteorites.)
� Since hydrocarbons formed from inorganic reactions in the above 2 examples, some think hydrocarbons on earth may have formed in a similar way.
Abiotic Oil?� Methane is present in volcanoes (1% - 15%). Abiotic oil from
the mantle that migrated upward, or volcanoes erupting through a
cover of sediments already containing some hydrocarbons?
� Some laboratory experiments using a high-pressure and high
temperature apparatus have produced petroleum from solid iron
oxide (FeO), marble (CaCO3) and H2O –with no biotic compounds
or hydrocarbons originally present.
Could petroleum be produced abiotically? Yes, inassociation with extraterrestrial and internal igneousactivity but it’s not commercial grade.
Could petroleum be produced from recycling various waste?
Yes….
• Thermal Conversion Process (TCP)Changing of manure and/or animal & vegetable waste to crude
oil.
• Thermal Depolymerization (TDP)
Can change many carbon-based materials into crude oil and
methane, and is not limited to manure or vegetable waste. Web
Link: ““““Anything into Oil””””, Discover Vol. 27 April 2006
http://discovermagazine.com/2006/apr/anything-oil
• Pyrolysis
Decomposition of organic material at high temperatures without
oxygen. Web link: Clean Oceans International
http://cleanoceansinternational.org/
Carthage Missouri plant opens in Feb 2005.
270 tons turkey guts & 20 tons of pig fat can yield 500 barrels oil worth ~$42,000/day. Other by-products: fertilizer and water.
Problems: initial high cost, odors and emission violations. US
consumes >22 million bpd175lb human = 38lbs oil, 7lbs gas, 7lbs mineral & 123 lbs water
175
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Top Producing Oil Countries as of 2014 BBL/Day
1 United States 13,973,000
2 Saudi Arabia (OPEC) 11,624,000
3 Russia 10,853,000
4 China 4,572,000
5 Canada 4,383,000
6 United Arab Emirates (OPEC) 3,471,000
7 Iran (OPEC) 3,375,000
8 Iraq (OPEC) 3,371,000
9 Brazil 2,950,000
10 Mexico 2,812,000
11 Kuwait (OPEC) 2,780,000 1
2 Venezuela (OPEC) 2,689,000
13 Nigeria (OPEC) 2,427,000
14 Qatar (OPEC) 2,055,000
15 Norway 1,904,000
16 Angola (OPEC) 1,756,000
17 Algeria (OPEC) 1,721,000
18 Kazakhstan 1,719,000
19 Colombia 1,016,000
20 India 978,000 t
List includes conventionaland unconventional sources
Approximate US Energy breakdown(notice 86% is from Fossil Fuels)
How long will current conventional oil reserves last?
• Known and projected global oil reserves expected to be 80% depleted in 42 – 93 yrs. At the rate of consumption in 2008, OPEC’s reserves will last ~85 yrs.
• Known recoverable US reserves is ~21 billion barrels and US consumes ~22 million barrels/day.
US reserves with no oil imported:21 billion barrels/22 million barrels/day = 2.6 years
US imports ~13.5 million barrels of oil/day (~61% of 22 mill).
21 billion barrels/the remaining 8.5 million US barrels use/day = 6.7 years
• Opening the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to drilling would add ~4 – 10 months
• Saudi Arabia alone could supply world for ~10 yrs.
• Global oil consumption is expected to increase >30% by 2020.» Source: G.Griggs, UCSC
Peak Oil = the midpoint of depletion, when ½ the total has been taken.
Other sources of Oil / UnconventionalOil Shale and Oil Sand (aka “Heavy Oils”)
Oil still in Source RockOil Shale:
Sedimentary rock containing organic kerogen (altered org matter in Sed Rk)
– never buried deep enough to raise temperature required to convert
Kerogen to liquid oil
– Massive deposits underlie US
(estimate 2-5 trillion barrels)
Oil Sand/ aka Tar Sand:
mixture of sand, clay, water and
Bitumen (a viscous, heavy oil, too thick
to flow out of rock, the soluble portion of Kerogen).
– Alberta Canada extensive deposits--few in US
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Oil Shale Resources of North AmericaIt’s estimated that the Green River Formation in Colorado,
Wyoming and Utah contain >400 billion barrels of oil.
“Monterey Shale”
Oil Shale Booming• Hydraulic Fracturing (Fracking): a drilling process
designed to increase the yield of oil and/or gas out
of rock; method involves fracturing surrounding
rock (increasing permeability) and pumping fluids
into the fractures under extremely high pressures to
force the desired gas or liquids out.
• As of 2012, 2.5 million "frac jobs" had been performed
worldwide on oil and gas wells; over one million of
those within the U.S.
• Oklahoma Earthquakes: between 1978 and 2008 ~2-
6/yr. In 2010 there were 1,047 earthquakes28
Web Link: Horizontal Wells and Frackinghttp://www.northernoil.com/drilling
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VY34PQUiwOQ (6.5min)
Some Fracking Practices
Steel casing, cement sleeve – protect aquifers
Horizontal drilling
Perforation
Water + sand + slickening agents + salt
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_additives_for_hydraulic_fracturing
https://fracfocus.org/chemical-use/what-chemicals-are-used
http://www.propublica.org/special/hydraulic-fracturing-national
Read this slide at home
electrical gunshots perforate
steel casing & cement, then
slickwater pressure + propping
agents fracture the shale
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How Fracking Can Impact The Environment
• water consumption, C02 output; use of diesel pumps, compressors,
drills, etc.
• methane escape & flaring
• truck traffic, emissions, habitat impacts, pipelines
The number of people who have died in Texas car crashes involving commercial vehicles has increased
by more than 50 percent since the fracking boom started there in 2008. Fatal car accidents in Texas
rose from 301 incidents in 2009 to 454 incidents in 2013, according to Texas Dept of Transportation data.
• wastewater disposal
– underground / aquifer contamination
– untreated in streams
– burden on sewage treatment plants
32~93x54 Miles
The Athabasca Tar
Sands of Alberta,
Canada
McMurray FormationFluvial and estuarine,
Early Cretaceous (146 -100my)
How much Oil Shale and Tar Sand (aka oil sand)?
• Global supplies are estimated to be 200X larger than
conventional oil.
• More oil is trapped in Canadian tar sands than Saudi Arabia
has in all it’s reserves.
• It is estimated that tar sand in Alberta & Orinico Oil Belt in
Venezuela contain nearly 3.4 trillion barrels of oil.
At end of 2010, world proven conventional crude oil reserves
stood at >1.49 trillion Barrels
Why not use these resources?
• Oil shale and sand extraction requires surface mining
– ecosystem disruption; forests, wetlands, grasslands
– huge volumes of waste rock-- only ~3 barrels of shale oil for 1 ton of rock processed
– 3 barrels of H2O/1 barrel of shale oil produced
– tailing ponds created: hold leftover water, sand, clay, bitumen, salts, metals (Ni, V, Hg, As, Pb)
– pollution floats downstream
– land reclamation issues
– lower useful energy yield than conventional oil and gas
Web Link: http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100831/full/news.2010.439.html
Web Link: Garth Lenz: The True Cost of Oil
– http://www.ted.com/talks/garth_lenz_images_of_beauty_and_devastation.html
17.4 min