Petroleum
•Petroleum,
along with oil and coal, is classified as a fossil fuel.
•Fossil
fuels are formed when sea plants and animals die, and the remains become buried
under several thousand feet of silt, sand or mud.
•Fossil
fuels take millions of years to form and therefore petroleum is also considered
to be a non-renewable energy source.
Petroleum is
formed by hydrocarbons with the addition of certain other substances, primarily
sulphur.
Petroleum in its natural form when
first collected is usually named crude oil, and can be clear, green or black and
may be either thin like gasoline or thick like tar.
There are several major oil producing
regions around the globe. The Kuwait and Saudi Arabia's crude oil fields are
the largest
Petroleum products
•Petroleum products are useful materials derived from crude oil as it
is processed in oil refineries. Unlike petrochemicals, which are a
collection of well-defined usually pure chemical compounds, petroleum products
are complex mixtures.
Petrochemicals
•Petrochemicals are chemical products derived
from petroleum.
•Two
petrochemical classes
are olefins including ethylene and propylene, and
aromatics including benzene, toluene,
and xylene isomers.
OIL
SPILL
•An oil spill is the release of
liquid petroleum hydrocarbon into the environment, especially
marine areas, due to human activity, and is a form of pollution.
•Oil
spills may be due to releases of crude
oil from tankers, offshore platforms, drilling
rigs and wells, as well as spills of refined petroleum
products (such as gasoline, diesel) and their by-products, heavier
fuels used by large ships such as bunker fuel, or the spill of any oily
refuse or waste oil.
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