Uses of crude oil refined products

Petrochemicals are chemicals made from petroleum (crude oil) and natural gas. Petroleum and natural gas are made up of hydrocarbon molecules, which are comprised of one or more carbon atoms, to which hydrogen atoms are attached. Currently, oil and gas are the main sources of the raw materials because they are the least expensive, most readily available, and can be processed most easily from crude oil. Only about five percent of the oil and gas consumed each year is needed to make all the petrochemical products. Petrochemicals have had a dramatic impact on our food, clothing, shelter and leisure. Some typical petrochemical intermediates are: - Vinyl acetate for paint, ethylene glycol for polyester - textile fibers - styrene which is important in rubber and plastic manufacturing.

Effects of petroleum industry on the environment

Air pollution; Exhaust

Hydrocarbon + oxygen

water + carbon dioxide.

When oil or petroleum distillates are combusted usually the combustion is not complete. This means that incompletely burned compounds are created in addition to just water and carbon dioxide. The other compounds are often toxic to life; examples are carbon monoxide and methanol. Also, fine particulates of soot blacken humans' and other animals' lungs and cause heart problems or death. Benzene is present in automobile exhaust. More important for vapours from spills of diesel and crude oil are aliphatic, volatile compounds. Although "less toxic" than compounds like benzene, their overwhelming abundance can still cause health concerns even when benzene levels in the air are relatively low.

Acid rain;

Trees killed by Acid Rain 1

Nitrogen + Oxygen = Nitrous oxide High temperatures created by the combustion of petroleum causes nitrogen gas in the surrounding air to oxidize, creating nitrous oxides. Nitrous oxides, along with sulphur dioxide from the sulphur in the crude oil, combine with water in the atmosphere to create acid rain. Acid rain causes many problems such as dead trees and acidified lakes with dead fish as coral reefs in the world's oceans are killed by acidity of the water. Climate change; Humans burning large amounts of petroleum create large amounts of CO2 (carbon dioxide) gas that traps heat in the earth's atmosphere. Also some organic compounds, such as methane released from petroleum drilling or from the petroleum itself, trap heat several times more efficiently than CO2. This contributes to Global warming and has far reaching effects on the ecosystem.

Oil spills;

A bird covered in oil from the Black Sea 1

An oil spill is the release of a liquid petroleum hydrocarbon into the environment, especially marine areas, due to human activity, and is a form of pollution. The term is usually applied to marine oil spills, where oil is released into the ocean or coastal waters, but spills may also occur on land. Spilt oil penetrates into the structure of the plumage of birds and the fur of mammals, reducing its insulating ability, and making them more vulnerable to temperature fluctuations. Cleanup and recovery from an oil spill is difficult and depends upon many factors, including the type of oil spilled, the temperature of the water (affecting evaporation and biodegradation), and the types of shorelines and beaches involved. Spills may take weeks, months or even years to clean up. Oil spills may be due to releases of crude oil from tankers, refined petroleum products or waste oil. Waste oil is used oil containing not only breakdown products but also impurities from use. Some examples of waste oil are used oils such as hydraulic oil, transmission oil, brake fluids, this poisons both soil and drinking water especially as runoff from storms carries waste oil into rivers and oceans.

Fractional distillation of crude oil

Crude oil is separated into fractions by fractional distillation, it separates a mixture into a number of different parts, called fractions. A tall column is fitted above the mixture, with several condensers coming off at different heights. This is based on the characteristic of boiling point; the furnace is used to provide suitably high temperatures between 350 - 400oC so that the hydrocarbon groups of which crude oil is comprised separates and raises up the column to be collected at the specific temperature it cools at.

The column is hot at the bottom and cool at the top. Fractions at the top of the fractionating column have lower boiling points than the fractions at the bottom; the heavy bottom fractions have more carbon atoms making it "heavier". Therefore, it is the higher is its molecular weight and has a higher boiling point than the light gasses. In some cases, distillation columns are operated at less than atmospheric pressure (vacuum) to lower the temperature at which a hydrocarbon mixture boils. This "vacuum distillation" (VDU) reduces the chance of thermal decomposition (cracking) due to over heating the mixture. Note; Small quantities of a crude oil may be composed of compounds containing oxygen, nitrogen, sulphur and metals. Sulphur content ranges from traces to more than 5 per cent. If a crude oil contains appreciable quantities of sulphur it is called sour crude; if it contains little or no sulphur it is called sweet crude.

Catalytic cracking; (VIDEO) Heat and catalysts are used to convert the heavier oils to lighter products using three "cracking" methods: fluid catalytic cracking (FCC), hydrocracking (Isomax), and coking (or thermal-cracking). The Fluid Catalytic Cracker (FCC) uses high temperature and catalyst to crack 86,000 barrels (3.6 million gallons) each day of heavy gas oil mostly into gasoline. Hydrocracking uses catalysts to react gas oil and hydrogen under high pressure and high temperature to make both jet fuel and gasoline. In the Delayed Coking Unit (Coker), 98,000 barrels a day of low-value residuum is converted (using the coking, or thermal-cracking process) to high-value light products, producing petroleum coke as a byproduct. The large residuum molecules are cracked into smaller molecules when the residuum is held in a coke drum at a high temperature for a period of time. Only solid coke remains and must be drilled from the coke drums.