Hunter Dylan Colon

OIL

OIL

• An oil is any neutral chemical substance that is a viscous liquid at ambient temperatures, is immiscible with water but soluble in alcohols or ethers. Oils have a high carbon and hydrogen content and are usually flammable and slippery (nonpolar). Oils may be animal, vegetable, or petrochemical in origin, volatile or non-volatile.

% OF USE• Production of gasoline (47%);

• Heating oil and diesel fuel (23%);

• Petrochemical feedstock (products derived from petroleum) for the manufacturing of chemicals, synthetic rubber, and plastics (18%);

• Jet fuel (10%);

• Propane (4%); and

• Asphalt (3%).

• Electric power generation (26.4%),

• Industrial use (30.3%),

• Residential use (21.6%),

• Commercial use (13.9%),

• Lease and plant fuel consumption (5%),

• Pipeline and distribution (2.6%), and

• Vehicle use (0.1%).

USES OF OIL• Gasoline

• Diesel fuel

• Heating oil

• Jet fuel

• Bunker fuel

• Fertilizers/pesticides

• Plastics

• Synthetic rubber

• Synthetic fibers

• Fertilizers/pesticides

• Dyes

• Paint

• Detergent

• Photographic film

• Food additives (canned food)

• Medicine

• Synthetic fibers (such as polyester, nylon, acrylic)

• Make-up

• Candles

ENVIRONMENTAL RISKS• When extracting oil the risk of an oil spill is always present and does in fact occur from

time to time. This takes a toll on all of the animals and hurts the ecosystem. Also it hurts the tourism industries in certain places.

• The way companies “solve” these issues is by advertising all they are doing to help and spending an unbelievable amount to fix the problem they caused. It doesn’t really solve the problem but it slightly improves their image even though they likely don’t care.

CULTURAL RISKS• The main risk is our heavy reliance on the middle east and other foreign nations for their

oil. We rely on them so heavily because off-shore drilling is not aloud in America. Oil is truly the backbone of our economy and vital for our nation to thrive. It creates an unbelievable amount of controversy and even takes center stage in presidential and government campaigns.

STUDENT RESPONSE• We do agree that oil is an extremely important resources. It is a driving part of our

economy. That being said we feel that a safe way to extract our own oil needs to be found. Relying on other countries for our most important resources give them a lot of leverage on us and problems arise often. It is a very difficult subject to find a specific solution to. We believe that if the USA could provide its own oil it could create many jobs and oil prices would be cheaper along with less reliance on foreign nations making us that more powerful as a whole.

WORKS CITED• "Natural Environment Blog." Uses of Crude Oil. N.p., n.d. Web. 21 Sept. 2012.

<http://www.natural-environment.com/blog/2008/03/06/uses-of-crude-oil/>.

• "Middle East." - Global Issues. N.p., n.d. Web. 21 Sept. 2012. <http://www.globalissues.org/issue/103/middle-east>.

• "Crude Oil Price, Oil, Energy, Petroleum, Oil Price, WTI & Brent Oil, Oil Price Charts and Oil Price Forecast." Crude Oil Price, Oil, Energy, Petroleum, Oil Price, WTI & Brent Oil, Oil Price Charts and Oil Price Forecast. N.p., n.d. Web. 21 Sept. 2012. <http://www.oil-price.net/>.