Petroleum

Abstract

One hears and reads various uses of the word “petroleum,” mostly by people outside the industry, which lead to confusion when considering quantities of energy resources. An appropriate definition for petroleum is: “A naturally occurring, oily liquid, consisting mostly of hydrocarbons, with small amounts of other compounds.” The key elements of this definition are the terms naturally occurring, oily liquid, and mostly hydrocarbons. Thus, liquids produced synthetically from other materials should not be called petroleum. Materials that contain hydrogen and carbon but are solid in the natural state cannot appropriately be called petroleum. The organic material in oil shale, either as it occurs in the rock or after release from the rock, should not be called petroleum. To further distinguish petroleum from related organic materials, people in the industry have identified the heavy, black organic material in tar sands by the name “bitumin,” and heavy oils estimated at more than one trillion barrels in Venezuela alone, which are too viscous to be recovered by current techniques, are called “black oils.” By adhering to these definitions, quantities assigned to the various energy resources become meaningful; otherwise, they are without meaning.