It seems that every time I’m being driven someplace, I pass by one gas station after another. Sometimes, my parents realize they’re low on gas so they stop and have some gasoline pumped into the car.
But, where does this gasoline come from?
We might know that most of our energy today comes from fossil fuels. About 300 million years ago, there were plants in bogs and swamps that died. They partially decayed and turned into peat. Peat looks like soil but it is the substance that occurs when something decays. The plants had been in a wet place. So, when the place became dry, other materials settled on top of the peat. Heat, pressure and time are needed before the peat becomes coal. People have to dig extremely deep to access the coal.
Gasoline is made up of hydrogen and carbon, which makes it (creatively called) a hydrocarbon. The gasoline put into cars is made from crude oil. The crude oil that’s pumped from the ground is petroleum. Petroleum comes from very, very old seas. Ancient seas, in fact. Plankton lived in those seas, died and sank to the bottom of the ocean. Debris settled onto the plankton.
After a while, two substances were formed: Bitumen (an ingredient of petroleum) and kerogen. There is a possibility, if the conditions are perfect, that the kerogen can become a hydrocarbon. And not just any hydrocarbon — but crude oil. If the temperature is higher, kerogen can become a gaseous hydrocarbon, which is also called natural gas. Since it are less dense than the sea it is in, it floats up and forms a reservoir, which is later drilled by people.
Petroleum is dug up using rigs and then, through pipelines, it is sent to be refined. Refining means petroleum is turned into crude oil. Then, the crude oil is branded. Some examples are Exxon and Mobil. And then, the oil is sent to its respective gas stations, where it is then put into the cars’ tanks.
Another way to visualize this is that crude oil is either domestically gotten or it is imported. Then it is sent to a refinery. It is then either placed into refinery storage or pipeline storage, where it is then sent to a bulk terminal storage. Tanker trucks take the refined oil to gas stations.
Oil is a nonrenewable resource. Natural gas is another common nonrenewable resource. This means humans are using it faster than it is being produced. This could be devastating if we were to run out of the resource. Not only that, but nonrenewable resources are bad for the environment.
Renewable resources are those that can be used up at the same rate they are produced. Examples of renewable resources are wind energy, solar energy, geothermal energy, hydropower energy and biomass energy.
These renewable resources can be used in such a way that they become integrated into daily lives. If we all switch to renewable resources, we can have a clean environment and not worry about running out of resources.
Vaageesha Das is a 10th grader at Morgantown High School. Today’s information comes from: https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/gasoline/where-our-gasoline-comes-from.php; https://www.exxon.com/en/fuel-journey; https://www.sciencenewsforstudents.org/article/explainer-where-fossil-fuels-come; https://science.howstuffworks.com/gasoline2.htm.
