Oil is such a valuable resource because it has many uses. Crude oil (its natural state) is refined into different types of oil. Fuel oil comes in many forms: gasoline (petrol) for motor vehicles; has oil for diesel and central heating fuel; kerosene for aircraft jet engines. These and other oil products can be processed to make chemicals used in plastics, lubricants, drugs and solvents.
Crude oil and other liquids produced from fossil fuels are refined into petroleum products that people use for many different purposes. Biofuels, such as ethanol and biodiesel, are also used as petroleum products, mainly in mixtures with gasoline and diesel fuel.
Petroleum is the largest U.S. energy source. We use petroleum products to propel vehicles, to heat buildings, and to produce electricity. In the industrial sector, the petrochemical industry uses petroleum as a raw material (a feedstock) to make products such as plastics, polyurethane, solvents, and hundreds of other intermediate and end-user goods.
In 2018, U.S. petroleum consumption averaged about 20.50 million barrels per day (b/d), which included about 1.2 million b/d of biofuels. Gasoline is the most consumed petroleum product in the United States. In 2018, consumption of finished motor gasoline averaged about 9.33 million b/d (392 million gallons per day), which was equal to about 45% of total U.S. petroleum consumption.
Distillate fuel oil is the second most-consumed petroleum product in the United States. Distillate fuel oil includes diesel fuel and heating oil. Diesel fuel is used in the diesel engines of heavy construction equipment, trucks, buses, tractors, boats, trains, some automobiles, and electricity generators. Heating oil, also called fuel oil, is used in boilers and furnaces for heating homes and buildings, for industrial heating, and for producing electricity in power plants. Total distillate fuel oil consumption in 2018 averaged about 4.15 million b/d, which was equal to 20% of total U.S. petroleum consumption.
Hydrocarbon gas liquids (HGL), the third most-used category of petroleum in the United States, include propane, ethane, butane, and other hydrocarbon gas liquids that are produced at natural gas processing plants and oil refineries. HGL consumption in 2018 averaged about 3.01 million b/d. The petrochemical industry uses HGL as feedstock for making many products.
Propane, a heavily consumed HGL, is also used in homes for space heating and water heating, for clothes drying, for cooking, for heating greenhouses and livestock housing, for drying crops, and as a transportation fuel.
Jet fuel is the fourth most-used petroleum product in the United States. Jet fuel consumption averaged about 1.71 million b/d in 2018.
picture Credit : Google
