Uses of Gas Oil
Us Petroleum Holdings Oil has many uses; it heats homes and businesses and fuels trucks, ships and some cars. A small amount of electricity is produced by diesel, but it is more polluting and more expensive than natural gas. It is often used as a backup fuel for peaking power plants in case the supply of natural gas is interrupted or as the main fuel for small electrical generators. In Europe the use of diesel is generally restricted to cars (about 40%), SUVs (about 90%), and trucks (virtually all). The market for home heating using fuel oil, called heating oil, has decreased due to the widespread penetration of natural gas. However, it is very common in some areas, such as the Northeastern United States.
Residual fuel oil is less useful because it is so viscous that it has to be heated with a special heating system before use and it contains relatively high amounts of pollutants, particularly sulfur, which forms sulfur dioxide upon combustion. However, its undesirable properties make it very cheap. In fact, it is the cheapest liquid fuel available. Since it requires heating before use, residual fuel oil cannot be used in road vehicles, boats or small ships, as the heating equipment takes up valuable space and makes the vehicle heavier. Heating the oil is also a delicate procedure, which is inappropriate to do on small, fast moving vehicles. However, power plants and large ships are able to use residual fuel oil.
Residual fuel oil was used more frequently in the past. It powered boilers, railroad locomotives and steamships. Locomotives now use diesel, steamships are still used however are not as common as they were previously due to their higher operating costs, (most LNG carriers use steam plants as boil off gas emitted from the cargo can be used as a fuel source), and most boilers now use heating oil or natural gas. However, some industrial boilers still use it and so do a few old buildings, mostly in New York City. Residual fuel’s use in electricity generation has also decreased. In 1973, residual fuel oil produced 16.8% of the electricity in the United States. By 1983, it had fallen to 6.2%, and as of 2005, electricity production from all forms US Petroleum Holdings of petroleum, including diesel and residual fuel, is only 3% of total production. The decline is the result of price competition with natural gas and environmental restrictions on emissions. For power plants, the costs of heating the oil, extra pollution control and additional maintenance required after burning it often outweigh the low cost of the fuel. Burning fuel oil, particularly residual fuel oil, also produces much darker smoke than natural gas, which affects the perception of the plant by the community.
Heavy fuel oils continue to be used in the boiler “lighting up” facility in every coal-fired power plant, of which there are a small number in the UK and dozens in China. Although on an enormous scale, it is analogous to lighting kindling to start a fire – without performing this simple function it is difficult to begin the large-scale combustion process.
The chief drawback to residual fuel oil is its high initial viscosity, particularly in the case of No. 6 oil, which requires a correctly engineered system for storage, pumping, and burning. Though it is still usually lighter than water (with a specific gravity usually ranging from 0.95 to 1.03) it is much heavier and more viscous than No. 2 oil, kerosene, or gasoline. No. 6 oil must, in fact, be stored at around 100°F (37.8°C) heated to 150°F (65.6°C)–250°F (121.1°C) before it can be easily pumped, and in cooler temperatures it can congeal into a tarry semisolid. The flash point of most blends of No. 6 oil is, incidentally, about 150°F (65.6°C). Attempting to pump high-viscosity oil at low temperatures was a frequent cause of damage to fuel lines, furnaces, and related equipment which were often designed with lighter fuels in mind.
(For comparison, BS2869 Class G Heavy Fuel Oil behaves in similar fashion, requiring storage at 104°F (40°C), pumping at around 122°F (50°C) and finalising for burning at around 194°F (90°C) / 248°F (120°C).)
Most of the facilities which historically burned No. 6 or other residual oils were industrial plants and similar facilities constructed in the early or mid 20th century, or which had switched from coal to oil fuel during the same time period. In either case, residual oil was seen as a good prospect because it was cheap and readily available, even though it provided less energy per litre than lighter fuels. Most of these facilities have subsequently been closed and demolished, or have replaced their fuel supplies with a simpler one such as gas or No. 2 oil. The high sulfur content of No. 6 oil– up to 3% by weight in some extreme cases– had a corrosive effect on many heating systems (which were usually designed without adequate corrosion protection in mind), shortening their lifespans and increasing the polluting effects. This was particularly the case in furnaces that were regularly shut down and allowed to go cold; the internal condensation produced sulfuric acid.
Environmental cleanups at such facilities are frequently complicated by the use of asbestos insulation on the fuel feed lines. No. 6 oil is very persistent, and does not degrade rapidly. Its viscosity and stickiness also make remediation of underground contamination very difficult, since it reduces the effectiveness of methods such as air-stripping.
When released into water, such as a river or ocean, residual oil tends to break up into patches or tarballs– mixtures of oil and particulate matter such as silt and floating organic matter- rather than form a single slick. An average of about 5-10% of the material will evaporate within hours of the release, primarily the lighter hydrocarbon fractions. The remainder will then often sink to the bottom of the water column.
Alternative methods petroleum extraction
Alternative methods
During the oil price increases of 2004-2008, alternatives methods of producing oil gained importance. The most widely known alternatives involve extracting oil from sources such as oil shale or tar sands. These resources exist in large quantities; however, extracting the oil at low cost without excessively harming the environment remains a challenge.
It is also possible to chemically transform methane or coal into the various hydrocarbons found in oil. The best-known such method is the Fischer-Tropsch process. It was a concept pioneered in Nazi Germany when imports of petroleum were restricted due to war and Germany found a method to extract oil from coal. It was known as Ersatz (English:”substitute”) oil, and accounted for nearly half the total oil used in WWII by Germany. However, the process was used only as a last resort as naturally occurring oil was much cheaper. As crude oil prices increase, the cost of coal to oil conversion becomes comparatively cheaper. The method involves converting high ash coal into synthetic oil in a multi-stage process. Ideally, a ton of coal produces nearly 200 liters (1.25 bbl, 52 US gallons) of crude, with by-products including tar.[citation needed]
Currently, two companies have commercialised their Fischer-Tropsch technology. Shell in Bintulu, Malaysia, uses natural gas as a feedstock, and produces primarily low-sulfur diesel fuels. [8] Sasol [9] in South Africa uses coal as a feedstock, and produces a variety of synthetic petroleum products.
The process is today used in South Africa to produce most of the country’s diesel fuel from coal by the company Sasol. The process was used in South Africa to meet its energy needs during its isolation under Apartheid. This process produces low sulfur diesel fuel ; it also is an increased threat to environment, as it produces large amounts of greenhouse gases.
An alternative method of converting coal into petroleum is the Karrick process, which was pioneered in the 1930s in the United States. It uses high temperatures in the absence of ambient air, to distill the short-chain hydrocarbons of petroleum out of coal.
More recently explored is thermal depolymerization (TDP), a process for the reduction of complex organic materials into light crude oil. Using pressure and heat, long chain polymers of hydrogen, oxygen, and carbon decompose into short-chain petroleum hydrocarbons. This mimics the natural geological processes thought to be involved in the production of fossil fuels. In theory, TDP can convert any organic waste into petroleum.
Us petroleum holdings quimics
Petroleum is a mixture of a very large number of different hydrocarbons ; the most commonly found molecules are alkanes (linear or branched), cycloalkanes, aromatic hydrocarbons, or more complicated chemicals like asphaltenes. Each petroleum variety has a unique mix of molecules, which define its physical and chemical properties, like color and viscosity.
The alkanes, also known as paraffins, are saturated hydrocarbons with straight or branched chains which contain only carbon and hydrogen and have the general formula CnH2n+2 They generally have from 5 to 40 carbon atoms per molecule, although trace amounts of shorter or longer molecules may be present in the mixture.
The alkanes from pentane (C5H12) to octane (C8H18) are refined into gasoline (petrol), the ones from nonane (C9H20) to hexadecane (C16H34) into diesel fuel and jet fuel, and the ones from hexadecane upwards into fuel oil and lubricating oil. At the heavier end of the range, paraffin wax is an alkane with approximately 25 carbon atoms, while asphalt has 35 and up, although these are usually cracked by modern refineries into more valuable products. Any shorter hydrocarbons are considered natural gas or natural gas liquids.
The cycloalkanes, also known as napthenes, are saturated hydrocarbons which have one or more carbon rings to which hydrogen atoms are attached according to the formula CnH2n. Cycloalkanes have similar properties to alkanes but have higher boiling points.
The aromatic hydrocarbons are unsaturated hydrocarbons which have one or more planar six-carbon rings called benzene rings, to which hydrogen atoms are attached with the formula CnHn. They tend to burn with a sooty flame, and many have a sweet aroma. Some are carcinogenic.
These different molecules are separated by fractional distillation at an oil refinery to produce gasoline, jet fuel, kerosene, and other hydrocarbons. For example 2,2,4-trimethylpentane (isooctane), widely used in gasoline, has a chemical formula of C8H18 and it reacts with oxygen exothermically:[6]
Incomplete combustion of petroleum or gasoline results in production of potentially toxic byproducts. Too little oxygen results in carbon monoxide. Combustion in air (which contains mostly nitrogen) results in nitric oxides. For example:
US Petroleum Holdings: Business Model
Our Business Model & Strategy:
There is no doubt that the trend in the Oil and Natural Gas market is toward higher and higher prices. The contributing factors for this are many and extremely diverse, running from political uncertainty to increased global consumption. We believe, US Petroleum Holdings, as most analysts do, that this trend will continue throughout the decade and through the next. Suffice it to say that we are in the right business, which under current circumstances will remain resilient to many of the dangerous economic forces that may arise.
West Side Proyect, Holdings Petroleum
West Speaks Field – 2 well Re-Drill
History
Shallow production of oil was driving the exploration of the West Speaks Field in the early oil boom years. Many wells were drilled in the 1960’s and early 1970’s with oil production as the main objective, not gas. The wells were drilled and logged, showing that the intervals of our present day interest were “hydrocarbon bearing”, but the technology was not there to get it out of the ground. Adding to this problem was typically a lack of gas pipelines to take this gas production to market and the prices that were being paid for this production was far less than $.30 per Thousand Cubic Feet of Gas (MCFG). These factors killed the effort towards gas production and the exploration effort was usually short-lived. Due to increases in gas pricing over the last few years, many independent oil and gas companies have re-focused their efforts in these types of areas that were drilled during earlier times in search of oil reserves.
The West Speaks Field has been commercially productive from shallow Yegua, Frio and Miocene are oil bearing sands and the Upper Wilcox gas bearing sections, but no real commercial production existed with the deeper Middle and Lower Wilcox series until recently. This area of prolific Wilcox production has seen substantial development in the last few years with “Roeder” (Middle Wilcox) and “Migura” (Lower Wilcox) discoveries. These sections of the Middle to Lower Wilcox intervals have generated substantial commercial gas production from the field after new fracture stimulation technology was implemented during the completion operations. Larger independent companies such as El Paso Natural Gas and Dominion Exploration and Production are actively developing the Roeder & Migura Wilcox sections in the area with some new wells generating gas flows in excess of 5 Million Cubic Feet of Gas per Day.
We have identified many plugged well bores in the West Speaks Field that were drilled during the 1960’s and early 1970’s that were logged showing gas pay. Core samples were taken and determined to yield considerable hydrocarbons. Several of these wells had casing installed and were cemented. While a handful of wells were tested in the Roeder Wilcox series, they flowed a nominal amount of gas at a non-commercial rate. Many of the wells were deemed as dry holes and some of the wells were re-completed in the shallower zones. The idea of “re-entering” a plugged well bore is not new, however recent prices of oil and natural gas has brought old thinking back into the light. The wells of this program will be re-entered, in some instances deepened, and then the zones of our interest will be fracture stimulated with modern technology. This type of project is typically less expensive than drilling a new well and the geologics are heavily in favor as the site has been logged.
Henderson – Muniza #1 Re Entry Well Read more »
Lindsey Gas project: US Petroleum Holdings
Lindsey Gas Unit #1 Well Re-Entry
Hartburg Field, Orange County, Texas
History
Orange County was a relatively barren area until 1949 when oil was discovered at the Hartburg field. Between 1949 and 1971 seventeen wells were brought in, and the local economy was revitalized.
The Hartburg Field is a rollover anticline on the downtown side of a large regional growth fault in the down-dip Yegua trend found in Southeast Texas. The Yegua section here contains low resistivity pay requiring shaly sand log analysis techniques. Read more »
US Petroleum holdings a Recent Outlook
Official Energy Statistics from the U.S. GovernmentTrends in energy supply and demand are affected by many factors that are difficult to predict, such as energy prices, U.S. economic growth, advances in technologies, changes in weather patterns, and future public policy decisions. It is clear, however, that energy markets are changing gradually in response to such readily observable factors as the higher energy prices that have been experienced since 2000, the greater influence of developing countries on worldwide energy requirements, recently enacted legislation and regulations in the United States, and changing public perceptions of issues related to the use of alternative fuels, emissions of air pollutants and greenhouse gases, and the acceptability of various energy technologies, among others The Energy Information Administration projects increased consumption of biofuels (both ethanol and biodiesel), growth in coal-to-liquids (CTL) capacity and production, growing demand for unconventional transportation technologies (such as flex-fuel, hybrid, and diesel vehicles), growth in nuclear power capacity and generation, and accelerated improvements in energy efficiency throughout the economy.
Despite the rapid growth projected for biofuels and other nonhydroelectric renewable energy sources and the expectation that orders will be placed for new nuclear power plants for the first time in more than 25 years, oil, coal, and natural gas still are projected to provide roughly the same 86-percent share of the total U.S. primary energy supply in 2030 that they did in 2005 (assuming no changes in existing laws and regulations). The expected rapid growth in the use of biofuels and other nonhydropower renewable energy sources begins from a very low current share oftotal energy use; hydroelectric power production, which accounts for the bulk of current renewable electricity supply, is nearly stagnant; and the share of total electricity supplied from nuclear power falls despite the projected new plant builds, which more than offset retirements, because the overall market for electricity continues to expand rapidly in the projection.
Classfication of oil for US Petroleum Holdings
. Brent Crude, comprising 15 oils from fields in the Brent and Ninian systems in the East Shetland Basin of the North Sea. The oil is landed at Sullom Voe terminal in the Shetlands. Oil production from Europe, Africa and Middle Eastern oil flowing West tends to be priced off the price of this oil, which forms a benchmark.
. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) for North American oil.
. Dubai, used as benchmark for Middle East oil flowing to the Asia-Pacific region.
. Tapis (from Malaysia, used as a reference for light Far East oil)
. Minas (from Indonesia, used as a reference for heavy Far East oil)
. The OPEC basket used to be the average price of the following blends:
o Arab Light Saudi Arabia
o Bonny Light Nigeria
o Fateh Dubai
o Isthmus Mexico (non-OPEC)
o Minas Indonesia
o Saharan Blend Algeria
o Tia Juana Light Venezuela
OPEC attempts to keep the price of the OPEC Basket between upper and lower limits, by increasing and decreasing production. This makes the measure important for market analysts. The OPEC Basket, including a mix of light and heavy crudes, is heavier than both Brent and WTI.
In June 15, 2005 the OPEC basket was changed to reflect the characteristics of the oil produced by OPEC members. The new OPEC Reference Basket (ORB) is made up of the following: Saharan Blend (Algeria), Minas (Indonesia), Iran Heavy (Islamic Republic of Iran), Basra Light (Iraq), Kuwait Export (Kuwait), Es Sider (Libya), Bonny Light (Nigeria), Qatar Marine (Qatar), Arab Light (Saudi Arabia), Murban (UAE) and BCF 17 (Venezuela).
Oil Production by Country:
. Saudi Arabia (OPEC) – 10.37 MMbbl/d
. Russia – 9.27 MMbbl/d
. United States 1 – 8.69 MMbbl/d
. Iran (OPEC) – 4.09 MMbbl/d
. Mexico 1 – 3.83 MMbbl/d
. China 1 – 3.62 MMbbl/d
. Norway 1 – 3.18 MMbbl/d
. Canada 1 – 3.14 MMbbl/d
. Venezuela (OPEC) 1 – 2.86 MMbbl/d
. United Arab Emirates (OPEC) – 2.76 MMbbl/d
. Kuwait (OPEC) – 2.51 MMbbl/d
. Nigeria (OPEC) – 2.51 MMbbl/d
. United Kingdom 1 – 2.08 MMbbl/d
. Iraq (OPEC) 2 – 2.03 MMbbl/d
In order of amount exported in 2003:
. Saudi Arabia (OPEC)
. Russia
. Norway 1
. Iran (OPEC)
. United Arab Emirates (OPEC)
. Venezuela (OPEC) 1
. Kuwait (OPEC)
. Nigeria (OPEC)
. Mexico 1
. Algeria (OPEC)
. Libya (OPEC) 1
Though still a member, Iraq has not been included in production figures since 1998
Science of Oil
Most geologists view crude oil, like coal and natural gas, as the product of compression and heating of ancient organic materials over geological time scales. According to this theory, it is formed from the decayed remains of prehistoric small marine animals and algae. (Terrestrial plants tend to form coal.) Over millennia this organic matter, mixed with mud, is buried under thick sedimentary layers of material. The resulting high levels of heat and pressure cause the remains to metamorphose, first into a waxy material known as kerogen, and then into liquid and gaseous hydrocarbons in a process known as catagenesis. Because hydrocarbons are less dense than the surrounding rock, these migrate upward through adjacent rock layers until they become trapped beneath impermeable rocks, within porous rocks called reservoirs. Concentration of hydrocarbons in a trap forms an oil field, from which the liquid can be extracted by drilling and pumping.
Geologists also refer to the “oil window”. This is the temperature range that oil forms in-below the minimum temperature oil does not form, and above the maximum temperature natural gas forms instead. Though this corresponds to different depths for different locations around the world, a ‘typical’ depth for the oil window might be 4 – 6 km. Note that oil may be trapped at much shallower depths, even if it is not formed there. Three conditions must be present for oil reservoirs to form: a rich source rock, a migration conduit, and a trap (seal) that concentrates the hydrocarbons.
The reactions that produce oil and natural gas are often modeled as first order breakdown reactions, where kerogen breaks down to oil and natural gas by a large set of parallel reactions, and oil eventually breaks down to natural gas by another set of reactions.
FORMATION OF OIL: Abiogenic theory
The idea of abiogenic petroleum origin was championed in the Western world by astronomer Thomas Gold based on thoughts from Russia, mainly on studies of Nikolai Kudryavtsev. The idea proposes that large amounts of carbon exist naturally in the planet, some in the form of hydrocarbons. Hydrocarbons are less dense than aqueous pore fluids, and migrate upward through deep fracture networks. Thermophilic, rock-dwelling microbial life-forms are in part responsible for the biomarkers found in petroleum.
According to the following authors; V. A. Krayushkin, T. I. Tchebanenko, V. P. Klochko, Ye. S. Dvoryanin from the Institute of Geological Sciences, Kiev, Ukraine, the modern Russian-Ukrainian theory of deep, abiotic petroleum origins is by no means simply an academic proposition. After its first enunciation by N. A. Kudryavtsev in 1951, the modern theory was extensively debated and exhaustively tested. Significantly, the theory not only withstood all tests put to it, but it also settled many previously unresolved problems in petroleum science, such as that of the intrinsic component of optical activity observed in natural petroleum. It also demonstrated new patterns in petroleum, previously unrecognized, such as the paleonological and trace-element characteristics of reservoirs at different depths. Most importantly, the modern Russian-Ukrainian theory of deep, abiotic petroleum origins has played a central role in the transformation of Russia (then the U.S.S.R.) from being a “petroleum poor” entity in 1951 to the largest petroleum producing and exporting nation on Earth, principally with the drilling and development of the oil and gas fields in the Dnieper-Donetsk Basin.
However, this theory is very much a minority opinion, especially amongst western geologists. It often pops up when scientists are not able to explain apparent oil inflows into certain oil reservoirs. However, most of these “abiotic” fields are explained as being the result of geologic quirks. No western oil companies are currently known to explore for oil based on this theory.
ALTERNATIVE MEANS OF PRODUCING OIL
As oil prices continue to escalate, other alternatives to producing oil have been gaining importance. The best known such methods involve extracting oil from sources such as oil shale or tar sands. These resources are known to exist in large quantities; extracting the oil at low cost and without too deleterious an impact on the environment remains a challenge.It is also possible to transform natural gas or coal into oil (or, more precisely, the various hydrocarbons found in oil).
The best-known such method is the Fischer-Tropsch process. It was a concept pioneered in Nazi Germany when imports of petroleum were restricted due to war and Germany found a method to extract oil from coal. It was known as Ersatz (“substitute” in German), and accounted for nearly half the total oil used in WWII by Germany. However, the process was used only as a last resort as naturally occurring oil was much cheaper. As crude oil prices increase, the cost of coal to oil conversion becomes comparatively cheaper.
The method involves converting high ash coal into synthetic oil in a multistage process. Ideally, a ton of coal produces nearly 200 liters (1.25 bbl, 52 US gallons) of crude, with by-products ranging from tar to rare chemicals.
Currently, two companies have commercialized their Fischer-Tropsch technology. Shell in Bintulu, Malaysia, uses natural gas as a feedstock, and produces primarily low-sulfur diesel fuels. Sasol in South Africa uses coal as a feedstock, and produces a variety of synthetic petroleum products. The process is today used in South Africa to produce most of the country’s diesel fuel from coal by the company Sasol. The process was used in South Africa to meet its energy needs during its isolation under Apartheid. This process has received renewed attention in the quest to produce low sulfur diesel fuel in order to minimize the environmental impact from the use of diesel engines.
An alternative method is the Karrick process, which converts coal into crude oil, pioneered in the 1930s in the United States.
More recently explored is thermal de-polymerization (TDP). In theory, TDP can convert any organic waste into petroleum.
