Petroleum

Petroleum, also referred to as crude oil or simply oil, is a major transportation fuel, source of energy for grid power generation, feedstock for chemical manufacturing, source of industrial-grade hydrogen gas, feedstock for various materials, and major utility heating fuel. The recovery or production of petroleum of underground deposits or reservoirs also provides the world with a portion of its natural gas supply, as the fossil fuels are usually located together in deposits in addition to petroleum gases.

Petroleum is a leading global energy commodity and feedstock for materials and chemical production, with its economic significance to modern industrialized economies rivaled only in select regions by natural gas.

The production of oil or petroleum is accomplished through drilled wells that allow geological pressure to release oil up the well to the surface with water and gas injected to the reservoir to boost pressures and sustain production. Recovered oil is transported through pipelines or tankers to refineries that remove impurities and undesirable constituents in the crude oil before refining where processing units divide useful petroleum products through fractional distillation.

Petroleum has a number of important market applications, most often as gasoline or fuel oil, but also heating oil, jet fuel, diesel fuel, asphalt, paraffin wax, tar, hydrogen, fertilizers, pesticides, plastics, kerosene, liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), lubricants, wax, sulfur, sulfuric acid, and petroleum coke. The United States is the leading national consumer of crude oil, followed by China. Petroleum accounts for over 30% of the global total primary energy supply (TPES).