Oil and Natural Gas Formation

Learn how oil and natural gas form! Subscribe for weekly videos: https://goo.gl/COrUU6

Mr. Weather’s World is a weekly video series bringing you interesting and reliable information about the Earth Sciences, Space Weather, and Climate Change. Tune in each week for exciting new content with host and meteorologist Curt Silverwood (Millersville University Alum).

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Two fossil fuels that are used daily for energy are oil and natural gas. These non-renewable energy resources are hydrocarbons - which means that they consist of chains of molecules made of carbon and hydrogen atoms.

Natural gas is found in a vapor form and is composed of small molecules. The small molecules allow natural gas to flow and evaporate easily. On the other hand, oil is found in a sticky, liquid form and composed of medium to large molecules.

Where do these substances come from?

Instead of plant material like coal, gas and oil form from the breakdown of chemicals from the cells of marine critters called plankton. Plankton die and fall to the seafloor and are buried with sediment over time. As the plankton get buried, temperatures deep within the Earth’s crust rise and pressure increases, causing the plankton to change to oil and gas.

Oil and gas are most commonly found together in layers of folded rock.

They are less dense than water so they are forced upward in the crust moving through permeable rock. Eventually, they are stopped by an impermeable rock, such as shale. This shale layer traps the oil and natural gas below it and is referred to as the roof rock. The rock below the oil and gas is called the reservoir rock. These hydrocarbon traps that form are called reserves.

Drilling is used to collect oil and natural gas, which pumps the oil or gas from the ground. They are then stored and saved for human use.
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