History of petroleum

Ignacy Łukasiewicz—creator of the process of refining kerosene from crude oil.

Petroleum, in one form or another, is not a recent discovery, but its current status as an integral component of politics, society, and technology has its roots in the early 20th century. The invention of the internal combustion engine was the major influence in the rise in the importance of petroleum.

Early history

More than four thousand years ago, according to Herodotus and confirmed by Diodorus Siculus, asphalt was employed in the construction of the walls and towers of Babylon; there were oil pits near Ardericca (near Babylon), and a pitch spring on Zacynthus (Ionian islands, Greece). Great quantities of it were found on the banks of the river Issus^{[citation needed]}, one of the tributaries of the Euphrates. Ancient Persian tablets indicate the medicinal and lighting uses of petroleum in the upper levels of their society.

Oil was exploited in the Roman province of Dacia, now in Romania, where it was called picula.

The earliest known oil wells were drilled in China in 347 AD or earlier. They had depths of up to about 800 feet (240 m) and were drilled using bits attached to bamboo poles. The oil was burned to evaporate brine and produce salt. By the 10th century, extensive bamboo pipelines connected oil wells with salt springs. The ancient records of China and Japan are said to contain many allusions to the use of natural gas for lighting and heating. Petroleum was known as burning water in Japan in the 7th century. In his book Dream Pool Essays written in 1088, the polymathic scientist and statesman Shen Kuo of the Song Dynasty coined the word 石油 (Shíyóu, literally "rock oil") for petroleum, which remains the term used in contemporary Chinese.

The first streets of Baghdad were paved with tar, derived from petroleum that became accessible from natural fields in the region. In the 9th century, oil fields were exploited in the area around modern Baku, Azerbaijan. These fields were described by the Arab geographer Abu al-Hasan 'Alī al-Mas'ūdī in the 10th century, and by Marco Polo in the 13th century, who described the output of those wells as hundreds of shiploads. Petroleum was distilled by the Persian alchemist, Muhammad ibn Zakarīya Rāzi (Rhazes), in the 9th century, producing chemicals such as kerosene in the alembic (al-ambiq), and which was mainly used for kerosene lamps. Arab and Persian chemists also distilled crude oil in order to produce flammable products for military purposes. Through Islamic Spain, distillation became available in Western Europe by the 12th century. It has also been present in Romania since the 13th century, being recorded as păcură.

The earliest mention of petroleum in the Americas occurs in Sir Walter Raleigh's account of the Trinidad Pitch Lake in 1595; while thirty-seven years later, the account of a visit of a Franciscan, Joseph de la Roche d'Allion, to the oil springs of New York was published in Sagard's Histoire du Canada. A Finnish born Swede, scientist and student of Carl Linnaeus, Peter Kalm, in his work Travels into North America published first in 1753 showed on a map the oil springs of Pennsylvania.

In 1710 or 1711 (sources vary) the Russian-born Swiss physician and Greek teacher Eyrini d'Eyrinis (also spelled as Eirini d'Eirinis) discovered asphaltum at Val-de-Travers, (Neuchâtel). He established a bitumen mine de la Presta there in 1719 that operated until 1986.

In 1745 under the Empress Elisabeth of Russia the first oil well and refinery were built in Ukhta by Fiodor Priadunov. Through the process of distillation of the "rock oil" (petroleum) he received a kerosene-like substance, which was used in oil lamps by Russian churches and monasteries (though households still relied on candles).

Oil sands were mined from 1745 in Merkwiller-Pechelbronn, Alsace under the direction of Louis Pierre Ancillon de la Sablonnière, by special appointment of Louis XV. The Pechelbronn oil field was active until 1970, and was the birthplace of companies like Antar and Schlumberger. The first modern refinery was built there in 1857.

Modern history

See also: Petroleum industry#Modern history

Oil field in California, 1938.

The modern history of petroleum began in the 19th century with the refining of kerosene from crude oil. Although the Russian Dubinin brothers had purified kerosene directly from petroleum in their factory in 1823, and the process of refining kerosene from coal was discovered by Nova Scotian Abraham Pineo Gesner in 1846, it was only after Ignacy Łukasiewicz had improved Gesner's method to develop a means of refining kerosene from the more readily available "rock oil" ("petr-oleum") seeps, in 1852, that the first rock oil mine was built in Bóbrka, near Krosno in central European Galicia (Poland/Ukraine) in 1853. In 1854, Benjamin Silliman, a science professor at Yale University in New Haven, was the first person to fractionate petroleum by distillation. These discoveries rapidly spread around the world, and Meerzoeff built the first modern Russian refinery in the mature oil fields at Baku in 1861. At that time Baku produced about 90% of the world's oil.

The question of what constituted the first commercial oil well is a difficult one to answer. Edwin Drake's 1859 well near Titusville, Pennsylvania, discussed more fully below, is popularly considered the first modern well. Drake's well is probably singled out because it was drilled, not dug; because it used a steam engine; because there was a company associated with it; and because it touched off a major boom. However, there was considerable activity before Drake in various parts of the world in the mid-19th century. A group directed by Major Alexeyev of the Bakinskii Corps of Mining Engineers hand-drilled a well in the Baku region in 1848. There were engine-drilled wells in West Virginia in the same year as Drake's well. An early commercial well was hand dug in Poland in 1853, and another in nearby Romania in 1857. At around the same time the world's first, but small, oil refineries were opened at Jasło, in Poland, with a larger one being opened at Ploiești, in Romania, shortly after. Romania is the first country in the world to have its crude oil output officially recorded in international statistics, namely 275 tonnes. By the end of the 19th century the Russian Empire, particularly the Branobel company in Azerbaijan, had taken the lead in production.

In addition to the activity in West Virginia and Pennsylvania, an important early oil well in North America was in Oil Springs, Ontario, Canada in 1858, dug by James Miller Williams. The discovery at Oil Springs touched off an oil boom which brought hundreds of speculators and workers to the area. New oil fields were discovered nearby throughout the late 19th century and the area developed into a large petrochemical refining centre and exchange. The modern US petroleum industry is considered to have begun with Edwin Drake's drilling of a 69-foot (21 m) oil well in 1859, on Oil Creek near Titusville, Pennsylvania, for the Seneca Oil Company (originally yielding 25 barrels per day (4.0 m³/d), by the end of the year output was at the rate of 15 barrels per day (2.4 m³/d)). The industry grew through the 1800s, driven by the demand for kerosene and oil lamps. It became a major national concern in the early part of the 20th century; the introduction of the internal combustion engine provided a demand that has largely sustained the industry to this day. Early "local" finds like those in Pennsylvania and Ontario were quickly outpaced by demand, leading to "oil booms" in Ohio, Texas, Oklahoma, and California.

Early crude production
in the U.S.

Year	Volume
1859	2,000 barrels (~270 t)
1869	4,215,000 barrels (~5.750×10^5 t)
1879	19,914,146 barrels (~2.717×10^6 t)
1889	35,163,513 barrels (~4.797×10^6 t)
1899	57,084,428 barrels (~7.788×10^6 t)
1906	126,493,936 barrels (~1.726×10^7 t)

By 1910, significant oil fields had been discovered in Canada (specifically, in the province of Alberta), the Dutch East Indies (1885, in Sumatra), Persia (1908, in Masjed Soleiman), Peru (1863, in Zorritos District), Venezuela, and Mexico, and were being developed at an industrial level.

Access to oil was and still is a major factor in several military conflicts of the twentieth century, including World War II, during which oil facilities were a major strategic asset and were extensively bombed.

Until the mid-1950s coal was still the world's foremost fuel, but after this time oil quickly took over. Later, following the 1973 and 1979 energy crises, there was significant media coverage on the subject of oil supply levels. This brought to light the concern that oil is a limited resource that will eventually run out, at least as an economically viable energy source. Although at the time the most common and popular predictions were quite dire, a period of increased production and reduced demand in the following years caused an oil glut in the 1980s. This was not to last, however, and by the first decade of the 21st century discussions about peak oil had returned to the news.

Today, about 90% of vehicular fuel needs are met by oil. Petroleum also makes up 40% of total energy consumption in the United States, but is responsible for only 2% of electricity generation. Petroleum's worth as a portable, dense energy source powering the vast majority of vehicles and as the base of many industrial chemicals makes it one of the world's most important commodities.

The top three oil producing countries are Saudi Arabia, Russia, and the United States. About 80% of the world's readily accessible reserves are located in the Middle East, with 62.5% coming from the Arab 5: Saudi Arabia (12.5%), UAE, Iraq, Qatar and Kuwait. However, with high oil prices (above $100/barrel), Venezuela has larger reserves than Saudi Arabia due to its crude reserves derived from bitumen.

See also

• Pennsylvania oil rush
• Petroleum
• Petroleum industry
• Energy (society)
• Texas Oil Boom

Further reading

• Akiner, Shirin; Aldis, Anne, ed. (2004). The Caspian: Politics, Energy and Security. New York: Routledge. ISBN 978-0-7007-0501-6. 
• Bamberg, J.H. (1994). The History of the British Petroleum Company, Volume 2: The Anglo-Iranian Years, 1928–1954. Cambridge University Press. 
• Painter, David S. (1986). Oil and the American Century: The Political Economy of US Foreign Oil Policy, 1941–1954. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press. ISBN 978-0-801-82693-1. 
• Rouhani, Fuad (1971). A History of OPEC. New York, NY: Praeger. 
• Vassiliou, Marius (2009). Historical Dictionary of the Petroleum Industry. Lanham MD: Rowman and Littlefield-Scarecrow Press. p. 665. ISBN 0-8108-5993-9. 
• Yergin, Daniel (1992). The Prize: The Epic Quest for Oil, Money & Power.