150 Years of Plenitude: The Story of Oil

Exactly one hundred and fifty years ago, on August 27, 1859, the first commercial oil well in the US began producing. The subsequent petroleum bounty has enabled and defined modern civilization.

This post is a status update in honor of the day–on how far we have come and our immediate challenges.

People have used oil obtained from the ground since at least 4,000BC. In the Middle East, crude oil that seeped to the surface was used to waterproof boats and as an adhesive in the construction of buildings and roads. Crude oil was also refined in minor quantities for lamp and heating oil in ancient China, though this technology never made it directly to modern times. By 600AD, the Byzantines used crude oil to produce a flame-throwing weapon known as Greek fire.

The modern oil industry began as a result of the search for inexpensive lighting. Until 1859, most people obtained artificial light by burning animal fats in the form of beeswax candles or whale oil. Whale oil shed the purest light of all available fuels, and became a luxury product. Overfishing led to a decline in the whale population (click here to see a cool whale video today) and a sharp increase in whale oil prices.

In order to take advantage of the high prices of illumination, a group of investors hired a railroad conductor named Edwin Drake to head to a location close to where traces of crude oil had been observed on the surface. After a nervous few weeks in rural Pennsylvania, Drake struck oil on August 27, 1859. The 69 foot deep well on a salt dome rock formation yielded around 15 barrels a day. Others quickly followed Drake and drilling soon spread across the region.

The petroleum that flowed from this well in what became known as Oil Creek, near Titusville, Pennsylvania, started the modern oil industry we know today (oil had been produced in other parts of the world, but the Titusville well kicked off industry on a large scale).

http://www.theoildrum.com/node/5715