1. Introduction to Petroleum Technology

When people consider petroleum, they first think of energy. Petroleum and other fossil fuels now provide more than 86% of the energy consumed by mankind. In addition, fossil resources, especially petroleum and natural gas, serve as the organic source of tens of thousands of consumer products, which enrich our daily lives.

To understand petroleum and the petroleum industry, one must be familiar with the technology used to find and recover crude oil and natural gas and transform them into useful products. These technologies can also be applied to gases and liquids from coal, shale, and renewable biomass. Research and development aimed at improving or modifying existing technologies and developing new ones usually require physical testing and chemical characterization.

Three-dimensional imaging exhibits geological formations most likely to contain oil and gas. Rigorous basin modeling optimizes exploration and production. Modern production technology includes enhancements in horizontal drilling and offshore platform design. The application of hydraulic fracturing to previously unrecoverable oil and gas from tight reservoirs has transformed the United States into the world's leading producer of oil and gas.

Midstream technology includes trading, shipping, and transportation, along with processing prior to transportation. Midstream processing includes froth treatment for upgrading bitumen from steam-assisted gravity drainage (SAGD) into synthetic crude oil (syncrude). Sophisticated planning models enable global energy companies to quickly decide logistics: which oils to buy, how to allocate them between numerous processing plants, and whether to resell them.

Crude oil goes to refineries, which use distillation, treating, conversion, extraction and blending processes to produce fuels, hydrogen, lubricants, waxes, coke products, asphalt, and sulfur. Some refinery streams are sent to petrochemical plants.

Ever-improving mathematical models enhance all aspects of petroleum technology. Model-predictive control (MPC) stabilizes operations and reduces product-quality giveaway, increasing profitability at relatively low cost. The simple return on investment for an MPC project can be 3–4 months. Process engineers rely on rigorous equipment and piping models to optimize designs, not just in the oil and chemical businesses, but in all process industries. With such models, energy consumption in processing plants has been reduced by up to 70% since the 1980s. Rigorous reaction models, based on molecular characterization, serve as the foundation for real-time online economic optimization, in some cases for entire refineries. Economic optimization uses an objective function to find the most profitable balance between equipment constraints, feed quality, product yields, product properties, and utilities costs.

One cannot over-emphasize the importance of safety and protection of the environment. Failure to understand technology fundamentals and process details is the root cause of many infamous industrial catastrophes. Lack of understanding of technology fundamentals occurs at all levels, from the control board to the board room. Corporate executives who insist that safety is Number One must invest in safety-enhancing infrastructure. They must ensure that operators are well-trained and equipment is well-maintained.

Petroleum will remain significant for decades to come. Hopefully, ever-advancing technology will continue to supply energy and raw materials while protecting workers and the environment.