Chapter #14- Energy: Some Basics
1: How does the energy crisis in Ancient Greece and Rome compare to the oil crisis today? Explain.
The energy crisis is not new. Ancient Greeks and Romans exhausted the wood supply
upon which they depended for heat and cooking. They began to take advantage of solar
energy to heat.
Energy Basics
2: What is “work”? Definition and mathematical equation.
Work is the product of force times distance. When the interaction ceases, the two objects no longer experience the force. Forces only exist as a result of an interaction. So energy is defined by its ability to move something.
Define the following:
* Chemical Energy: There are also different fundamental sources of energy: chemical, light, nuclear (a type of chemical energy really) and heat.
* Kinetic Energy: the energy associated with movement
* Heat Energy:Water stored behind a dam is potential energy as is the energy stored in a battery
* Potential Energy: the potential to move something.
3: What is the “first law of thermodynamics”?
energy can neither be created nor destroyed, but it may be transformed from one type into another type
4: What does it mean to have a “higher quality of energy”?
the 'rebound' effect is the extent to which the energy saving generated through energy efficiency measures is taken back by consumers in the form of higher consumption, either by increasing the quantity of energy used (for instance to increase their comfort levels) or due to a higher quality of energy service.
5: What is the “second law of thermodynamics”? Energy Efficiency
any conversion of energy from one form to another requires that some of the initial energy input be degraded into a less useful form, usually heat
6: Define: First-Law Efficiency
deals with the amount of energy without consideration of the quality or availability, and is
expressed by energy delivered/energy supplied
7: Define: Second-Law Efficiency
the minimum amount of energy required/actual energy input.
The second-law efficiency tells us how efficient a process is relative to how efficient it
could be
Energy Units
8: What is the fundamental energy unit in the Metric System? How is it defined?
The standard metric system in use is the International System of Units, commonly abbreviated to the SI system. In this system, the unit of energy is the "Joule", named after the British physicist James Joule. One Joule is the energy transferred when a force of one Newton acts through a distance of one metre.
9: What is POWER? How is it expressed?
The rate of doing work, work over time.
10: What is thermal efficiency?
measure of the output energy divided by the input energy in a system
11: What is electrical resistivity? What does it cause?
Resistivity is a measure of a material's resistive property. It is purely a function of the material itself. This is not a function of the shape, it is merely a function of the material itself. When an electric current flows through any conductor, heat is generated due to collision of free electrons with atoms. This is the cause of the property called electrical resistance. It is the property of a material by virtue of which it opposes the flow of electrons through the material. The energy lost in this process of resistance is the heat energy.
Energy Sources and Consumption
12: What percentage of the energy in the United States is derived from fossil fuels?
90%
13: What percentage of the energy use in the United States is used efficiently?
50%
Energy Conservation, Increased Efficiency and Cogeneration
Define the following:
14: Conservation: the careful use of natural resources (such as trees, oil, etc.) to prevent them from being lost or wasted
15: Cogeneration (define and give an example):
Cogeneration is the harnessing of more than one for of energy from a single source. As an example a generator creates electricity and as it does this it gets very hot. Cogenration is a term that could be used to describe the electricity it made when added to the heat it made if the heat was used to heat a building.
16: In the United States, space heating and cooling of homes and offices, water heating, industrial processes and automobiles account for nearly ______% of the total energy use
60%
Building Design
17: What is a passive solar energy system? Give examples.
When most people think of solar energy, they think of solar panels generating electricity to run lights and other devices in the home. Photoelectric cells are not the only way to harness solar energy, however. There are many simple and low-tech ways you can harness the energy from the sun to reduce your energy bills and heat your home or water. This use of solar energy is often calledpassive solar.
18: What are some ways that older homes can be modified to be more energy efficient?
Adding new or additional insulation to your ceilings, attic and walls along with using caulking or weather stripping to make sure doors and windows are properly sealed will prevent cold drafts and air leaks to keep warm air inside during the freezing winter.
Industrial Energy
19: U.S. Industry consumes about _______ of the energy produced.
1/3
Values, Choices and Energy Conservation
20: Name 3 ways that people could modify their behavior to help save energy
Use car pools, purchase hybrid car, turn off lights
21: What is the concept of Integrated, Sustainable Energy Management?
A popular computer buzzword that refers to two or more components merged together into a single system. Sustainable Energy Management is an important multidisciplinary area devoted to finding new methods of sustainable energy production and improving the efficiency of existing systems. It addresses issues such as the social and environmental aspects of energy use, as well as the economic, policy and technical aspects of conventional and sustainable energy generation and use.
Micropower
22: What is the concept of micropower?
The idea that the problem of power supply can be addressed in a smaller, more localized fashion that is still economical has led to the concept of micropower.
Critical Thinking Issue: Use of Energy Today and in 2030
23: How much energy in exajoules, did the world use in 2010 and what would you project global energy use to be in 2030?
250 Exajoules, the global energy need to use double that in 2030.
24: The average person emits as heat 100 watts of power. If we assume that 25% of it is emitted by the brain, how much energy does your brain emit as heat in a year?
9125 watts
25: Can the world supply one-third more energy by 2030 without unacceptable environmental damage? How?
No, because some of the resources we are using now will be gone.
26: In what specific ways could energy be used more efficiently in the United States?
Pass laws to make energy be used more efficiently.
Chapter #15: Fossil Fuels and the Environment
1: What is Peak Oil? What is predicted to happen when we reach peak oil?
Peak oil is the point in time when the maximum rate of crude oil extraction is reached, after which the rate of extraction is expected to begin to decline.Predicting the timing of peak oil involves estimation of future production from existing oil fields as well as future discoveries. Although Hubbert peak theory was proposed in the 1950s, it was not until the early 21st century that serious interest in a reliable estimate of future oil production arose.
Fossil Fuels
2: How were fossil fuels created?
Fossil fuels are made of out of plant and animal decays that existed long time ago. They were formed during the Carboniferous period that occurred about 360 millions year ago. The plants sunk to the bottom of swamps and oceans decayed and formed the current oil and coal deposits.
3: The major fossil fuels- crude oil, natural gas and coal- are our primary energy sources; they provide approximately _______ of the energy consumed worldwide.
90%
Crude Oil and Natural Gas
4: Where were crude oil and natural gas deposits created?
First, the remains are changed into peat by decomposition and pressure.Second, the peat is buried by sediment, so that pressure and heat is applied. This turns it to coal. Last the pressure pushes water out of the coal, creating many different compounds called hydrocarbons. Gases are also produced, one of which is methane, the major constituent of natural gas.
5: Why do we not find oil and gas in geologically old rocks?
Old rocks take time to migrate to the surface
6: What the favorable rock structure to trap oil and gas deposits?
judge that the rocks and the structure are favorable to the trapping of petroleum under a certain area, but until a discovery well has been drilled he does not know whether that area is an oil pool. Imagination, then, is an indispensable quality of the petroleum geologist.
Petroleum Production
7: How much oil can be recovered from wells by primary production?
25%
8: What are enhanced recovery techniques of oil and gas deposits?
Enhanced recovery techniques are used to mobilize the remaining oil. There are three common approaches: thermal recovery, gas injection or chemical flooding.
9: Where are 60% of the total known reserves found?
Middle East
10: When will world oil production likely to peak?
next few decades
Natural Gas
11: How is natural gas primarily transported? 12: Why is natural gas considered to be a clean fuel?
pipelines
Coal-Bed Methane
13: What is coal-bed methane and how much is estimated to exist? (How many years does this represent?)
stored on the surfaces of organic matter in coal (20 trillion cubic meters in 5yrs)
14: What are the PROS and CONS of drilling for and using coal-bed methane?
As the price of fossil fuels, continue to rise the means through which these products are produced will be come of greater importance. Methane is natural gas that is produced from non-oil bearing formations, while natural gas is produced from those formations that are oil bearing.Methane is released from coal seams by first drilling a well bore down into the coal seam. This well bore is drilled to in the same manner as typical groundwater water wells.
Black Shale Natural Gas
15: What are some of the concerns of hydrologic fracturing for black shale natural gas?
Water pollution and contamination of drinking water
Methane Hydrates
16: What are methane hydrates composed of? How were they formed?
ice like compounds made of methane gas. They were formed as a result of microbial digestion of
organic matter in the sediments of the seafloor.
17: Where do methane hydrates form?
ocean where deep
The Environmental Effects of Oil and Natural Gas
18: What are some of the environmental effects of recovery of oil and gas?
Use of land to construct pads for wells, pipelines and storage tanks to build a network of
roads
20: What are some of the environmental effects of delivery and use of oil and gas?
Direct environmental and ecological impacts of agriculture ‘on the farm’ are certainly reduced in organic systems. However, global trade and distribution of organic products fritter away those benefits and undermine its leadership role.
21: What are some arguments FOR and AGAINST drilling in the ANWR (Alaskan National Wildlife Refuge)?
The debate over whether or not to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to drilling for oil and natural gas has raged for over 40 years. Throughout this time, industry representatives have argued that drilling would put a valuable untapped natural resource to good use, would allow us to reduce our dependence on foreign oil, and could be undertaken with minimal disturbance of wildlife.
Coal
22: What is COAL? How is it created?
Coal is a nonrenewable hard black rock-like substance which is burned to heat houses and produce electricity and was once used to power trains and boats. It is made up of: carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen and varying amounts of sulphur. When the geologists examine the fossil plants in coal, they find the leaves and bark came from plants which no longer exist on earth. They infer that these plants probably grew in moist warm swampy forests roughly 300 million years ago.
23: Which type of coal has the greatest energy content? Which type has the lowest?
Anthracite is coal with the highest carbon content, between 86 and 98 percent, and a heat value of nearly 15,000 BTUs-per-pound. Most frequently associated with home heating, anthracite is a very small segment of the U.S. coal market. There are 7.3 billion tons of anthracite reserves in the United States, found mostly in 11 northeastern counties in Pennsylvania.
Coal Mining and the Environment
24: What is strip mining?
Strip mining is a type of surface mining which involves the removal of a thin layer of material known as an “overburden” to access buried deposits of useful minerals.
25: What are some of the environmental impacts of strip mining?
Area mining, Open pit mining
Mountaintop Removal
26: What are some of the environmental impacts of mountaintop removal?
Water, Forests, Biodiversity
27: What does the “Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act of 1977” require?
Grade spoil piles to achieve a postmining topography that approximates the premining topography.
Underground Mining
28: Underground Mining accounts for approximately _____% of the coal mined in the United States
40%
29: What are the dangers to miners in underground mining?
Cave-ins, Gas explosions
30: What are the environmental impacts of underground mining?
Land Disturbance
Transporting Coal
31: How is most of the coal transported in the United States?
At power plants, coal is burned in a furnace with a boiler to make steam. The steam is then used to spin the turbines that produce electricity. According to the Department of Energy, "About 92 percent of the coal used in the United States is for generating electricity." There are also industrial uses for coal.
The Future of Coal
32: The burning of coal produces nearly ____% of the electricity used and about ____% of the total energy consumed in the United States today
50% ,25%
33: How much air emissions are created using coal to create electricity in the U.S.?
70% of the total emissions of sulfur dioxide, 30% of nitrogen and 35% of carbon dioxide are created using coal.
34: What did the Clean Air Amendment of 1990 mandate?
The Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990 mandate the elimination of lead from all U.S. motor fuel by January 1, 1996. This represents the final step in a gradual reduction of lead in gasoline since the early 1970s. "Regular" gasoline typically contained approximately 4.0 grams of lead per gallon; average lead content was reduced to 0.5 gram/gallon in 1985, and still further to 0.1 gram/gallon in 1986.
35: What is allowance trading?
Discount offered by producers or marketers to distribution channel members (distributors, wholesalers, retailers) usually as a short-term promotional incentive. Its objective is to effect a lower retail price to stimulate sales. Not to be confused with trade discount.
Oil Shale and Tar Sands
36: What is oil shale? How is it created and where is it found?
Oil shale is a type of sedimentary rock that is rich in kerogen. oil shale is found all over the world, including China, Israel, and Russia. The United States, however, has the most shale resources.
37: What are the environmental impacts of developing oil shale?
the environmental impacts of oil shale, vast amounts of energy are required to support production. In Driving it Home, NRDC cites Rand Corporation estimates that generating 100,000 barrels of shale oil would require 1,200 megawatts of power—or the equivalent of a new power plant capable of serving a city of 500,000 people. Proponents of oil shale have a stated goal of producing one million barrels of the resource per day.
Tar Sands
38: Why can’t petroleum be recovered from tar sands from conventional methods?
The oil is too thick to flow easily
39: How are tar sands processed?
Tar sands can be mined and processed to extract the oil-rich bitumen, which is then refined into oil. The bitumen in tar sands cannot be pumped from the ground in its natural state; instead tar sand deposits are mined, usually using strip mining or open pit techniques, or the oil is extracted by underground heating with additional upgrading.
1: How does the energy crisis in Ancient Greece and Rome compare to the oil crisis today? Explain.
The energy crisis is not new. Ancient Greeks and Romans exhausted the wood supply
upon which they depended for heat and cooking. They began to take advantage of solar
energy to heat.
Energy Basics
2: What is “work”? Definition and mathematical equation.
Work is the product of force times distance. When the interaction ceases, the two objects no longer experience the force. Forces only exist as a result of an interaction. So energy is defined by its ability to move something.
Define the following:
* Chemical Energy: There are also different fundamental sources of energy: chemical, light, nuclear (a type of chemical energy really) and heat.
* Kinetic Energy: the energy associated with movement
* Heat Energy:Water stored behind a dam is potential energy as is the energy stored in a battery
* Potential Energy: the potential to move something.
3: What is the “first law of thermodynamics”?
energy can neither be created nor destroyed, but it may be transformed from one type into another type
4: What does it mean to have a “higher quality of energy”?
the 'rebound' effect is the extent to which the energy saving generated through energy efficiency measures is taken back by consumers in the form of higher consumption, either by increasing the quantity of energy used (for instance to increase their comfort levels) or due to a higher quality of energy service.
5: What is the “second law of thermodynamics”? Energy Efficiency
any conversion of energy from one form to another requires that some of the initial energy input be degraded into a less useful form, usually heat
6: Define: First-Law Efficiency
deals with the amount of energy without consideration of the quality or availability, and is
expressed by energy delivered/energy supplied
7: Define: Second-Law Efficiency
the minimum amount of energy required/actual energy input.
The second-law efficiency tells us how efficient a process is relative to how efficient it
could be
Energy Units
8: What is the fundamental energy unit in the Metric System? How is it defined?
The standard metric system in use is the International System of Units, commonly abbreviated to the SI system. In this system, the unit of energy is the "Joule", named after the British physicist James Joule. One Joule is the energy transferred when a force of one Newton acts through a distance of one metre.
9: What is POWER? How is it expressed?
The rate of doing work, work over time.
10: What is thermal efficiency?
measure of the output energy divided by the input energy in a system
11: What is electrical resistivity? What does it cause?
Resistivity is a measure of a material's resistive property. It is purely a function of the material itself. This is not a function of the shape, it is merely a function of the material itself. When an electric current flows through any conductor, heat is generated due to collision of free electrons with atoms. This is the cause of the property called electrical resistance. It is the property of a material by virtue of which it opposes the flow of electrons through the material. The energy lost in this process of resistance is the heat energy.
Energy Sources and Consumption
12: What percentage of the energy in the United States is derived from fossil fuels?
90%
13: What percentage of the energy use in the United States is used efficiently?
50%
Energy Conservation, Increased Efficiency and Cogeneration
Define the following:
14: Conservation: the careful use of natural resources (such as trees, oil, etc.) to prevent them from being lost or wasted
15: Cogeneration (define and give an example):
Cogeneration is the harnessing of more than one for of energy from a single source. As an example a generator creates electricity and as it does this it gets very hot. Cogenration is a term that could be used to describe the electricity it made when added to the heat it made if the heat was used to heat a building.
16: In the United States, space heating and cooling of homes and offices, water heating, industrial processes and automobiles account for nearly ______% of the total energy use
60%
Building Design
17: What is a passive solar energy system? Give examples.
When most people think of solar energy, they think of solar panels generating electricity to run lights and other devices in the home. Photoelectric cells are not the only way to harness solar energy, however. There are many simple and low-tech ways you can harness the energy from the sun to reduce your energy bills and heat your home or water. This use of solar energy is often calledpassive solar.
18: What are some ways that older homes can be modified to be more energy efficient?
Adding new or additional insulation to your ceilings, attic and walls along with using caulking or weather stripping to make sure doors and windows are properly sealed will prevent cold drafts and air leaks to keep warm air inside during the freezing winter.
Industrial Energy
19: U.S. Industry consumes about _______ of the energy produced.
1/3
Values, Choices and Energy Conservation
20: Name 3 ways that people could modify their behavior to help save energy
Use car pools, purchase hybrid car, turn off lights
21: What is the concept of Integrated, Sustainable Energy Management?
A popular computer buzzword that refers to two or more components merged together into a single system. Sustainable Energy Management is an important multidisciplinary area devoted to finding new methods of sustainable energy production and improving the efficiency of existing systems. It addresses issues such as the social and environmental aspects of energy use, as well as the economic, policy and technical aspects of conventional and sustainable energy generation and use.
Micropower
22: What is the concept of micropower?
The idea that the problem of power supply can be addressed in a smaller, more localized fashion that is still economical has led to the concept of micropower.
Critical Thinking Issue: Use of Energy Today and in 2030
23: How much energy in exajoules, did the world use in 2010 and what would you project global energy use to be in 2030?
250 Exajoules, the global energy need to use double that in 2030.
24: The average person emits as heat 100 watts of power. If we assume that 25% of it is emitted by the brain, how much energy does your brain emit as heat in a year?
9125 watts
25: Can the world supply one-third more energy by 2030 without unacceptable environmental damage? How?
No, because some of the resources we are using now will be gone.
26: In what specific ways could energy be used more efficiently in the United States?
Pass laws to make energy be used more efficiently.
Chapter #15: Fossil Fuels and the Environment
1: What is Peak Oil? What is predicted to happen when we reach peak oil?
Peak oil is the point in time when the maximum rate of crude oil extraction is reached, after which the rate of extraction is expected to begin to decline.Predicting the timing of peak oil involves estimation of future production from existing oil fields as well as future discoveries. Although Hubbert peak theory was proposed in the 1950s, it was not until the early 21st century that serious interest in a reliable estimate of future oil production arose.
Fossil Fuels
2: How were fossil fuels created?
Fossil fuels are made of out of plant and animal decays that existed long time ago. They were formed during the Carboniferous period that occurred about 360 millions year ago. The plants sunk to the bottom of swamps and oceans decayed and formed the current oil and coal deposits.
3: The major fossil fuels- crude oil, natural gas and coal- are our primary energy sources; they provide approximately _______ of the energy consumed worldwide.
90%
Crude Oil and Natural Gas
4: Where were crude oil and natural gas deposits created?
First, the remains are changed into peat by decomposition and pressure.Second, the peat is buried by sediment, so that pressure and heat is applied. This turns it to coal. Last the pressure pushes water out of the coal, creating many different compounds called hydrocarbons. Gases are also produced, one of which is methane, the major constituent of natural gas.
5: Why do we not find oil and gas in geologically old rocks?
Old rocks take time to migrate to the surface
6: What the favorable rock structure to trap oil and gas deposits?
judge that the rocks and the structure are favorable to the trapping of petroleum under a certain area, but until a discovery well has been drilled he does not know whether that area is an oil pool. Imagination, then, is an indispensable quality of the petroleum geologist.
Petroleum Production
7: How much oil can be recovered from wells by primary production?
25%
8: What are enhanced recovery techniques of oil and gas deposits?
Enhanced recovery techniques are used to mobilize the remaining oil. There are three common approaches: thermal recovery, gas injection or chemical flooding.
9: Where are 60% of the total known reserves found?
Middle East
10: When will world oil production likely to peak?
next few decades
Natural Gas
11: How is natural gas primarily transported? 12: Why is natural gas considered to be a clean fuel?
pipelines
Coal-Bed Methane
13: What is coal-bed methane and how much is estimated to exist? (How many years does this represent?)
stored on the surfaces of organic matter in coal (20 trillion cubic meters in 5yrs)
14: What are the PROS and CONS of drilling for and using coal-bed methane?
As the price of fossil fuels, continue to rise the means through which these products are produced will be come of greater importance. Methane is natural gas that is produced from non-oil bearing formations, while natural gas is produced from those formations that are oil bearing.Methane is released from coal seams by first drilling a well bore down into the coal seam. This well bore is drilled to in the same manner as typical groundwater water wells.
Black Shale Natural Gas
15: What are some of the concerns of hydrologic fracturing for black shale natural gas?
Water pollution and contamination of drinking water
Methane Hydrates
16: What are methane hydrates composed of? How were they formed?
ice like compounds made of methane gas. They were formed as a result of microbial digestion of
organic matter in the sediments of the seafloor.
17: Where do methane hydrates form?
ocean where deep
The Environmental Effects of Oil and Natural Gas
18: What are some of the environmental effects of recovery of oil and gas?
Use of land to construct pads for wells, pipelines and storage tanks to build a network of
roads
20: What are some of the environmental effects of delivery and use of oil and gas?
Direct environmental and ecological impacts of agriculture ‘on the farm’ are certainly reduced in organic systems. However, global trade and distribution of organic products fritter away those benefits and undermine its leadership role.
21: What are some arguments FOR and AGAINST drilling in the ANWR (Alaskan National Wildlife Refuge)?
The debate over whether or not to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to drilling for oil and natural gas has raged for over 40 years. Throughout this time, industry representatives have argued that drilling would put a valuable untapped natural resource to good use, would allow us to reduce our dependence on foreign oil, and could be undertaken with minimal disturbance of wildlife.
Coal
22: What is COAL? How is it created?
Coal is a nonrenewable hard black rock-like substance which is burned to heat houses and produce electricity and was once used to power trains and boats. It is made up of: carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen and varying amounts of sulphur. When the geologists examine the fossil plants in coal, they find the leaves and bark came from plants which no longer exist on earth. They infer that these plants probably grew in moist warm swampy forests roughly 300 million years ago.
23: Which type of coal has the greatest energy content? Which type has the lowest?
Anthracite is coal with the highest carbon content, between 86 and 98 percent, and a heat value of nearly 15,000 BTUs-per-pound. Most frequently associated with home heating, anthracite is a very small segment of the U.S. coal market. There are 7.3 billion tons of anthracite reserves in the United States, found mostly in 11 northeastern counties in Pennsylvania.
Coal Mining and the Environment
24: What is strip mining?
Strip mining is a type of surface mining which involves the removal of a thin layer of material known as an “overburden” to access buried deposits of useful minerals.
25: What are some of the environmental impacts of strip mining?
Area mining, Open pit mining
Mountaintop Removal
26: What are some of the environmental impacts of mountaintop removal?
Water, Forests, Biodiversity
27: What does the “Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act of 1977” require?
Grade spoil piles to achieve a postmining topography that approximates the premining topography.
Underground Mining
28: Underground Mining accounts for approximately _____% of the coal mined in the United States
40%
29: What are the dangers to miners in underground mining?
Cave-ins, Gas explosions
30: What are the environmental impacts of underground mining?
Land Disturbance
Transporting Coal
31: How is most of the coal transported in the United States?
At power plants, coal is burned in a furnace with a boiler to make steam. The steam is then used to spin the turbines that produce electricity. According to the Department of Energy, "About 92 percent of the coal used in the United States is for generating electricity." There are also industrial uses for coal.
The Future of Coal
32: The burning of coal produces nearly ____% of the electricity used and about ____% of the total energy consumed in the United States today
50% ,25%
33: How much air emissions are created using coal to create electricity in the U.S.?
70% of the total emissions of sulfur dioxide, 30% of nitrogen and 35% of carbon dioxide are created using coal.
34: What did the Clean Air Amendment of 1990 mandate?
The Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990 mandate the elimination of lead from all U.S. motor fuel by January 1, 1996. This represents the final step in a gradual reduction of lead in gasoline since the early 1970s. "Regular" gasoline typically contained approximately 4.0 grams of lead per gallon; average lead content was reduced to 0.5 gram/gallon in 1985, and still further to 0.1 gram/gallon in 1986.
35: What is allowance trading?
Discount offered by producers or marketers to distribution channel members (distributors, wholesalers, retailers) usually as a short-term promotional incentive. Its objective is to effect a lower retail price to stimulate sales. Not to be confused with trade discount.
Oil Shale and Tar Sands
36: What is oil shale? How is it created and where is it found?
Oil shale is a type of sedimentary rock that is rich in kerogen. oil shale is found all over the world, including China, Israel, and Russia. The United States, however, has the most shale resources.
37: What are the environmental impacts of developing oil shale?
the environmental impacts of oil shale, vast amounts of energy are required to support production. In Driving it Home, NRDC cites Rand Corporation estimates that generating 100,000 barrels of shale oil would require 1,200 megawatts of power—or the equivalent of a new power plant capable of serving a city of 500,000 people. Proponents of oil shale have a stated goal of producing one million barrels of the resource per day.
Tar Sands
38: Why can’t petroleum be recovered from tar sands from conventional methods?
The oil is too thick to flow easily
39: How are tar sands processed?
Tar sands can be mined and processed to extract the oil-rich bitumen, which is then refined into oil. The bitumen in tar sands cannot be pumped from the ground in its natural state; instead tar sand deposits are mined, usually using strip mining or open pit techniques, or the oil is extracted by underground heating with additional upgrading.