petroleum
Definition
Literally 'rock oil,' it is a general term for crude oil and natural gas. Primary source of automotive fuels and lubricant oils, petroleum is a complex mixture of hydrocarbons and paraffins in some areas, and aromatics and cyclo-paraffins in other areas. Thought to have been formed from decomposition of animal and vegetable life under heat and pressure during geologic periods, it occurs usually in deep rock strata but sometimes near to the surface. When 'cracked' and refined, it produces hundreds of petrochemicals that are converted into tens of thousands of products, with new ones appearing continually. Crude petroleum (crude oil) contains about 80 percent carbon compounds, 11 percent hydrogen, and 1 to 2 percent of nitrogen, oxygen, and sulfur. In most oil fields, oil and natural gas occur together, gas being the top layer on crude oil under which may lie water. One barrel of petroleum equals 5604 cubic-feet of natural gas, 1.45 barrels of liquefied natural gas (LNG), or about one barrel of gas oil. Called also crude oil or mineral oil.
petroleum is in the Environment & Pollution Control, Industries, Manufacturing, & Technology and Material & Occupational Safety subjects.
petroleum appears in the definitions of the following terms:
Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC),
catalytic reforming,
crude oil,
business tax,
carbon,
phenols,
API gravity,
natural gas,
clean fuel,
synthetic natural gas (SNG)
and
petroleum appears in these other terms: petroleum products, liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), petroleum gases
This content can be found on the following page:
http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/petroleum.html
email to a friend
print this definition
cite this definition
link to this page
