Isn't oil oil?

[Deja Q]

I've heard varients:

Shale oil
sand oil
Light sweet crude oil (?! Does it taste like sugar or something?!)

Where can I find more information on this?

Thx!

[RC]

1. Ya tried google?

[EstimatedProphet]

2. It's different grades

and they distill out to different chemicals-gas, kerosene, benzene, etc. It's my understanding that the heavier the crude, the more prized it is, because more things can be distilled from it. So crude is the most sought after, then shale or sand. Correct me if I'm wrong...

[muffin_man]

3. I think shale is kinda untapped.

Not sure think I heard in passing or a zine that shale is untapped due to no efficient process to extract it yet.Could have been refering to extracting butt monkeys so don't quote me,I just needed to raise my post count.Thanks!:)

[VTMechEngr]

4. Its where it is found and texture

Some oil is thick, some more watery. Also, sandstone is must eaiser to pump oil out of than a shale. As of now, we cannot really tap shale oil since the oil will not flow.

[muffin_man]

5. How about that!

I actually sorda kinda correctly remembered something! Glad you showed up VT!

[Dogmudgeon]

6. Oils

Shale and sand oil are extremely viscous, so they are very difficult to process. Right now, it costs so much to process these oils, that it's not worth it.

Light sweet crude is the "premium" crude oil that is put in barrels and sold to refiners. Crude oil in general is graded by viscosity (thickness) and non-petrochemical substances, like sulfur, that occur in the oil.

There is about twice as much shale and sand oil as there is the liquid crude oil, and lots of it is in Canada. When liquid crude oil becomes expensive (as it surely will in a few years), it may become cost-effective to spend more money to extract the oil from its sand or shale "matrix".

That's the basics. Type the words "shale oil sand light sweet crude" into Google and sift through the results.

--bkl

[VTMechEngr]

8. The Grade we should be concerned about?

Arabian Light. And thats actually the name.

[Shanty Oilish]

7. Well...no pun intended...

Unless it's the best you've got to work with, shale is a PITA you go through to get to the real goodies underneath. It's costly and not very efficient to extract petroleum from shale.
Sand oil, it's thick, gunky stuff, also requires work. You extract bitumen from it and upgrade light sweet crude.
That's the short answer. :)

[Shanty Oilish]

9. Good link

Syncrude (oil sand in Canada) has some downloadable video and not-too-technical info on their site. www.syncrude.com