Professor Ball
Solutions to the Oil Consumption Problem
8 March, 2012
Section 5
A couple weeks ago, I stopped at a gas station to fill up my tank. As a pizza delivery driver I spend a decent amount of money on gas every week. While I was getting gas, I wandered, are we ever going to run out of it and will we survive without it? In this essay I will attempt to solve one of the biggest problems in modern world – dependence and very large consumption of gasoline. According to the Seattle Times, Americans use over 880 million gallons of gasoline per day. With an average of 755 cars for every 1000 people, the United States of America consumes more gasoline than South America, Europe, Africa, and Asia combined (Source: Energy Information Agency) ! Modern world get well more than 80% of its energy from fossil fuels, major part of it is oil. We use oil everywhere, from lipstick and painkillers to gasoline and tires. Almost everything that we use on daily basis is made out of oil. According to the EIA, over 60% of world transportation is ran on oil based fuels. How much longer can we consume the resource until we run out of it? If someday we run out of oil, I think that the world should be prepared!
Gasoline is a petroleum-delivered liquid that is used in internal combustion engines which are used in almost every type of transportation. Over the years, the consumption of gasoline is increasing, while the sources are exhausting. Many geologists propose that most of the sources of oil on Earth have reached so-called “peak oil” which is the point where the amounts of oil produced start to decline. American Association of Petroleum Geologists provides a good example of the peak. In 1861, oil derrick called McClintock #1 produced 50 barrels of oil daily. In 2006, 145 years later, it produced 1 barrel a day. This example shows that everything has a limit. “Peak oil” is also what causes dramatic price changes on gasoline around the world. In 2000, one
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